Harris Tran: From Experiencing the War as a Child, to Migrating and Settling in the United States
Profilers: Ivan Cuevas, Amanda Harmon, Nika Llamanzares, Ryan Tran, Preston Nguyen
Life during the War in Vietnam
Question
Please introduce yourself
Harris Tran:
My true name is Banh. My last name is Tran. I was born in Saigon. It was south of Vietnam.
Question
Where did you and your family live during the war?
Harris Tran:
Actually, we live about 20-30 minutes away from central Saigon, it’s not far, it is about 10-15 miles away.
Question
What was it like growing up during the war? Were you old enough to understand what was going on?
Actually at the time during the war, I was around six, seven years old. Not much experience for the entire war but just partially a little bit.
Question
Can you tell us an experience you remember during the war?
Harris Tran:
Actually during the war we were just looking for a safe place to hide, because I remember that at the time the war was not far. Actually fighting was not far from our homes. It was about 5 to 10 kilometers away and even though at one point in time I did miss death by seconds. I remember at the time that I was sleeping with of course the entire family at night time and a bomb just blew up next to my home and that bomb killed a person in that house and luckily that it missed myself and my older brother. We survived. Actually the bomb just blew up next to our door, next to our home. And actually we slept well until my parents woke us up and said, “Hey the bomb just blew up next to our house. We have to get out and move away.” And at that time I learned oh the bomb blew up just next door.
Question
What have your parents told you about life during the war?
Harris Tran:
Actually my mother during the war we couldn’t do anything. Whatever job we can do, we do it for survival, you know. Even though we earn meager money we still do it no matter what, because everyone tried to earn something so that we can survive during the war. Not much job we can do because it’s during the war. So my father was in the army but he retired after that and he was a bus driver. It’s not a bus, it’s a kind of tricycle vehicle, it had three wheels so he used that to make a living for our family so we can survive through the war.
Question
Did your mom do anything as well?
Harris Tran:
Yes, she did. She just had a small shop at a local supermarket. Actually it’s a kind of street market here. It’s similar to a street market here. She sold clothes, fabrics, all kinds of materials so we can make small money from that. So and you see they fed us with a small amount of money because it’s at war we couldn’t find any job – real job to make a living.
Question
What was it like having to constantly hide and be without a stable home during the war?
Harris Tran:
Actually it’s just in our neighborhood. We have people just dig a big kind of bunker. But it’s not actually a bunker but it’s called a “bunker” so people can hide in there. It’s like a sandbag. People put around their house but we dig underneath the foundation to build a small bunker so people can hide there. It’s whatever place that we can hide from bullets then we just hide no matter what. But that’s what people did at the time. We didn’t have any kind of strong material to build a strong bunker like that. We just dig underneath the foundation to make life there.
Question
What was your childhood like during the war?
Actually we were just having fun. We didn’t know what was happening surrounding us so we just play with other kids unless our parents pull us out of that and hiding. “So oh we know that there was something happening now.” So we just hide, but any chance that we could get out and we get out-we’re children. We don’t care, we don’t know death or life whatsoever. We just, “oh it’s play it’s fun. So okay fun so get out.”
Question
Did you have school during this time?
Harris Tran:
Yes we did but it was on and off. It’s not that we went to school on a daily basis. I remember we were off for a few months until the south collapsed then after that the school was established then we went back. But we were off at the time.
Question
Did you learn about the war in school?
Harris Tran:
No. At the time when I went before Saigon collapsed, then we went with normal school but after Saigon collapsed then what we learned was similar to that – when I look at North Korea now, you know children went to school they are indoctrinated with all kinds of communism. We were like that. We were similar to that so we learn about the leaders at the time that how the leaders created Vietnam, how communist fought for freedom, all kinds of that. They indoctrinated us with all kinds of that. It’s a kind of personal worship or leadership or something like that.
Question
Was there any discrimination between other Vietnamese people?
Harris Tran:
Yes. It happens after Saigon collapsed with the communist occupied the entire country. Then there were a lot of discrimination against those people who served in the old army which align with the US. So those people they put in jail or it’s called educational camps. Actually it’s a jail, it’s merely a jail, it’s a prison. So they got all those people and put them in jail even though my father had a small role in army but he retired befor[e the war. He got jail for I think for a few days but because he had nothing to provide to them so they released him. But a lot of people they got jail for a long long time even though 10 years, 15 years or you know. It’s has been long, it was long time. Even though children got discriminated too in education. Children who had parents serving in the new government or new army- I mean in communist army- then they got a lot of privileges such as they may easily get accepted into a good school. Even though when you take a test and if the test you got lower score, you still got accepted because of your parents serving in the new government. But for those children who parents serving in the old government then they had to get the very high score to get accepted. The difference obvious. Sometimes if you get into university, you have to take a test then even though the test, the children who parents communist then they can get for example 20 points you get accepted. But for children who parents serving in the old government, you have to get higher 25 or even 39 of course had to be higher to get accepted.
Question
Was your family ever discriminated against during the war?
Harris Tran:
During the war because at the time I was kind of small, I didn’t know that was actual discrimination supposed to be you know, but we just living our life. We just living our life, whatever happened to us then we try to overcome it. Difficulties or discrimination against us then we try to overcome. I actually remember at the time after ‘75 which is the year that Saigon collapsed, and we live under new government and they ration almost everything. You know the food, especially the food, if your family serve in the new government you can get good food, but if you serve in the old government the things different.
Question
What was life like right after the war?
Harris Tran:
Of course there’s a lot of restriction you know. There’s a lot of restriction even though restriction in movement you couldn’t just travel from one location to another location. You have to get permit from the local government, so that allow you to travel from one place to another. For example if you want to travel from lets say Berkeley to San Francisco, then you need a permit for it. It’s not merely you drive a car to drive there, no. You have to get a permit from the local government, “Oh what you want to go there, what purpose you are going there?”, so you have to get a permit otherwise they just seem they put you to jail. So there’s a lot of restriction and every on the way there was a lot of checkpoints. They check out on you.
Migrating to Canada and the United States
Question
What year and how old were you when you left Vietnam?
Harris Tran:
Actually, I left in ‘92. Actually, I came to Canada first under sponsorship of my oldest brother because he went there first. So he sponsor the entire family over. Then after that I got married with my wife here, and then I moved here in ‘95.
Question
Did you meet your wife in the U.S or Vietnam?
Harris Tran:
We met in Vietnam. We were in the same university and we met over there and then she went here under because her father was in a high position under old government. So he got jail for some time but after he got out and the U.S government sponsored those people over you know those people who serve under old government over to the U.S here. So their family was under that category so she went here and then after that I met her here.
Question
How long were you in Canada?
Harris Tran:
Actually I tried to cross oversea a few times but failed. Mostly because when I was there, in Vietnam, everyone at the age of eighteen had to serve their country. You had the join the army for at least 3 years. For a time Vietnam was fighting against Cambodia and they tried to establish something over there. At the time I had to join the army but my father didn’t want me to because most people from our neighborhood came back with their leg amputated. So of course they didn’t want me, my brother or sister to be like that so they tried to get us out of Vietnam no matter what. I tried to cross the sea a few times to the US, but i got caught and was jailed a few times and came back until my older brother could sponsor us over.
Question
Can you tell us about how your brother cosponsored you to come to Canada?
Harris Tran:
My oldest brother he crossed overseas and had the same issue as me. He was in his 2nd year of medical school and he was about 18 or 20. Another 2 years and he would be a doctor. But the government sent us a letter saying if he wanted to continue with school, he had to serve 3 years in the army. And my parents didn’t want that, you know. So he had to go hide. I remember that when he was in hiding at my aunts place, the local government sent people to check out our house. Every time we went out there were people watching us to see whether my brother somehow came home, they were gonna get him. So that’s why my parents tried to get him out, and luckily he got out. He wanted to go to the US but because the time it took (to get a VISA) he landed in Canada cause it took a shorter time. About 6 months to migrate to Canada.
Question
How long was your brother in hiding for?
Harris Tran:
He was hiding- he got into medical school in ‘76, but he got out of Vietnam in ‘78 or ‘79. He spent 1 or 2 years in hiding. He hid from one place to another, one night with one aunts house and another night in another place. But he rarely came home cause he knew when we came home he might get caught. So it took him about 1-2 years to get out.
Question
What was life like when you moved to the US?
Harris Tran:
The most struggles that we had was the language. When we tried to deal with daily activities, language is the key, and we didn’t understand anything. Even myself, I was a good student in school I was an excellent student, but when I came here I was a less than average student. Not because I couldn’t understand, just because of the language. I remember being very good at Math and Physics in Vietnam, but when I came here I struggled because I couldn’t understand what it said in the problem. I had to look up every word in the dictionary to understand the problem and then solve the problem. Even though math and physics, have very little words in them, I struggled.
Question
Were there any Vietnamese communities that allowed you to be close to home?
Harris Tran:
When we came here things were so strange. We were scared of meeting people because we couldn’t understand what they said. So when we met anyone we just tried to get away from them, because we couldn’t understand what they were saying.
Question
What city did you live in when you first moved to the US?
Harris Tran:
When I came here we lived in Chino, Chino Hills. Just around southern california.
Question
Is there a thriving Vietnamese population in Chino Hills?
Harris Tran:
Uh not many Vietnamese, they mostly occupy in Santa Ana. But I like it here, after spending years over here I have met a lot of people and they are very friendly.
Question
Have you been back to Vietnam since moving to the US?
Harris Tran:
Yeah I did a few times, but I haven’t been back for about 10 years.
Question
What was your biggest takeaway returning to Vietnam after all those years?
Harris Tran:
It changed a lot, when I came back there were a lot of things that I couldn’t recognize anymore, even my own street. Before people were very friendly cordial, helpful especially when you were in need. But when I came back people seemed like they don’t care about anything anymore, they just care about their own lives and not anything around them. Just trying to survive and make a living. In my old town, even though we were poor we still took care of others when they were in need. But when I came back I didn’t see that.
Reflections after the war
Question
Has the Vietnam War significantly impacted who you are today?
Harris Tran:
It’s hard for me to compare before and after the war because I was a small child before the war. We couldn’t appreciate what was good, what was bad. After the war, we mostly focused on school. It’s the culture in Vietnam, to mostly focus on studying how to get higher education and how to achieve in life. We didn’t care much about life surrounding us.
Question
Did you bring the aspects of your culture with you when you came to the US?
Harris Tran:
Yes, when I came here, I was 22 and had to start high school even though I was in my 2nd year of university in Vietnam. Even though I was bored, I had no choice. It’s the culture of Vietnamese people, higher education is key to success in life. Over here we didn’t have anything other than our education.
Question
Having come into the US as an immigrant do you have any words of wisdom?
Harris Tran:
Just working hard — when I came here I slept only 2-3 hours a day. In the daytime I had to go to work to make a living for myself and at night I had to study because language was the barrier for me to adapt to this new life. I believe that most
Question
Do you feel more Vietnamese or American?
Harris Tran:
I have been living here (US) for over 30 years. I came here where I was 24, now I’m 58. I think- it’s hard to say. Being here there’s some things I can’t adapt to, but even being back there (Vietnam) there were some things I couldn’t adapt to either. It’s kinda in the middle, cause all my childhood was in Vietnam and then suddenly came here with a new life. There are a lot of things to learn and to know, so it’s kinda in the middle. But there’s still something in me that feels more Vietnamese.