Boon Vong | Journal

I’m sure most of us have mixed emotions when it comes to thinking about the places where we grew up.  In movies and tv, you see it a lot, famous people and athletes returning to their humble homes with a lit match or a bulldozer in tow.  For regular followers of my work, I’m sure you know a little bit about my story; if you’re Lao or a refugee you can pretty much look to your own family’s history to see my own.

On the road leading up to the small town where we first settled, there was a dam where we used to fish for food.  I remember as a kid getting really filthy in the shallows, flipping over stones looking for crawfish or other critters.  We would come home with buckets full, and combined with bamboo shoots found behind the local high school made for some nice family meals.  Today the area is fenced off with no tresspassing signs.

Tryon, North Carolina was the home of the church that sponsored us, and it became our home as well, in the autumn of 1980.  It is a quaint small town, hardly changing at all since then.  I’m sure locals back then wondered about us, the scruffy immigrant kids walking the streets.  I don’t know if we ever dared enter in any of those stores, I only remember walking to the local gas station with my older brothers to get candy.

The church gave us a house, which is no longer there.  I remember it was at the bottom of a wooded hill, and below the local elementary school.  It was a simple fireplace and kerosene heated home, and even though I was bit beyond that age, I slept in a crib.  Everything we had came from the donation box at the church.  From our oversized suits to the furniture.  I remember it was really cold in the bottom portion of the house, and one of our sponsors would come over to teach my mother how to can and preserve all sorts of fruits and vegetables.  My dad worked at a textile mill and when he would come home on his bicycle, I would meet him at the door and he would pat me on the head and give me a candy bar.

My mother spoke no English, while I was lucky enough to enter school as a kindergartener.  It was October, around Halloween actually, when I had a most frightening experience as a little kid in America.  In class one day we were all having lessons when a teacher dressed as a green skinned witch burst through the door and cackled.  All the other kids laughed and tugged at the make believe witch’s straw hair while my cousin and I bolted to the next room.

I remember one day in gym class getting to experience hula hoops.  My mother would walk up the hill to pick me up in the afternoon.  One day I had just learned to tie my shoes, and was so proud to have taught my mother.

The local landmark was the Tryon horse.  I remember looking at it every time we would go into town, to church, or to the grocery store.  The little theater is still ticking, and we once saw Annie there.  It was an odd coincindence that I fell asleep at the same Annie did when Daddy Warbucks took her to the cinema.

In a short year, our family and extended family was growing quickly, with my parents and the church bringing over our relatives and friends.  In Tryon I remember my uncle’s family living in basically a tool/storage shed on the property of an okra farmer.  My cousin had a little duck toy that had a weighted base that never let it tip over.  The place was so small that when he and I would jump on the bed we would have to watch out not to bump our heads on the ceiling.  I think there was a crab apple tree in front of their home, I tried climbing it, slipped and a branch split open my leg, which I still have the scar from.

We then moved across the state line to Landrum, South Carolina, which was a mere stone’s throw away from Tryon.  Most of us lived together in these apartments.  Our lives had progressed to the point where we were now driving clunkers instead of old bicycles and had a normal life of school, work, church, and television.

This is the apartment where we lived, during the times when you really start storing memories as a kid.  It’s still the same after all this time.

Back then my dad borrowed a Polaroid camera from one of our sponsors and he would take photos of us.  I remember sitting on that bench with my corduroy brown pants and yellow Mickey Mouse t-shirt.  We had a blue Toyota Corolla that my dad basically built with his own hands.  I used to ride around with him everywhere.  He was so proud when he bought a steering wheel cover from the store and I watched while he was lacing it up.  I even remember the day he gave up smoking.  Being from the old country and in the military, everyone smoked.  One day he just pushed a barely puffed cigarette into the ashtray and that’s where it stayed.

As I was taking my own photos, I could hear little kids laughing inside our old apartment, and I thought that it was just like that when we were here.  I remember my oldest brother bought Michael Jackson’s Thriller on vinyl and was playing it full blast while my uncle’s foot tapped.  He was of the long hair Santana and Steely Dan era but appreciated the music.  Around Christmas, one of our sponsors at the church dressed up as Santa Claus and he brought me a Snoopy toy set.  I remember rushing home after school to watch He-Man on our black and white television.  I remember being so afraid of the dark and would run as quick as I could to my parents’ room where I slept on the floor to grab my blanket.  We didn’t have much then but the memories were still pretty good.

This was the second elementary school I went to.  In our early years we would ride the schoolbus, and I remember there was a new Mexican immigrant family that would board it in front of their house right at the railroad tracks.  It was a house smaller than the one we were given, without running water, so they couldn’t bathe.  When they got on the bus we all pinched our noses and no one would let them sit down.  We were fortunate then, and now.

This empty shell was the local TG&Y, a K-Mart type of store.  We rarely got to go in to look, and even rarer, did we get a toy.  One day my cousins were in town to visit and they would always remark how their mom would buy them things and how my mom was never as seemingly generous.  It was perhaps true, most of my comic books and toys came from my road trips with my father to the flea markets in Greer and Spartanburg, while my mom was concerned with preparing food and saving money.  That day my mother for some reason, perhaps under unwarranted pressure, took us there and said we all could pick out toys.  My cousins picked cap guns and I chose a rubber and plastic toy dinosaur that was a bit out of the price range.  I rarely, if ever pitched a fit in a store, but I believe I was on the verge of one, so she bought it for me anyway.  My mother didn’t have an easy time in the early years in America.  She had an enlarged thyroid that had to be operated on.  She had numerous dental problems that caused her pain and embarrassment.  One day my dad was working on one of our jalopies behind the apartment.  He had the thing jacked up precariously and summoned my mother to come help him.  I don’t have a full recollection of what happened but I do remember screaming, blood, and a neighbor helping my mother away from the scene.  My father’s never asked my mom to do any type of mechanical labor again.  Maybe that memory was just a dream, maybe this entire thing is just a dream.

We were blessed to have so many good people in our lives back then.  Sadly, there aren’t too many left.  One of our host families, we called Mr. and Mrs. D for short, with the inflection of dee, which in Lao, means good.  Can’t really say enough about them and their kindness and generosity, people who sponsored and supported a family they’d never met before, and definitely took a gamble on how we would turn out.  We spent so many good days and summers there, at their house in front of the lake.  Mrs. D would call me her “Monday Grandson,” as she would take me to the local art center and restaurants while my mother was taking weaving classes or at the hospital.  Somewhat embarassing but true, she can still recall the difficulty of showing me as a little boy how to use the toilet, and not always sit Indian style everywhere.  She is an artist herself, with paintings covering her walls, and perhaps that simple gesture of taking care of a young boy set me on my way.

One summer she took me and my brothers out on the lake on the canoe.  In trying to teach us English through experience, she pointed out the tons of water lilies on the surface.  One of my brothers snatched one up and bit the stalk.  She was surprised that we had lilies back in Laos, and would eat them.  Sharing of culture, sharing of lives, I don’t know if those summers will ever come to pass again.

When we escaped Laos on the Mekong river, we had two families and two boats.  From what my parents tell me, the boat that I was on with my mother and brothers was leaking and it was amazing that we didn’t die right there.  We didn’t, and we continued to live.

Notes:  Dragon Boat practice at the lake, it’s not too late to join our team! Come out for papaya salad!

H.A.G.S!
(Have a Great Summer!)

Thanks to LAS for again organizing the Kid’s mini summer camp.  Also thanks to Wat Lao Buddhakhanti for allowing us the space to teach and play.

(more…)

Notes: Just random clips thrown together, 5D mk II and D90, mostly handheld, and of course manual focus on everything.  One could see the advantages of the little ”HD” cameras out there with their extreme depth of focus (i.e. every unecessary thing in focus), but I still like the messups and the old 16mm look.  Song is “Remember” by ATB.  Was thinking of music to use and the cadence somehow fit.

AAPA Convention | Marriott Marquis | Atlanta, GA

When I was a kid, I wore thick glasses and read a lot of books.  Relatives would call me “little doctor.”  I guess it would have been a smarter career move, instead of this whole “artist / photographer / documentarian / lazy thinker” joyride that I’ve been on for awhile, but you know, it’s hard in any field.  Especially when you grew up, like most of us refugees, as sons and daughters of factory workers.  It’s especially tough when the fields we choose in “higher education” don’t necessarily like supplying mentors, people to show you the ropes on how the world really works.  Not too many educators or professionals will give you the keys to the kingdom, they seem lost in just sending people through the turnstiles.  Before I go off too long on my rant, let’s just say I gave up on medical school, in oh, probably the 4th grade.  Here’s a fellow who stuck it out though, new Lao brother to the “Team,” Phoumy Bounkeau, PA-C, PhD, who was in Atlanta receiving an award from the American Association of Physician Assistants for Humanitarian PA of the Year for his work in Laos.

From the Press Release:

ATLANTA — Phoumy Bobby Bounkeau, PA-C, PhD, of Seattle, Wash., received the American Academy of Physician Assistants 2010 Humanitarian PA of the Year Award at the organization’s 38th Annual Physician Assistant Conference in Atlanta yesterday. Bounkeau, of Lao and Thai descent, co-founded the CME training project, a program that provides funding for rural Lao health workers to travel from their villages to the large city of Luang Prabang to participate in much-needed continuing medical education.

“My roots are in Laos and Thailand, and I know all too well that, especially in rural areas, this part of the world is often underserved by modern health care,” said Bounkeau. “By extending a hand to those who have the desire to learn and serve, we broaden the reach of the best health care practices across the globe. I am honored that AAPA has chosen to recognize this important and necessary work.”

Bounkeau’s CME training project provides curriculum on patient history, physician assessment, emergency medicine, ultrasound technology, reproductive health and pediatrics, as well as medical leadership for hospital administrators and medical English for hospital workers. The program, which is funded in part by the PA Foundation, provides Lao health workers an opportunity to strengthen and update their clinical skills.

Bounkeau is a Distinguished AAPA Fellow, former president of the Washington State Academy of Physician Assistants and co-founder of AAPA’s Asian and Pacific Islander PA Caucus, and is currently employed by the VA Puget Sound Healthcare System. On weekends and evenings, Bounkeau volunteers at Seattle International Community Health Services providing culturally competent health care services to patients speaking Southeast Asian languages.

RLCD Festival | Nashville, TN

Wat Sattha Dhamma | Alto, GA

Random Notes: Like most Lao things, humble beginnings on this one as well, but there aren’t many times in America these days where you can witness an old timey barn raising, people pulling together to build something.  Time will tell if this becomes a Lao “Bonnaroo” field, and more complaints from the neighbors, but hey, I didn’t hammer a single nail or lay down a single brick, so I’ll just hush up.  …Especially since my parents and the community back home seem intent on really trying to make it work.  Been meaning to show the other side of all these festivals and gatherings…but you know, I think I’d rather not.  Get so much flak from other people, my goal is to still put our best foot forward.  Whatever photos go up, they still wouldn’t tell the viewer that most of the community works in textile mills and chicken factories.  No doctors or lawyers funding the stones for this one, just regular old country folk.

The Lovett School | Atlanta, GA

Notes: John Wood had a pretty comfy position at Microsoft ten years ago.  While travelling through Nepal he visited a quaint school in the mountains and found their “library” was merely a filing cabinet with things left over from hikers and travelers.  Apalled at this he vowed to return with more books… After leaving Microsoft and founding a successful nonprofit called Room to Read, in ten years, thousands of books in what is probably thousands of libraries, have been given out to children in some of the most troubled parts of the world.  Everywhere from Africa to Nepal, and of course Laos.  Education can hopefully break the cycle of poverty and it is nice to know schoolkids over there can experience the simple joy of flipping through a reading book designed for them in their home language.  It was also a nice surprise meeting Dikembe Mutumbo, best known for his tenure in the NBA with teams like the Denver Nuggets and our hometown Atlanta Hawks, but he also spent considerable resources to build a hospital in his native Republic of Congo.

I had the pleasure of meeting a gentleman in Laos, Manophet, whose life story is pretty amazing. As a farmer, monk, soldier, singer, translator, teacher, and father, his life was full of triumph and tragedy, that should make us all think about our own selfish desires and priorities. I’m saddened to hear that he passed away due to a stroke in Laos. I came to know him through a photo, and hope that my own humble attempts at documenting what I thought to be some important moments in my own life, preserve the good will and spirit that he sure did emanate.

 

These are some transcripts from the video that I shot during our dinners in Xieng Khouang. Yeah, good times…

 

(Manophet telling us the story about how during the bombing campaign in Xieng Khouang, his village and family was torn apart, and how he lost and reunited with a brother)

 

M: “…and we thought, if he’s alive, he’s probably with mother, and my mother thought, if he was alive he was probably with father.

 

When both sides came back without him, and we thought he was killed.

 

But 1994 we knew that he was alive. In Minnesota. In Minneapolis. A Hmong family came back to visit (Xieng Khouang) and they brought the picture to my father, my mother, and they asked, ‘Remember the man?’ They said ‘No,’ it’s been too long, since ‘68 til ‘94. And then in 1997 he came back to visit.”

 

FB: “Where was your brother that day?”

 

M: “He was with a Hmong family during that day, during that night.”

 

ER: “They protected him. They took him in because he was lost. And they took him to America with them.”

 

M: “Yeah, and then they trekked from Xieng Khouang to Viengchanh, 3 months, walked until they got to Viengchanh, and then they swam across the Mekong River, and they got caught by the Thai police and got sent to the refugee camp. And from there they got the opportunity to go to America. And then the Hmong family said, ‘What about the boy?’ (referring to Manophet’s brother)

 

If you would like to come with us you would have to change his name, to be a Hmong name, and then my brother did. He added his name to the family list and then they were gone. They started to settle in Philadelphia, that’s where my brother went to school, and the Hmong family supported him, and he became some sort of a nurse, or some support to a doctor. Now he works for the Hmong community in Minneapolis.”

 

FB: “Did you ever get to meet him again?”

 

M: “Yeah, he came back in 1997. On behalf of the family I was holding up the sign. It was a big day, I was you know, suspecting a lot, because I was a soldier before. I was trained in Viet Nam, Russian instructors told me sometimes you will see CIA come to your family with someone’s picture and try to get information. I thought, 50% it could be true and 50% it could be…false, you know…and I keep holding the sign, and finally he walks out. When he saw his name, he dropped everything in front of the gate and he runs to me. He couldn’t say any words to him, because he was shaking me, asking ‘Are you my brother, are you my brother?’ I can’t recognize him because it’s too hard. Then he said ‘Where are our parents?’ Behind me is my family, my father my mother, and my sister, the rest of the family. He pushed me out of his arms and he ran to my parents. All of them were crying…29 years went by, we came back to see each other again.”

 

“It was the biggest day. And he got to visit only 10 days. And the government only allowed him to visit only Viengchanh. 10 days went by like 10 hours. My mother’s stories with the 3 children in the caves, my father’s stories with the 3 children in the refugee camps, my brother’s stories with the Hmong family on the way to America, life in America.”

“My parent’s nearly forgot him. The family nearly forgot him because it’s been too long. And then one day somebody show up and it was like–”

 

FB: “Rising from the dead.”

 

FB: “What was his age, was he older than you?”

 

M: “Yeah. He was 12 years older than me. He missed the both sides of the parents because the house was burning, and he ran out by himself. So he got lost. And the next day, he found a Hmong family, and the Hmong family kept telling him, ‘Come with us, soon you’ll find your parents.’

 

That’s why in my (English) class there are many Hmong children. (Points to his adopted son and smiles) Yeah, he’s Hmong.”

 

For me I don’t care whoever they are, they can come to me whenever they need like to learn. So the kids you have seen in class today, actually I charge them to pay me a little bit, but I usually do not get the money, maybe I got a bunch of bananas, pumpkins, bag of rice, vegetables, a live chicken in a basket. The students would say, ‘My father could not sell it, could we accept it?’ Most of the food they brought me, I have not chance to eat it. Because when they come to read the books during the weekends, they’re hungry, they cook whatever they brought me, they’re being there like it’s their house. (smiles) And some of them respect me more than in their house. They can come anytime.”

 

CK: “Some of them travel long distances to be in summer school. Some of them travel four hours, where do they stay?”

 

M: “They have their cousins that live in town. Or some of them they rent a house, 5 or 8 of them rent a little room and stay together.”

 

FB: “So do you have a wife?”

 

M: “Me? My wife have gone to America. To Connecticut. Because her father was a Royal Lao Army, and he was in the refugee camp. And so he settled in America for…good business. And he came back and took his family with him. He doesn’t want to leave the family here. He was afraid that sometime, you know, his family would be harmed by him (his past political association).”

 

FB: “So you live alone over here?”

 

M: “I have three boys with me. And then I have my own son.”

M: “My parents, are Lao born. And when I was younger they always told me what is good to do. Being nice and generous, that’s it.”

 

FB: “What happened with me is, I was in Viengchanh with IDS, and I lived in a Lao village for 2 and a half years, so I like the Lao people very much. At the time I didn’t like the Americans—well, I still don’t like the Americans (laughs all around).

 

ER: “…present company excluded.”

 

FB: “…in September of 1969, my friend who was a journalist asked me to go in and translate. So we go in on my motorcycle, and it’s the first day that the refugees were at That Luang and I was the first to talk to them, because I spoke Lao, you know.

 

M: “Could be including my father.”

 

FB: “Yeah, maybe. You know what you could ask your father? I have a very good friend named Boungeun Leungpraseuth, so he’s an ethnic Chinese but he grew up on the plain of jars, and he came out with the refugees. He became my best friend. So I was very angry about this. I was against the US government bombing the people (of Laos). One day I asked ‘Ngeun to collect the drawings and the essays so we could tell their story. So he collected them, because the people, they would not trust me, cause I’m an American, but they would trust ‘Ngeun because before he was a soldier with the Pathet Lao. So we had the book, ‘Voices from the Plain of Jars.’”

 

M: “Right! That’s my favorite book!”

 

FB: “You know it?”

 

M: “I know that book, very well.”

 

FB: “He’s the one that edited the book.”

 

M: “Oh my gosh! What a lucky meeting!”

 

 

M: “…especially since they allowed Russian troops to settle here, about 3 or 5 thousand Russian soldiers. I was a young boy, I tried to be a monk, or a novice. They said to me, ‘Why don’t you be a soldier?’ But the Buddhists that Lao people have been respecting for many hundred years, Russians just came for the short period, and said, ‘Why don’t you be a soldier?’ My father would like to go to the temple with food. They would say, ‘Why don’t you offer it to the military? It would be better than offering it to the monk, he’s doing nothing. Just staying there, what do you believe about that? But more than half of Lao population believe in that religion. But then they just come in the short time and they cut it off. Just from 2000 up did everything start to return. Before you wouldn’t see the monk walking around the streets of Phonsavanh. You won’t see any beautiful roof of the temple up in Phonsavanh, no. You won’t see any one to have time, to face in front like me and speaking English to you. If I did that, next day I have to be in the police station. ‘What did you talk about last night?’ ‘Who is he?’”

 

FB: “What’s your own attitude towards Buddhism today?”

 

M: “Well, just the first, xieng, or if you call it, you know, novice. Yeah, special occasions for the Buddhist, my family would go together to the Buddhist temple and you know respect whatever, or offering things. Meet the friends and talk the good things. Most of the monks here they like me, because they love me to tell them about about tourists, what do they ask, what do they want to say, what do they think about. Most of the old monks they really like me. Young novice, they also call me “teacher,” can you tell me this word? A lot of young monks, they learn English.” 

M: “…and he went to looking for the (bamboo) shoots, and he dug it, and he hit the bombie. It was happening about 2pm. Like today. And later of the day, he doesn’t come home, and his wife try to go out to find him with the neighbors, but nobody found him. Until the next morning, 8am, they found him in the jungle. Both eyes, already gone. Like you said, the meditation will help, if you feel, you know, if you do something good for someone, you just sit down and quiet and think of something nice. That’s alright. And I mentioned it to her, and she was very proud that I gave the money to the blind man. And he used that money to build a fish pond because that’s the only thing he owns that will feed the family. Because only him a person that will affect the family for all. It was very hard to see somebody like that. And then Barbara, she went to the hospital to see the victims, from about 5 boys, 2 immediately died, and other 3 still badly injured. One still in the hospital, the other two already returned home. Just nearby my village. The other side of the hills. The boys found bombies and they tried to hit it and bang. When I thought about it, in that case I feel angry…for America. I tell you the truth, I feel very angry about it. Why did they make something like this? It isn’t an anti-tank, anti-aircraft or any other things, just the human, the little boy who know nothing. They got killed by this.”

 

M:  “Sometimes I feel I should leave this country.  I don’t want to see any more problem.  I want to be quiet.  I want to be free like the other people it would be easier.  In the other end, when I mention it to my students I stop teaching from tomorrow, many in the back row start to cry.  ‘Teacher if you stop where will we study?’  Well, anywhere you can find, you know for you.  ‘No, we can’t without you, we can’t.  Please don’t.’  It’s very difficult.”