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| Back row from left: Choi Ok-suk, General Lee's youngest and eldest daughters, his sister and wife, Duyen Nguyen, Helene and Gen. Lee Dong-yeong. Front row: General Lee's youngest son, Phu Nguyen, Bao Nguyen, William Nguyen, Gen. Lee's son Min-hui / Courtesy of William Nguyen |
By Matt VanVolkenburg
On April 26, 1975, as the North Vietnamese Army closed in on Saigon, William Nguyen received a letter that changed his life. The letter, from his sister in Australia, contained a photo of her Korean husband together with Cho, a high-ranking official at the Korean Embassy in Saigon. She urged William to find Cho and seek his help in gaining passage aboard one of two tank landing ships (LSTs) that the ROK Navy had sent to evacuate Korean civilians from Vietnam.
William, his brothers Bao and Phu and his sister Duyen packed a suitcase and took motorcycle taxis through jammed traffic to the embassy. To get past the crowds of people trying to enter, William climbed the embassy wall and found Cho. Upon reading the letter, Cho gave him four patches, which allowed his siblings to gain entry to the compound and board buses to the port where the LSTs were waiting. After surviving a terrifying storm near Taiwan, in which they lost most of their clothing that had been left out on deck to dry, they arrived in Busan on May 13, 1975.
Thousands of people lined the streets to welcome them as buses took them to a recently closed girls' high school that had been converted into a refugee camp. Red Cross officers ushered them into rooms with mattresses and blankets and then served dinner, which William remembers being ramyeon and japchae. Within a few months, most of the Vietnamese refugees had been sent to third countries like the U.S., Canada, or France, but those without ties abroad had no choice but to remain in the camp.
Though the camp provided for their basic needs, with few clothes and very little money, William and his siblings might have found their internment to be a struggle if not for the intercession of a Red Cross worker named Choi Ok-sook. Mrs. Choi, whose husband was a police chief in Busan, learned of their plight and became their sponsor, which allowed them to leave the camp with her. She told them to call her "mother" and had them spend weekends at her house. On one of their first outings, she took them to the market and bought them something they hadn't told anyone they desperately needed: underwear.
"How did she know that we were not wearing underwear?" William wonders even now. "I still vividly remember that feeling of appreciation every time I think of it."
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| From left to right: William Nguyen and Choi Ok-suk at William's wedding / Courtesy of William Nguyen |
In late 1975 the Korean government decided to settle the remaining refugees in Korea. Language and vocational classes preceded their resettlement, which included stipends, housing and job placement assistance. William and his siblings were resettled in Incheon, where he worked for Hanguk Kigye and was taught how to weld. His brother Bao worked for an electrical company, while his sister worked for Sony Renown, the CEO of which did much to help them resettle.
William's family was also helped by Mr. Cha, a Red Cross worker at the Busan refugee camp who was from Seoul, and who showed them around the city and went hiking with them after they moved to Incheon.
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| Mr. Cha, a Red Cross security worker at the Busan refugee camp, and William's sister, Duyen, wearing the hanbok Mr. Cha gave her as a gift. / Courtesy of William Nguyen |
In early 1976, the Vietnamese wife of a political officer at the U.S. Embassy hosted a party to celebrate Tet, or Lunar New Year, and invited the Vietnamese community. It was there that connections were made that led William to meet his future wife Helene, who was of Korean-Chinese heritage but had grown up in Vietnam.
Worried about her surrogate children, Choi connected William's family with a family friend who lived in Yongsan, Marine General Lee Dong-yeong. General Lee's eldest son, Min-hui, would often visit them and bring them food before driving them to his family's house for a meal or showing them around Seoul.
"They were wonderful people," William said. "Even today I still wonder; they were powerful and upper-class people, and we were just a bunch of loser brothers and sister refugees [but] they took us in and looked after us. There are no words to describe their kindness."
Choi and members of General Lee's family attended William's wedding in Incheon in August 1976. At the wedding, when it came time to bow to his parents, William and his bride bowed to Choi instead.
William and his siblings moved to Australia in late September 1976, but in January 1977 he returned to Korea so he could bring his wife to Australia. While in Korea he visited General Lee in Seoul and Mrs. Choi in Busan.
As William remembered, "General invited us to his house to have dinner and after dinner, Mrs. Lee gave us $200 ― a lot of money for us at that time. Before getting in the car to go back to Incheon she gave me the warmest hug I ever felt in my entire life. I still could see her tears when the car left for Incheon! It was the biggest impact in my life up to now. From them I learned to be humble and kind all the time."
According to William, during his tearful farewell with Mrs. Choi in Busan, "I promised her I would come back to visit her again but I never fulfilled it. My only excuse is that life was hectic while overseas as an immigrant but I still regret it and feel so guilty about it." He has since lost touch with Mrs. Choi and General Lee's family, but hopes find a way to reconnect with them soon. Hoping to "pay tribute to a great lady with a heart of gold," William and his family will fulfill his 40-year-old promise by visiting Seoul and Busan early next year.
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