He still remembers how scared, confused and betrayed he felt that day.
He remembers the gunfire and the bombs in his hometown, the people running, seeking places to hide, and the packed concrete school building, where he, his parents and five of his eight siblings hid, panicking because his eldest sister was nowhere to be found.
The instant the southern government surrendered, the local militia, the supposed protectors of the city, began helping the North, and the Southern military members frantically shed their uniforms, afraid of being caught by the communists. Later that afternoon, the tanks arrived with Viet Cong soldiers celebrating their victory, proudly bearing their red flag with its yellow star.
My dad was eleven years old the day Saigon fell …
The full version of this story is posted on HHSToday as “Forty years.”
Of all the columns I’ve written, this is my personal favorite. My family and my cultural heritage are such important pieces of who I am, and I never thought I’d have the opportunity to see a story about them published. I wrote this column at midnight on the 40th anniversary of the Fall of Saigon. Just a few hours prior, I’d asked my dad if he remembered that day. Our conversation became the lead as I sat in my bedroom, late at night, writing about the feeling of anger and sadness and pride that I’d experienced that day. Though I hadn’t intended to publish this column, my adviser suggested publishing it in the newspaper. Vietnam is a place that is always talked about in historical context. There are so many stories from the war that stay untold. I’m proud to have had the opportunity to tell a small piece of that story.
This story was published in the May 2015 issue of the Red & Black and on hhstoday.com.