Crossing the Mekong River
Interviewer: Are there any stories or memories that you dad told you about? What was your favorite?
Interviewee: One of my favorites, I mentioned also in my documentary that I am making right now, is the time that he swam across the Mekong River. Uhm, I will say a couple. But, basically he said that it was a very dark night and he was, planning to escape because like, he had already asked his parents. He told me, “I had to ask my parents because it was the only way I would feel a sense of peace in myself, if I ask my parents if I can leave. Because if I don’t leave right now, they’re gonna kill me, they’re gonna find me.” Because basically, they knew that he was part of the other side, they were like you may not be Communist, but you’re on the other side. You’re our enemy. And so, my dad, he was very well-known in his leadership with anti-communism and stuff like that. And so, he asked his parents and his parents were like “yea, just go,” and so he left home and he went with his cousin- he went with someone else- to go and try to escape from Laos to Thailand, you know, to seek refuge and he thought that Thailand would be safer, well that’s another story.
And he basically escaped from Laos and he met with his cousin and he told me that he went to speak to.. you know to distract the people that are watching because there are obviously guards around the Mekong River because they know that there are people trying to escape Laos from communism. And he was just talking to the person at the house near the Mekong River, and whenever he’d talked to this [person], his cousin would call and say “oh, I found something” or whatever and my dad said that he left, “oh I gotta go, oh I gotta go meet up with my cousin.” And that’s when he put most of his clothes in his bag, and him and his cousin, took the dip and just swam across the Mekong River and then he said he was swimming, swimming, swimming, and when he finally hit sand he still kept swimming because he was like “oh my god water, or sand,” and he didn’t realize because he had been swimming for so long, he just didn’t look back. And he said that at that time he cried, because… and knowing my dad he doesn’t really cry at all. He is a very, very strong and very prideful person, but he said that he lost his country and he is a very, very patriotic person. It just runs through his veins, and runs through me. He is a very prideful person.