I'm glad that you stopped by my website to read my story!
Link to Vietnam pictures....
My Photo Album
Tra Vinh, South Vietnam is still an impoverished third world country today. Tra Vinh is where my ancestors are from. My grandfather who is 85 years old this year is still living in the same house that does not have proper sanitation or just simply put, it's not a livable environment for anyone. My grandfather and other relatives may be used to the way of life there, but I saw it in their faces and I know that they are not content. With that being said, my heart goes out to them completely and I truly would like to make a difference in their lives by helping them get a good home to live in comfortably.
I am providing a summarized story of my background and have included a little information on Vietnam/Cambodia's history because I believe that it is important to remember and continue to learn and that I share our true stories amongst my family and friends and even people who have an interest in knowing what it was like for us to flee our homeland to come to America to make a new life here in the United States.
******VIETNAM/CAMBODIA: BIRTH, DEATH, ESCAPE
By Rumdoul Lu
It was in early 1970's when the United States had already withdrawn from Saigon and the Viet Cong were still taking over villages and killing whole families, especially if you were of Cambodian origin living in Vietnam. North Vietnam was claiming South Vietnam land as theirs and forced many families to leave their homes so that they could divide the land and use it for other purposes. The northern Vietnamese despised the people of South Vietnam simply because they were known as "Kampuchea Krom". They strongly wanted to demise our religious Khmer culture and most important origin. Initially South Vietnam was part of Cambodia, hence why we and other people that live in Southern Vietnam are known as "Lower Cambodians". The correct word for that is Kampuchea Krom - we're Cambodians but righteously inherited Vietnamese customs which makes us half Khmer half Yuon. In 1975 my father fled to Cambodia leaving my mom and his children behind because the Viet Cong were going around dispelling people of Kampuchea Krom background and either kill them instantaneously, or torture them with lethal injection to die, or to simply make them become a dysfunctional being. During the upheaval my father was captured and taken in to prison they beat him with their guns, kicked him, punched him and locked him up in jail for no specific reason. Their only excuse was that my father is not a full Vietnamese man. He was in jail for a few months when miraculously he was able to escape and fled to Cambodia for safety. We somehow met up shortly thereafter. We moved from town to town and village to village (Battambang, Svey Rieng, Kad Kondal - where I was born) in or around the Capital of Cambodia - Phnom Penh, for a few years until the holocaust occurred. In early 1975, things were shaky in Cambodia. The government was not stable and Cambodia started to fall. Here is a little background of the area: (http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/2732.htm#history)
My father explained that each time that he had to flee Vietnam or Cambodia, he had to go alone because everyone knew that the man of the family would always be assassinated first. Everyone knows that if you were to be captured by the Khmer Rouge you will not come out alive. My father said when he escaped to Vietnam during the Pol Pot era, he left my mom and us kids in the wee of the night and traveled along the riverside by feet not knowing exactly if he was on the right track back to our home country - Tra Vinh, South Vietnam. He was fortunate enough to have run into another man who was also fleeing from the Khmer Rouge. The man had a map and together they both made it to South Vietnam. My father mentioned that this was in early October 1975 - was when I was born, so during our escape without my father - my mother had just given birth to me. It was three months later when we reunited with my father in South Vietnam. My mom said she was very lucky to have had her younger brother with her to help take care of her and us four kids. My mom resented my father for having to leave her and the kids behind all the time but my father said he had no choice because had he stayed with us at any time, he wouldn't be here with us today. Both of my parents have lost many of their siblings, relatives and even a child (who was my older sister, Davy) during the time and saw many deaths happen right in front of them. It was an extremely difficult and dreadful time for both of my parents throughout their lives in Vietnam and Cambodia. They both went through great misery and fear to fight to stay alive. They are still scarred by the past... but they are greatfully thankful that we were able to make it here to America.
This is my father Linh Thay (Thompson) and mother Saron today. My Grandfather that we're planning to help is my dad's father.
"The Khmer Republic and the War" ---
October 9, 1960 the Cambodian monarchy was abolished, and the country was renamed the Khmer Republic. Hanoi rejected the new republic's request for the withdrawal of NVA/VC troops and began to reinfiltrate some of the 2,000-4,000 Cambodians who had gone to North Vietnam in 1954.
Khmer Republic's leadership was plagued by disunity among its members, the problems of transforming a 30,000-man army into a national combat force of more than 200,000 men, and spreading corruption. The insurgency continued to grow, with supplies and military support provided by North Vietnam. But inside Cambodia, Pol Pot and Ieng Sary asserted their dominance over the Vietnamese-trained communists, many of whom were purged. At the same time, the Khmer Rouge forces became stronger and more independent of their Vietnamese patrons. More than 2 million refugees from the war lived in Phnom Penh and other cities.
On New Year's Day 1975, communist troops launched an offensive that, in 117 days of the hardest fighting of the war, destroyed the Khmer Republic. Simultaneous attacks around the perimeter of Phnom Penh pinned down Republican forces, while other Khmer Rouge units overran fire bases controlling the vital lower Mekong resupply route. A U.S.-funded airlift of ammunition and rice ended when Congress refused additional aid for Cambodia. Phnom Penh surrendered on April 17, 1975--5 days after the U.S. mission evacuated Cambodia.
Democratic Kampuchea.
Many Cambodians welcomed the arrival of peace, but the Khmer Rouge soon turned Cambodia--which it called Democratic Kampuchea (DK)--into a land of horror. Immediately after its victory, the new regime ordered the evacuation of all cities and towns, sending the entire urban population out into the countryside to till the land. Thousands starved or died of disease during the evacuation. Many of those forced to evacuate the cities were resettled in new villages, which lacked food, agricultural implements, and medical care. Many starved before the first harvest, and hunger and malnutrition--bordering on starvation--were constant during those years. Those who resisted or who questioned orders were immediately executed, as were most military and civilian leaders of the former regime who failed to disguise their pasts.
Within the CPK, the Paris-educated leadership--Pol Pot, Ieng Sary, Nuon Chea, and Son Sen--was in control, and Pol Pot was made Prime Minister. Prince Sihanouk was put under virtual house arrest. The new government sought to restructure Cambodian society completely. Remnants of the old society were abolished, and Buddhism suppressed.
Agriculture was collectivized, and the surviving part of the industrial base was abandoned or placed under state control. Cambodia had neither a currency nor a banking system. The regime controlled every aspect of life and reduced everyone to the level of abject obedience through terror. Torture centers were established, and detailed records were kept of the thousands murdered there. Public executions of those considered unreliable or with links to the previous government were common. Few succeeded in escaping the military patrols and fleeing the country. Solid estimates of the numbers who died between 1975 and 1979 are not available, but it is likely that hundreds of thousands were brutally executed by the regime. Hundreds of thousands more died of starvation and disease--both under the Khmer Rouge and during the Vietnamese invasion in 1978. Estimates of the dead range from 1.7 million to 3 million, out of a 1975 population estimated at 7.3 million. At least 600,000 Cambodians displaced during the Pol Pot era.
Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs
December 2005
*** My goal is to provide a house with electricity, appliances, clothing, food and proper medical care for my Grandfather (Linh H. Lu) and his son (my Uncle #3) who takes care of Grandpa. ***
If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to email me. Thanks again.
