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Photo courtesy of Don Nguyen.
Muoi Nguyen (front) plays with grandchildren at a recent family cookout.
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Photo courtesy of Don Nguyen.
Muoi and Don Nguyen pose for a photo in Wichita, Kansas in May 1982.
The war was over, but the fear was not. Nearly 40 years ago, one of the greatest Asian refugee migrations began as millions of “boat people” fled war-torn Vietnam. The near 20-year Vietnam War officially ended with the fall of Saigon in April 1975, but for the next 15 to 20 years, people fled the Viet Cong, post-war economic sanctions and more as the region remained in conflict.
These Vietnamese people chose to brave secret escape, choosing the rough waters of the South China Sea, often during typhoon season, and the risk of death rather than to stay in their country. Mothers placed their sons in boats with little in hand for hopes of a new life. Families were broken up along the way, escaping with others left behind, in hopes to one day be reunited. Some never did.
Trussville nail salon owner Don Nguyen and his family are one of the fortunate stories of the time.
“Escaping was a very dangerous situation,” Don said. “You have no choice, and have to get out of there.”
In the fall of 1981, 11-year-old Don and his father, Muoi, were part of a group that planned to escape the Vietnam coastal city Da Nang. Don, the oldest of three boys in a six-sibling family, was just three years away from the mark when the Vietnam government would take boys away from their families. Muoi, who fought for South Vietnam from 1968 to 1975, was now a commercial fisherman.
One night, Don joined Muoi on his fishing boat with six other fishermen. Their cover was a night of deep-sea fishing. The plan was to sneak back close to shore during the middle of the night and use different color flashlights to signal family and neighbors waiting in small canoes. Each canoe had a color. But when the boat approached land that night, shots were fired by members of the Vietnam coast guard, which chased the boat in a small motored canoe.
The plan was foiled.
“We left those people behind,” Don said. “We thought we were going to keep going and come back and pick them up, but when you come back you just have a 50 percent chance [of survival].”
Among those left behind were Don’s mother, Dinh, his three sisters Hong, Anh and Tuyet and two younger brothers Suan and Anh.
Their boat continued through the night to Hainan, an island province of China located 471 kilometers southwest of Hong Kong. There, the boat picked up others who were on the same journey. Shortly before reaching Hong Kong, Muoi’s boat met a canoe of 32 Vietnamese people. All came on board asking to pay with their watches and any gold they had.
“I left all of my family behind, so I really don’t need to take anything,” Don recalls his father saying.
Thirty minutes later, they picked up more passengers. Later that day, as they were about 45 minutes away from a refugee camp in Hong Kong, the refugees on Muoi’s boat encountered pirates.
“They took everything from everybody,” Don said.
They hid out the rest of the way in the boat’s float space. Upon reaching the camp, they slept two to a bed, in twin-sized, plywood beds bunked three levels high. Muoi found odd jobs, while Don began school.
“Dad earned very little money,” Don said. “At that time, we’d send money back to take care of our brothers and sisters for their next escape.”
Since the time the first family attempt failed, Dinh took Don’s siblings to Ho Chi Minh City to live with Don’s aunt -— an 18-hour drive from Da Nang.
During this time, in early 1982, Muoi was able to gain sponsorship to the U.S. because he fought the war as an ally in the South Vietnamese Army. A Catholic church in Wichita, Kansas, helped bring Muoi and Don to Kansas, where they lived on welfare until Muoi was able to find a job making $2.25 an hour.
“He still worked, raised me and continued to send money to my mom,” Don said.
After arriving in the U.S. they learned that Dinh was able to purchase a canoe for Don’s older sisters, Hong and Anh, and oldest brother, Suan. They were among 18 people in the canoe, which managed to escape and later hit an island during typhoon season.
“They kept praying and praying. No one knew where they were,” Don said.
Eventually Dinh had enough money for another canoe escape for her and her two youngest -— daughter Tuyet and son Anh. Despite it still being a heavy typhoon season, they set out for the Philippines.
“Nobody paid attention to them. Not many people are going to go into the deep sea during hurricane season in a canoe,” Don said. “We didn’t know where they were.”
Similar to his older siblings, the canoe hit an island, leaving the youngest of the six siblings forced to occasionally steal fish off boats to survive.
Eventually, Muoi received a letter from a friend in China who found out where all of the family members were and began working on their sponsorship to the U.S.
In December 1983, Don and Muoi were reunited with Hong, Anh and Suan in Wichita, but it wasn’t until early 1984 before Dinh and the two youngest arrived to complete the family reunion. It was almost three years since Don and his father had originally escaped.
Later that year, the family moved to San Diego to be close to Muoi’s nephew.
“We were so poor, we put six people in a 1974 Ford Mercury from Kansas to San Diego,” Don said. “Slowly, slowly we got there.”
In California, the family rented a beat-up house that needed a lot of renovations but was cheap to rent, Don said. They used the backyard to plant a garden. Muoi began work collecting cardboard for recycle, using a 1978 Toyota pickup to haul it around. Don would go to school and then work part-time to help his dad, jumping in and out of dumpsters to gather cardboard. One ton of cardboard brought $35.
Don and his siblings would walk 2 miles to and from school. They hid loose coins in the aluminum headboards or footboards of their bed, occasionally flipping the bed when they needed the money. Don said that was mostly for a special ice cream, which cost 31 cents.
Once one of his sisters got married, the family got into the arcade business and was eventually able to buy machines to drop off at businesses in town, splitting the commission with the shop owners. This was the Nguyens’ main revenue until a round of thefts made it difficult.
After school, Don married his wife Lisa in 1990, who went to cosmetology school and began doing nails. They talked the entire family into learning to do nails and moved to Alabama in 1996. The entire family followed both in location and profession.
Twenty years later, life is far different than it was when their journey began.
“Now all of the family is in Alabama and everybody has a nail salon and have kids and a family,” Don said. “We get together pretty much every week. We remember when the past was hard, especially my mom, brothers and sisters.”
Today, Muoi and Dinh live in Cullman with their youngest son, Anh, and spend their Alabama winters traveling back to Vietnam. Don’s other brother, Suan, is in Fultondale. His oldest sister, Hong, is in Hoover and youngest sister Tuyet, lives in his same neighborhood in Trussville. Don’s older sister Anh is the only one who has since left Alabama, now living in Daytona Beach, Florida.
Now the owner of Nails Plus on Main Street in Trussville, Don says his family has prospered through generosity.
“I believe I came from a family where my parents were always generous,” Don said. “It’s one of the reasons we’re here today. You do good things, good things will happen. We’re very, very lucky.”
