Last night was another bifurcated sleep with a break spelled by “Barney Miller” humor. I prefer to rise early and so try to truncate my middle of the night wakefulness as much as possible. Thinking about today`s writing i was going to try to depict my early friendship with the newly arrived “Boat People” in what became ground zero for “Little Saigon” of Orange County, Ca. Last night there was no indication of the mayhem in the capitol of my nation that i was to wake up to. It is not a putsch as the corporate media would so like you to believe, rather a staged circus designed to destabilize civic authority and solidify the autocratic corporate oligarchy attempting to rule the planet - I would rather reminisce about my friends Hoa Le, and Ngay Phan by describing their heroic journey into ‘merican culture, however sad it is that i haven’t seen them in 40 years, and that they are very likely ardent _rump supporters.
The first nguoi Viet to arrive in California were sent to Camp Pendleton Marine Corps just South of San Clemente. From this location clusters of immigrants were released through a sponsorship arrangement with local communities to aid in assimilation of acclimating to their new home. I was living in Santa Ana, close to downtown when this happened. Peering back through the haze of time, I believe that we met as participants in a Comprehensive Educational Training Act (CETA) program where we were to be trained as “Maintenance Mechanics” at one of the local community colleges. They were living close to one of the first Vietnamese Shopping Strips at the corner of Hope St & Sullivan in Santa Ana; i was living at Bishop off Broadway, also in Santa Ana, and we all commuted to Fountain Valley for training: welding, renovating assembly lines, rebuilding power hacksaws, etc.
Our class was an eclectic group during the year of the Biennial 1776-1976 and people were optimistic and happy to be alive; crossing cultural barriers came easy, and ours contained a broad spectrum from homeboys out of SA, soldiers from Saigon and engineering dropouts out of Irvine. What i remember vividly was the aplomb my new Vietnamese friends confronted their new reality - the restaurant at Hope & Sullivan included a social club and it became immediately clear how cohesive they were as a community, but also relentlessly expansive and curious about new experiences. My neighbors in the front house were a fractious couple with a young child and the husband’s volatile belligerence contributed much to their unhappiness. You can imagine his surprise when Hoa took a shine to the Señora and just moved in; as far as i know there was never an altercation of any kind, Hoa simply assumed head of household & that was that.
This was within a many generation deep latino barrio with routine murders and gang strife, but my friends were never daunted and routinely marched in loose formation with a confidence that gave the homies pause - a not easily accomplished feat. Of course it was not a reciprocal welcome, there was no easy admittance at the social club, and without an escort you may as well have been waiting for the midnight bus if you expected to order. Yet they were entirely open to foreign social events regardless of any language or cultural barriers. I remember my friends charming strangers in any number of different settings using generosity, warmth and kindness as their only entree. They, and my memories of their indomitable courage are responsible in large part for my decision to move here Vietnam when i did.
The courage of my friends is still more remarkable after i have viewed first hand the echo of havoc: physically, ecologically, culturally my own country wrought when occupying Vietnam for entirely venal reasons then - and more dubious now. It may be the lessons i was learning then, were left incomplete and required review, or i am just part of some karmic continuum for which there is no rhyme or reason and like a blind man in a darkened house i am feeling my way from room to room searching for something i didn’t know i’d lost, or bringing something necessary for some purpose i will not understand until i get there. Crazy as it seems, i believe it is a theory more practical than the hysteria being acted out in the seat of power in my own country by zealots who possess no scrap of doubt in their minds about behavior that is as dangerous as i’ve ever seen in my long life - i can only pray & occupy myself with peaceful activity until the light of reason returns to our darkened world.
jts 08/01/2021
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