What We Remember, What We Inherit
The Refugee as Abolition: Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the Fall of Saigon
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The Refugee as Abolition: Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the Fall of Saigon -
Chersa Lo
The fall of Saigon occurred on April 30th, 1975, when North Vietnamese tanks entered the Presidential Palace in Saigon (currently Ho Chi Minh City), South Vietnam. This year, April 30, 2025, will be the 50th anniversary of the fall of Saigon and the end of the Vietnamese War for the United States, and is a good opportunity to look at the impacts the war had on the people—specifically the Hmong people. The Secret War, a covert operation during the Vietnam War, saw the Hmong recruited by the CIA to fight against the communist forces in Laos, called the Pathet Lao. Hmong soldiers would help families escape to Thailand, fight against the Pathet Lao, and secure bases of operation for U.S. soldiers. Despite their sacrifices, the Secret War remains largely unknown and only partially acknowledged by U.S. military operations, with many memories of the Hmong people not fitting into official history. Memories, especially in displaced communities, are not fixed records but instead a living process shaped by trauma, preserved through storytelling, and tied to cultural identity. Many of the Hmong people’s physical belongings had to be given away when they resettled in different countries, but through storytelling and cultural practices, they survive and are passed onto the next generations (Vang, 2021). For the Hmong, who have no homeland but a rich collective history, memory becomes both a tool for survival and connection to the past.
This past spring, my grandfather passed away at 71, and in Hmong culture, we hold large funerals so family and friends from all over can come and commemorate his life. As a second-generation Hmong American, I was not able to speak to him in Hmong; it wasn’t the primary language that we used. Despite the difference in language, we spent a lot of time together where he played the Qeej and told me stories while we walked. I’m the only kid of his grandchildren who vaguely remembers what he was like before his stroke. He suffered 3 more strokes after, with the last taking his life in May 2024. His first stroke reduced a lot of what he could do; he regained some strength over time, but he never fully recovered. In my attempt to depict the afterlives of the war, I wanted to explore the history of my family and the effects of the fall of Saigon on them. To achieve this, I interviewed my dad, Xeng Lo, explored his memories of my grandfather, Neej Lo, looked into his experience as a refugee, and investigated how war lived through them and permeates all our communities.
My dad, Xeng Lo, was born in Laos in 1976 and spent 10 years in the Ban Vinai Refugee Camp until he and his family resettled in California, sponsored by my grandpa’s sister. They moved to Texas to assimilate to life in the United States and then to Wausau, Wisconsin, where they started their family.
What are your inherited memories of escape and living in the refugee camps?
Xeng Lo: I don’t remember running to Thailand from Laos, but what I do know are the stories your Poj (Father's mother) told me about the escape. Your Poj and her sister told us what happened and the suffering that we went through running from the Pathet Lao in the jungle. Your Grandma was very hungry and because they were running—she didn’t have enough food to produce milk for me. She always tells the story about how she would look for whatever she could find to feed me, and that we were suffering the whole way. She talks about many people dying along the way and making the choice to leave me behind because we were without any food and they were afraid that they could get killed by the communist soldiers. I cried and cried which risked everyone getting caught, so there were times that they almost left me for their safety. She told me that she did leave me behind one time, but she couldn’t bring herself to follow through with it so she went back to get me. I can’t imagine crossing the jungles, mountains, and rivers to the refugee camp. I don’t remember how we got across because I was so young, but your Poj tells me it was terrifying, and they weren’t sure if the Thai people would be friendly on the other side of the Mekong. My dad was fighting somewhere else and was shot while helping people escape to Thailand and had to walk for days from Laos to Thailand to get treated. As a woman who had to go through that herself, it must have been pretty traumatizing for her.
For me and the camp, we stayed there for 10 years; all I can remember is that there weren’t many things that you could do other than play with other kids. We weren’t allowed to leave the camp, and there were guards who kept watch, but the camp was bigger than the guards could cover so some people would sneak out to gather things. There was a school there too so that we could learn to read and write, but there weren’t any opportunities for you to prosper. People would come about once a week to distribute food, which we lived off of. We built our house out of bamboo because that was the only material we had when the refugee camp became overcrowded. I would go with some money from your Poj, and buy things to sell to the Thai people, like a watermelon I would cut up and sell to anyone who was passing by. People would come and tour the refugee camp and buy paj ntaub (Hmong story cloths) your Poj made.
We were split into 9 communities, and the camp was surrounded by a fence and barbed wire. Thai soldiers were by the gates so that we wouldn’t leave, but some people would cut the fence, and kids would get through to go look for food. Your Poj would give me money, and I would go with my uncle to buy and sell things to make money. I would set up my shop next to the road and go buy something like watermelon, then I would cut it up and try to sell it to anyone walking by. I think that I was able to use these personal skills to help me in school because I was never afraid of talking to kids or teachers. After the fear of having nothing to eat and selling to people on the street, asking for help and talking to people just came easily for me.
What did Grandpa do while he was in the military?
XL: Unfortunately, your grandpa didn’t like talking about the war, so we don’t fully know what he did. I think maybe he had PTSD because he never spoke about the war and his responsibilities, but at the funeral, we learned about the people he saved. Grandpa probably didn’t talk much about what happened in the war because of how bad it was. His brother-in-law got blown up next to him, he had to travel days with gunshot wounds in the jungle, and we don’t know what other memories he might have about it. I was a kid, so I don’t have all the memories about my dad’s history, about what he did during the war, the lives he saved. He was a radioman who led a small group of boys to call for supplies and help people escape. At the funeral, seven families came and talked about how Grandpa found them and helped them cross the Mekong into Thailand. They were the ones who told us that while they were saving them, your grandpa had gotten shot while they were fleeing. The group he had led during the war also came and talked about how the radioman was the heart of the team.
What was it like leaving the refugee camp?
XL: When I was about 9 years old, our names came up to leave. Our friends and family would follow us around until we got on the bus to go to the transit camps. We had to sell or leave everything that we had to our friends and family because we couldn’t bring anything. I remember looking at my friends and cousins while we were leaving, and I was scared to head into the unknown. When we got to the Phanat Nikhom transitional camp, we got medical checkups and education to prepare us for the U.S., but we still really didn’t know. I didn’t have any friends at the transitional camp, so I was pretty lonely at the time.
What I remember from the airport is that we were kind of separated from the people who were there with regular tickets. I felt like an outsider looking at the people walking around with their carry-on luggage, while those of us from the camps were brought to a separate area. Some people were going to different places like Australia and Canada. I remember being brought to a different place than the regular people at the terminal; it was super dark at the time, but there was a huge plane. I remember getting on and thinking if I was ever going to see my friends again. I thought that when I got onto the plane it was going to be mostly Asian people, but there were mostly white people. I will never forget this kind flight attendant who looked out for me; I was feeling sick, and she came to ask if I was okay; she gave me a blanket and watched over me during the trip.
How was it transitioning to life in the United States?
XL: It was scary; we were lucky that we had our aunt in Texas who sponsored us. We didn’t know how to use the toilet, we didn’t know the social norms, and we had never even used shampoo before. English was so hard to learn; we practiced in the camps, but it isn’t the same as using it. The ESL (English as a Second Language) teachers were the reason that we were able to get through school. Those teachers worked so hard to help us learn English, and I think that’s why everything was able to click. It was still hard because I was the translator for my mom and dad when we went to the hospital and for important documents, but I didn’t understand the terminology. I’m grateful that there are qualified interpreters now in hospitals. The only subject that I was good at was math because it was universal. It was because of the help of the teachers that I was able to do well in school and go to college, and your mom was able to become valedictorian.
We faced racism everywhere we went because we were different, and the people who lived there before us made sure that we knew we were different. When we moved to Wisconsin, it was especially worse. In the beginning, they were welcoming, but as more of Hmong refugees moved to Wausau, they were less welcoming. I remember one time I was leaving the library with my friend and we were both talking in Hmong, then an old lady came up to us and said, “Don’t you know that you’re supposed to speak English here? Do you know how many of our men died to rescue you guys over in Vietnam?” and I think it’s because she didn’t know we weren’t Vietnamese. I don’t know what possessed her to feel the need to come to correct us and point out that we should be appreciative of what happened in the war. In the early 90s, there was a lot of racism going on, and I think it’s because they didn’t know how to handle our growing population.
Overall, what were the impacts of the fall of Saigon for you?
XL: War happens because of the way humans are, and there are a lot of people out there who will harm others to get what they want. A lot of people died and did bad things, but looking back now, I didn’t go through all the things Grandpa and Grandma went through; we suffered a lot because we lost everything that we had. But I am grateful; I am grateful that I was able to come here and live so that I can have you guys and provide for you. What happened back then was tragic; we were so poor, but despite the poverty, when we compared it to our lives in Laos, we were rich.
It is strange when people expect us to be endlessly grateful. Yes, we’ve found safety, but that safety came at a cost to our homeland, and we had no part in creating the conditions that led to the war. I am grateful for the life I’ve built here, but the expectation of gratefulness ignores what was lost – our homeland, our culture, and the people left behind. We were uprooted from our peaceful life and had to fend for ourselves in America. We built a life here not because we were handed something, but because we worked hard and persevered through our struggles. Many of the refugees suffered worse here because they couldn’t adapt, while others found opportunities.
Personal reflection
My grandpa would take me on car rides and make sure I had a smile on my face. We used to go on walks, which I would call “walking talking,” and though there was a language barrier, we happily continued chatting. His strokes took a lot out of him; he had to learn how to walk and speak again. The time he spent in the hospitals became longer each time, and he wasn’t able to drive or work anymore. Despite that, the smile on his face was unbreakable, and I wondered what memories and thoughts he had. The funeral was hard, but I was able to hear a lot of stories about my grandfather there, how he led a team of 15-year-old boys to bring families to refugee camps in Thailand. He studied French, and his favorite saying was “comment allez-vous?” which means “how are you?” and he would repeat the saying over and over without any other words.
During my time at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, I learned a lot about the Hmong people, and the book Where Rivers Part by Kao Kalia Yang helped illustrate the experiences of running from war and being a refugee. These stories echo the experiences of my own family's history. I often think of the strength they showed in the refugee camp, navigating the harsh and uncertain environments while finding ways to provide for themselves. Their resilience shaped my understanding of our journey, not just as a story of survival, but one of perseverance and hope.
I see the ghosts of war, diaspora, poverty, trauma, assimilation, and racism in the actions of my parents and grandparents. Their habits, like never leaving a plate empty because they know what it is like to be hungry, keeping clothes in suitcases in case they need to flee again, or holding tightly to precious objects and photographs for the ones they left behind, carry the weight of these memories. These actions reflect their enduring strength and resilience, qualities passed down to me through their stories and sacrifices. The ability to maintain spirit, even in the darkest times, inspires me to view our family’s journey as one of immense courage and pride.
While the story of my family, and my people, is tragic, it is not the same feeling that I hold with me. The Hmong people are resilient and proud, and we have survived against all odds. I recognize the sacrifices of my family not as a burden I carry with me through my life, but as actions that strengthen me from the people who love and care for me so that I could be where I am today. I love my family, I miss my grandpa, and they will shine like gold in my heart. Forever and always.
