YOU HAVE ARRIVED

Just like that, 37 years went by. It was a cold night in New York City, just like tonight. Maybe colder since my family just came from tropical Singapore. Sure, we had a stop-over in Belgium but we stayed inside the airport the whole time so we didn’t know what the outside temperature was. An uncle on my mother side, a first cousin of hers on her father’s side, was the sponsor. He met us at JFK Airport with winter jackets for all of us. Uncle lived near the intersection of Neptune Avenue and Brighton First Street in the Sheepshead Bay area of Brooklyn. We were to stay with him for a short period of time so technically our first home in the U.S. was in Brooklyn. Uncle probably drove us home along the Belt Parkway West but I don’t remember anything from the car ride. Except that I threw up at the end of the trip. Unlike other family members, I don’t easily experience motion sickness, whether on airplane or on boat, but for some reason the car trip from JFK did it.

We stayed with Uncle perhaps for a week before the refugee agency found us an apartment in the Fordham Road section of the Bronx. Again I have few fragments of memory of the stay. I do recall being introduced to cheese pizza and most likely Sprite or 7-Up. It was sweet, bubbly, and white, that much I’m sure. I also remember being a bad guest by taking too long a bath. It was the first time I bathed in a tub, the tub filled with water and bubbles, and there was my younger cousin’s toy aircraft carrier, perhaps other toys too. So I got carried away. Auntie had to gently knock on the door to tell me to finish up.

We arrived on a Thursday so perhaps on Monday someone, perhaps Uncle and his son, accompanied me to some school perhaps to register. Maybe the plan at the time was for us to stay there a few months so Uncle thought I should be enrolled in school. I took one year of English before leaving Viet Nam but had no actual experience of using the language. Maybe my Uncle walked his son to school and thought it would be nice for me to come along to see the school. I am sure I went to some school shortly after arriving in the U.S. but for what reason I am not sure now.

I vaguely recall my late father saying that he made sure Uncle understood that he would like us to have our own place. That he didn’t want to burden Uncle any more than necessary. Of course it all depended on how quick the refugee agency can find us a place. Perhaps the refugee agency already prepared things ahead, or it was 1980 and apartments were plentiful in the Bronx, we had our own place shortly. Maybe by then the effect of jet lag wore off or I already gotten used to the new environment, I do have more clearer memories of the place. We did stay there for almost half a year. Next time, I’ll try to dig up some memories from that time.

A Vietnamese's Impression of America

Before settling down in America, my impression of it was whatever the adults told me from the TV shows. Television was a rare commodity that not everyone can afford, but we knew about Mission: Impossible, Bonanza, Star Trek, etc. I do not recall ever watching an entire episode or what language the shows were presented in. Probably in English and not translated into Vietnamese. We referred to the characters of the various show in our own way, such as "The Man With Silvery Hair" or "Donkey Ears". We believed that the cowboys were good guys and that the red-skinned savages were bad. We probably learned the "red" part from somewhere else because back then TVs were black-and-white only. We thought everyone in America was rich, probably from M:I. Everyone wore suits and other nice clothes. We knew that people didn't dress like cowboys and of course Star Trek was futuristic stuff. Possibly also from M:I we thought that there were only two kinds of people in America, black and white. When we moved to our apartment in the Bronx, we were surprised to meet Hispanic and Mexicans, even though there were not that many of them at the time. At John Peter Tertard JHS, I was surprised to meet Greeks, Koreans, Russians, and others. Of course, later on when I learned American history it all made sense. Without that knowledge, I even thought that American speak "American" language. From the TV shows, I also thought that people wore shoes into the house and left them on, even while sleeping, probably from some episode in which a character stayed at a hotel.

What was/is your impression of the United States of America?

Thirty Years On American Soil

Thirty years ago today I stepped onto U.S. soil for the first time. To be exact, it was U.S. tarmac, but you get the idea. Before that I spent a few weeks in Singapore and prior to that a few months in Indonesia. It was a long way from Viet Nam. Some day I will drill into more details about my experience as a boat person, but today the story is what I remember of that first few days in a new land.

• I don't recall ever having motion sickness before, not even on the indirect plane ride from Singapore to the U.S. However, when Uncle Ping drove our family from JFK airport to his home in Sheepshead Bay, sitting in the front passenger seat, I felt dizzy.
• The first time ever taking a bath in a tub, I spent a long time in it. I filled the tub with water and played with Cousin E's toy ship, I think it was an aircraft carrier of sort. It was not until Auntie knocked on the door that I finished up. Eek, I was a bad guest!
• The first pie of pizza was not very welcomed. We probably never had cheese before in our life.
• I may be wrong but in offering soda to us Uncle Ping referred to the drink as "leung tsa" (凉茶) or "cooling tea". To me, that was the bitter or tasteless stuff that my father used to make us drink to negate the effect of fried food and other bad stuff. The whitish soda, probably a Sprite, was not bitter or tasteless at all.
• Uncle Ping probably thought that we were going to stay in the area for a while. He took me to some school to register for class. I do not remember learning anything that one day. I think I did not even spend the whole day there.

Good grief, that is all I can remember of the momentous day. Not until high school that the idea of keeping a journal or diary came to me, so all I remember of the day is what little I myself can recall and whatever my siblings and parents, or maybe Uncle Ping's family, can recall.