Children of the Enemy Read online

  In a recent incident when he was drunk and upset with a friend, Charlie took a knife and sliced off the tip of his own pinky. Alcohol abuse has certainly been a factor in his troubles.

  Charlie’s background is one of hard times. Nguyet, a forty-seven-year-old Vietnamese woman, herself a refugee and a mother of an Amerasian daughter, knew Charlie’s mother and had this to say about his background:

  Charlie’s mother work bar same as me, work many bars . . . Melody, Rosie’s, Hi-Y, New York, Merrily. Many GI’s come, navy, air force too, all Americans. Charlie’s mother gets an American husband, he be army, and she born Charlie. Charlie’s mother and father go to Kampuchea. Charlie be very young, he stay with mother’s sister in Saigon. Mother’s sister, she leaves Saigon and gets married. Her husband don’t like Charlie, beats him all the time, so Charlie, he runs away. Charlie’s mother and father come back to Saigon. They don’t see mother’s sister, don’t see Charlie. They look everywhere but cannot find. Father says, “VC come soon, we cannot stay here,” and they go back to America without Charlie.

  Charlie arrived in the PRPC alone in 1989. He had expected to leave for America within six months of his arrival, but as a result of his numerous arrests, he has long been on “hold,” an administrative limbo which effectively removes him from the pool of refugees continuing on to the United States. Whether this hold will be temporary or permanent is uncertain.

  Our meetings, in which he spoke about himself, took place intermittently over the course of about ten months from late 1991 until mid-1992. The venues shifted from the monkey house, to Charlie’s spartan billet to the PRPC hospital, corresponding to the rapidly changing phases in Charlie’s unstable existence. He requested that I keep his real first name in the narrative, on the chance that his mother or father might read it and recognize him. Charlie attributes many of the problems that have entangled him to Vietnamese rejection of Amerasians, beginning for him, with the abuse he suffered at the hands of his aunt’s husband. He puts it simply: “Everywhere I went, people looked down on me.”

  I WAS BORN in Saigon, but I moved to Tay Ninh with my aunt when I was about eight. I really don’t remember much about Saigon from my childhood days. The only memory that sticks in my mind is of black American soldiers riding around in Jeeps. I was afraid of them. I guess that’s why I remember them.

  We were sent to the New Economic Zone in the Chau Thanh area of Tay Ninh province. We were very poor, and my aunt had to work very hard, but soon after we got there my aunt fell in love with the Communist village chief, a former guerrilla soldier. We moved into his house, a thatch hut with a dirt floor. His position made life easier for my aunt, but very difficult for me. He was a former guerrilla soldier, and he hated me, hated my American blood. He beat me, he tormented me with pliers. He even threw me down a well and almost drowned me. My aunt didn’t say anything, she was afraid of him.

  I never knew my mother, only my aunt. I don’t know if my aunt was really my blood aunt or not. Sometimes she told me she was my aunt. Sometimes she said that she found me in a garbage can, so how can I know? When I grew up, I went back to Saigon to the place I lived with my aunt. I wanted to find my real mother. The old people living there told me that I had two siblings, both Amerasian. My parents got them and took them to America, but I was left behind. That’s all I know.

  I ran away from my aunt and her husband when I was still a young boy. A girl in another village took pity on me and let me stay in her hut. She became what we call chi tinh than, my “mental sister.” By that I mean she instructed me in the way of life, because she had more experience than me.

  We lived in a small village about four kilometers from Tay Ninh town. She was a prostitute, she worked in town, on Cay Me Street in the first ward of Tay Ninh. She would take customers up to a rented room there.

  As a prostitute, she had very low status in the village. So did I, since I was the only Amerasian. I was never accepted there, I had no friends. I never went to school in Vietnam, not even one day. I just played by myself in the house. People used to insult me when I went out. They called me “My lai, My lai” [Amerasian]. I didn’t do anything, I just stayed away from them.

  When I was about fifteen, my mental sister was arrested for prostitution, and I was alone. She was sent to Cay Cay labor camp, about a hundred kilometers away, but still in Tay Ninh. I had no money to visit her, but I got work for one of the rich men in the village, taking care of water buffalo, and was able to save a little bit of money.

  I watched over eight buffalo. I got up early, before the sun rose. I would let the buffalo graze, but I watched them carefully, so that they didn’t eat the crop. If they ate any, the owner would beat me. So anytime they started to eat the crop, I would hit them to try to make them move. But sometime they wouldn’t listen, and they would get into the fields, and the owner would let me have it.

  After working with the buffalo for a year, I made enough money to go and visit my mental sister. But when I got to Cay Cay labor camp, I found out she was dead. They forced her to do hard labor, and she had very little to eat. She had no relatives to send her money for food.

  I went back to Tay Ninh, just slept out on the street in any place that looked okay. I picked up plastic bags and bottles and sold them to earn some money. When I got enough, I bought bread and sold it in the bus station. But there were problems, there are many other people picking up plastic bags and selling bread and cigarettes, and they don’t like competition. They don’t like a new boy. Also, I had a problem with the son of one of the village vice-chiefs. His family lived near the bus station, and he often came down with his friends to bother me. They taunted me, called me “son of the enemy,” and beat me up. Sometimes they stole the little money I had. His family was very powerful, so what could I do?

  I made a plan. I had a friend with a motorbike. I asked him to wait for me outside the station. When the chief’s son came, I stabbed him and fled on the back of the motorbike. I left Tay Ninh and made my way to Ho Chi Minh City.

  I went to the Ba Chieu area of Ho Chi Minh City, where I had a cousin. I stayed in his house a long time. My cousin’s mother-in-law didn’t like me. She complained that I didn’t work, only ate. It was true. I was poor, I had nothing to give them. I had no job, they had to support me, to buy me food. I tried to find work. I tried to work as a mason, but I was too weak, I just couldn’t do it. With no job, I just stayed at home and eventually they threw me out.

  I went over to Ba Chieu market and I begged for scraps, for leftovers, and slept on the street across from the market. Just like in Tay Ninh, there was a lot of competition. The beggars who were already working that area didn’t want me there, at least not the Vietnamese. The other Amerasians were friendly.

  At first I was begging, then I began to steal. I would steal fish and vegetables and sell them and get money to buy rice. I was hungry. I became part of a gang. There were only two Amerasians in the gang, me and another white guy, and we worked together. We would wait until someone wasn’t paying attention, and then we would steal their goods, their fish or vegetables. Sometimes while they were unloading a truck or car, and they weren’t looking, I would be able to pick something up.

  We divided up what we made stealing fish and vegetables, but if we stole other things we kept it all. I began to steal chains and watches from people, from passengers on buses and pedicabs. When the people were not paying attention, I would tear off their chain or watch and run. They yelled and screamed, but I would get away.

  Anyway, I got away until one time I snatched a chain, and a plain-clothes cop was right there and he nabbed me. He arrested me, and I was sent to Mac Dinh Chi prison. We just call it Mac prison. It’s near the center of Saigon, near the presidential palace.

  The cells can be very crowded there, as many as fifty prisoners. Other times there are only seven or eight to a cell. Some of the prisoners are pretty young. I guess I was about sixteen or seventeen at that time, and some were younger than me. Newcomers have to wash th
e floor and massage the older prisoners, the leaders. If you follow the orders of the dai bang, the head prisoner, then the older prisoners leave you alone.

  It was not too bad in prison because I got up and slept anytime I wanted. All the rules were up to the dai bang. After I did what he wanted, swept the floor or something like that, they left me alone. I could do what I wanted, but I never got to leave the cell. I had no money to bribe the guards to let me work outside. If you have money, you can pay the guards to let you work out of the cell as a cook, a cleaner, something like that. But I had nothing to give them, so I just stayed in the cell.

  The police would interrogate me. They wanted to know who my partners were, who worked with me. They questioned me every two weeks or so, and gave me a pencil and paper to write my story. I can’t write, so I just spoke and a friend in the cell wrote what I said. I had to do this many times, over and over, and each time they took my story they would compare it to the ones I had written before and ask questions about it. Then I had to write it again. This went on for a long time. Finally, they couldn’t find any of the people I had written about, and they became angry. That’s when the beatings began. They tied me down and beat me with rubber hoses and demanded to know the real names of my partners. Three times a day they beat me. After the beating, you can’t eat anything, just drink salt water, which helps you. They beat me for two days, and I couldn’t take anymore. I had to tell them about my partners, my friends.

  After I had been in for more than a year, a good friend of mine, a man ten years older than me, whom I call my “older brother,” paid off the prison authorities, and they let me go.

  I got out of prison and was right back on the street again, stealing. How else could I get money? I needed to eat. I was working with a partner, another Amerasian. We were on a motorbike, and he grabbed the chain of an overseas Vietnamese, a thick gold chain. My partner lost his balance and fell off the bike. People screamed and he was caught, but I got away.

  So I had to leave Saigon. I was afraid that my friend would tell the police where I was. I was really scared. If the police beat my friend, he would give my name, and I didn’t want to go back to jail. I had to get away, far away from Saigon.

  I dyed my hair black so no one could tell that I was an Amerasian and went down to Hoa Hung train station in Saigon. I headed north, to Thanh Hoa, near Hanoi. The family of a good friend lived up there. I didn’t pay for the train. I jumped on the train after it left the station, and I jumped off before the next station. I would walk around the station and get on another train. In this way I avoided ID checks and paying.

  Life in the north is different than in Saigon. It is harder there. People are poorer. They wear slippers, not shoes. The clothes are poor, not the same as Saigon, and I never saw any Amerasians there. I couldn’t find my friend’s family in Thanh Hoa, so I got a tiny room and I stayed there for a short while. I didn’t know what to do. I was afraid to go back to Saigon so soon after my friend’s arrest, but I was afraid to stay too long in Thanh Hoa. People might recognize my southern accent, know that I was not from there. Then I’d be in trouble again.

  I heard that life was easier in Cambodia. I had some friends who went over there. They said it was easier to make money there, and it was possible to escape through Cambodia to Thailand and from there go on to the United States.

  I left Thanh Hoa and went back south to the Go Dau district of Tay Ninh province, on the Khmer border. There is a police checkpoint there. I avoided that. There are guards patrolling along the border. I watched the patrols, and when it was clear I entered the forest and crossed the border.

  I first went to Bao Wat, a small town near the border. There were some Vietnamese people that I knew living there, and I looked for them. I helped them selling things at the market, clothes, and food. Some of the Vietnamese told me that in Svay City [probably Svay Rieng] I could find work, and arrange to escape into Thailand, so I went there.

  Svay is a pretty big town. A friend of mine was living there, a neighbor from Ba Chieu. I borrowed his bike, pedaled into the countryside, and bought chickens from the farmers. I sold them in town. It was easy to earn money. There were many Vietnamese there, and Amerasians too. Life was better there than in Vietnam.

  My idea though, was not to stay in Cambodia, but to get to Thailand, and from there to America. Many Vietnamese escape this way, and I joined a group of them with my friend from Ba Chieu. We had a plan and a guide. One night I took a bicycle rickshaw to a prearranged meeting place, about seven kilometers out of town, where I was supposed to join the group. The police stopped my rickshaw. They saw that I was Vietnamese, and my Khmer was not good enough to use to talk to them. They took me to a checkpoint, and arrested me. I had no documents, no ID. You need special documents to live in Cambodia.

  Charlie relates being sent to, and eventually escaping from, Cay Cay prison in Tay Ninh. After his escape, he was given shelter and work by a farmer. I expressed surprise that the farmer would take the risk of aiding an escaped convict. A Vietnamese associate of mine, himself a former reeducation camp prisoner, concurred, explaining that people living near a reeducation camp know full well the consequences of harboring an escapee. The young Vietnamese man interpreting for Charlie, however, felt that sheltering an escapee was not unusual, given the disdain of the South Vietnamese for the Communist government and its skewed system of justice. He mentioned that his own sister had aided escapees and that his brother, escaping from police custody stemming from an unsuccessful attempt to flee Vietnam by boat, had been hidden by complete strangers. Unfortunately, that same brother was shot and killed by police in a subsequent attempt to leave Vietnam by sea.

  So they sent me back to Tay Ninh, to P4 prison. I was charged with attempting to escape from Vietnam. I stayed there waiting for my “trial.” Remember I told you that I stabbed the son of a village chief in Tay Ninh years before? I wounded him, but he didn’t die. Anyway, one of the prison guards recognized me and they decided to get even. A group of them took me into a room and worked me over good, beat me till I lost consciousness. Then they poured water over my head to bring me to and beat me some more. I stayed in P4 prison four months. Then they sentenced me to three years in Cay Cay labor camp, the same place my mental sister had gone to and died in.

  In Cay Cay, there are cattle to watch, land to work, and a brick factory. They make you work in one of these places, according to your skill. If you are a farmer, you work the farm, a bricklayer, you lay brick, etc. You get two bowls of rice with salt each day, no vegetables. Every Sunday they gather the prisoners for political instruction about Ho Chi Minh’s policy, the Communist policy, and Communist life. I didn’t pay attention to that.

  They made me work as a farmer. I got up at five o’clock, then we did exercise until six. Then we went to the farm to work until five, with a one-hour break for lunch at about twelve, everyday the same, rain or shine. If you stop or take a break, the guards beat you with their rifle butt. We were always hungry, always. Work all day and so little to eat.

  Cay Cay prison is in a very remote area. It’s in a compound surrounded by a barbed wire fence. On one side is a river that borders Cambodia. Another side is a school for army recruits. Another side has a fence heavily manned by police. The rest is thick forest.

  When I was there only one month, I decided to try to escape. I saw others try, and I paid attention and learned from their experiences. I saw that prisoners who tried to escape through the police line were shot. It would be very difficult to escape through the army school. Prisoners who tried to escape across the river into Cambodia were often caught. I knew that those who tried to escape through the dense forest sometimes got lost and died of starvation, but I eventually decided to try that route.

  I made a plan to escape with two former South Vietnamese government officials. In Cay Cay prison, the political prisoners are separated from the common criminals, and I don’t know why they were in with the criminals. Maybe they had already been reeducated and rearreste
d for something else. I don’t know. I didn’t know them very well since we were working outside all day in different areas, and when we got back to the cell we were exhausted. There were many other prisoners around. It was hard to speak privately, so we had no time for small talk. When we spoke with each other, it was about escape. The older of the two officials made the plan and was our leader.

  We each had cans to pee in at night. In the morning, we had to dump the contents in a trough over by the barbed wire fence at the outer perimeter of the camp. Instead of emptying the piss there, we dumped it against the wall of our cell. The cell stank so bad anyway that you couldn’t even notice. We tried to do this when the other prisoners were sleeping.

  Every morning we took the cans to the trough and pretended to dump out the urine there. Since the trough was near the barbed wire fence, if the guard wasn’t looking, we would twist the strands of wire near to where it attached to the wooden post. We did this for months, emptying our urine against the wall of the cell, and when we were near the fence quickly working the strands of the barbed wire back and forth with our hands. After months the cell’s wall, made of cheap cement and badly constructed, became weakened, and the barbed wire at the fence post was worn through where we had repeatedly twisted it.

  One night I was awakened by a small pinch on the leg. It was the signal that this night was the night for escape. We took a spoon and began scraping at the spot on the wall where we had repeatedly dumped our urine. It was soft and gave way easily. When we had scraped away a quantity of cement, we were able to break off some of the block inside. In about two hours we had a hole big enough to crawl through.