The Girl in the Picture

by Denise Chong

  As soon as Kim heard the suggestion of a trip to Moscow, her mind registered one thing: opportunity! Cubana Airlines returning from Moscow to Havana refueled in Canada. She had heard it said: “Canada is very open, it is easy to stop there.” Rumor had made its way through the university several times about Cuban students on scholarship to Moscow supposedly recalled by the regime but never showing up back in Cuba. The Vietnamese wife of a Cuban, supposedly unhappy with her husband’s philandering ways, had taken their daughter on a visit to Hanoi; on the return flight she was known to have been in transit through Moscow, but she too never showed in Havana. Rumor and speculation was that those students, and the woman and her daughter, had stopped in Canada, for good.

  “Oh—honeymoon in Moscow is a good idea!” Kim said of the friend’s suggestion.

  This is a gift from God, she told herself. How she and Toan would manage to escape, she realized she had no idea. She calmed herself: God will take care of that. Just take it easy, and go.

  The response of the Vietnamese embassy to the couple’s travel request was perfunctory: “Toan can go. Kim cannot. You went to Mexico City and so you have already been outside Cuba once this year.”

  “What? My husband go alone on his honeymoon?”

  Kim laughed and laughed, and those at the embassy did too. Within days, she and Toan had tickets on Cubana Airlines departing September 29 and returning October 15. Kim set her sights on overcoming the next hurdle: to get transit visas from the Canadian government. She saw the visa as helping to open the door of her cage so that she could escape—with or without her husband—from Vietnam to the West.

  AT TWO IN THE MORNING, KIM AND TOAN were number three and four in line at the Canadian embassy. Every Western embassy in Havana was besieged by Cubans clamoring to apply to leave the country. Canada, with its liberal immigration policy and generous social assistance, was regarded as a highly desirable place to live. In part because of growing numbers of defectors off international flights, and a rise in the international smuggling of people across borders, Canada had imposed visitor and transit visa requirements on nationals from selected countries. The task of keeping out visitors whose real intent was to remain in Canada fell to Canadian immigration officers abroad.

  Kim and Toan’s interview was short. “Where are you going? Why?” In short order the Canadian officer refused them, providing, as was his perogative, no explanation. Kim was as unperturbed as Toan, but for different reasons. She told Toan confidently, “The Vietnamese embassy in Moscow knows me and will help us.” Normally, airlines made sure passengers had the transit visa for the return flight home before allowing them to board the outbound flight, but Cubana was lax about the requirement for Vietnamese passengers, knowing they often obtained readily the necessary visa in Moscow.

  Never had Kim felt so strong, so in control in her life. Prayer helped her maintain an outward calm. She confided her intentions to Nuria: “Mami, I have decided that, if I can get a visa to Canada, I am going forever, even on my own. If Toan can get a visa, and he wants to come, then we will go together.”

  Kim packed her small rattan suitcase, as did Toan, with clothes for a two-week vacation. In her purse, she put her cosmetics bag, painkillers, a Nikon camera and two souvenirs of her past life: the negatives from their wedding; and the green mirror from the toiletry set that she had picked out in the Bonn department store.

  Nuria surprised the rest of the Diaz family by insisting that she was coming to the airport to see the couple off. “But you never go! You hate saying goodbye!” Yamilen remarked. Of the small crowd there, Nuria was the only one weeping. Kim hugged her. “Mami, don’t cry.” Kim turned to chat with the others, hoping by her laughter to divert attention from Nuria, who was behaving as if distraught. Kim called to her sharply: “Mami!” Then, more gently, “I am only gone for two weeks!”

  “WE WILL HELP YOU TO SPEND TIME IN Moscow,” minders at the Vietnamese embassy said to Kim and Toan. If it wasn’t a minder’s presence keeping Kim from divulging her plans to Toan, it was somebody within earshot—an embassy worker or one or several other Vietnamese travelers. Even in the privacy of their guest room at the embassy, Kim dared say nothing, for fear the room was bugged. However, she efficiently took care of the business of getting transit visas: she quickly got in hand a letter, arranged by their minder at her request, from the Vietnamese embassy to the Canadian embassy, introducing Kim Phuc and Bui Toan. A receptionist at the Canadian embassy took their passports and told them their visas would be ready in twenty-four hours.

  Later that day, on a walking tour of Red Square, Kim maneuvered Toan and herself away from the group. “If I get the visa, I want to stay in Canada,” she told Toan jokingly, testing his reaction. He took it that way; Cubans on their flight had joked in the same manner.

  When they collected their passports with the transit visas stamped inside, Kim prayed in silence: “God, help me to explain to Toan my goal.” On one of the last days of their stay, their minder took them to a free market, helpfully pointing out bargains and gifts worth taking back to Cuba. Toan went on a shopping spree—a Walkman, jeans, T-shirts, souvenir Russian dolls that nestle one inside the other. He didn’t understand why Kim tried to discourage his purchases. He had to insist several times: “But I like this!” Kim forced herself to join in the buying, though playing in her mind was an image of her rattan suitcase, packed with these new purchases, sitting unclaimed in Havana’s airport.

  At the airport in Moscow, Toan was held up at passport control. Had not a Russian-speaking Cuban student intervened, he would have missed the flight. The student later explained that the Russian official was trying to extract a bribe before letting him pass.

  Kim and Toan occupied two seats in a row of three: she was in the middle, he in the window seat, a Cuban in the aisle seat. Kim checked: the closest Vietnamese passenger was three rows away. Even if he could overhear, Kim was not worried, knowing that he’d married a Cuban and that he and his wife had chosen to remain in Havana.

  “I cannot continue my life in Cuba,” was how Kim began her talk with Toan. By her words and tone, she displayed a formidable will and resolve that few outside her family knew she had. Her characteristic smile and laughter were nowhere. One moment she was forceful: “For certain, I do not want to go back to Cuba, or to Vietnam. I really want to stay in Canada.” The next, tender: “Even though we are husband and wife, if you don’t want to go—if you don’t want to stay with me—that is okay.”

  Toan, his nerves still frayed by the experience at passport control in the airport, was shocked, then in torment. He felt as though he was being asked to choose between his country and family, and his wife. He could not bear the thought of being banished from Vietnam. His family respected and idolized him, depended on him to return to help them. But what of his future with his new wife? “A husband and wife should not be separated,” he argued.

  Kim was reprimanding: “Why do you want to return to Cuba or to Vietnam? Life is nothing in Cuba or Vietnam.” Then, reassuring: “Don’t worry about the future. One day we will go back to Vietnam. Not now, but one day. For now, we will sacrifice much. We will lose everything in Cuba and we will suffer from missing our families. But, once we are in Canada, we will still try to help them.”

  Toan was afraid of the repercussions of a failed escape attempt. What if the Canadian government turned them back to Cuba, or Vietnam? He saw himself in jail. Even if Canada accepted them, how would he and Kim fare without family or friends? Or money? They calculated; between them they had three hundred dollars left. What did either of them know about Canada? Toan said he knew nothing. Kim knew it was cold, that its flag had a symbol of a red maple leaf—she had coveted such a pin on a student at the Moscow youth festival. But regardless, Toan could not see past the difficulty of finding out how to stay in Canada.

  Kim spoke with finality: “My number-one goal is to stay in Canada. I don’t have a number-two.”

  For the next several hours, until the end o
f the flight, the two sat in silence. Toan kept to himself his thought that the best outcome would be that the difficulty of escape would force them to turn back. Kim made one last effort to influence her husband’s choice: “If you return alone from your honeymoon, people will say you are crazy!”

  Noticing that the seat next to the Vietnamese passenger three rows away had been vacated, Kim sat herself down there. “I have an idea,” she began. She elaborated, telling him that her life as a famous victim of war was probably not what he imagined, that because of her fame the regime sought to control her life. She ended by asking what she desperately needed to know: “Do you know how I can stop in Canada?”

  The Vietnamese man reeled. “Why do you want to stop in Canada? Other people want to, and do, but you, you should not. If you do, it will cause Vietnam great embarrassment!” He was returning from a visit there, and he spoke enthusiastically about how Vietnam was thriving and opening up to foreign investors. He said it was not the poor or isolated country Kim had left years ago. “You are a very important person,” he told her. “You can bring Vietnam and Cuba closer together.”

  “If Vietnam is so much better, why are you staying with your family in Cuba? If you don’t believe in going back to Vietnam, why should I? You chose Cuba; I will stay in Canada.” They both laughed.

  The plane began its descent into Gander, Newfoundland, Canada’s most easterly province. At the terminal, there was a delay in opening the plane’s doors. It seemed the flight attendants had intended only Cubans to deplane, but some Russians had protested, insisting that they had a right to do some duty-free shopping in the airport. The captain announced that no one could remain on board during refueling, ending the dispute. Kim uttered an instruction to Toan: “Leave your bag behind so that they think we are coming back.” Still maintaining his silence, he complied, leaving behind a bag packed with his Walkman, a camera, and the light clothing he’d planned to change into upon arrival back in Havana.

  THE DEPLANING PASSENGERS MOVED DOWN a wide hallway with several turns. Kim took hold of Toan’s hand. She was certain someone among her fellow passengers must be thinking about staying and knew how. Everyone looks nervous, she thought, choosing finally to keep her eye on a Cuban father holding onto the hand of his daughter, perhaps four years old. The hallway ended at double doors leading into a huge concourse, with a duty-free shop and food counters. On the wall at one end, oversized letters spelled CANADA, above a flag with a red maple leaf. At the other end, large clocks displayed the time in Gander, Montreal, New York, London and Moscow.

  Seeing the Cuban and his daughter standing around, apparently waiting out the refueling stop, Kim left Toan to investigate the concourse. It was crowded with passengers coming and going. From time to time, she spotted Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers patrolling it, but she was afraid to approach, thinking that, as in Vietnam and Cuba, they could be state security agents. Time passed; their flight to Havana would be called soon. Suddenly, Kim felt despondent. I can’t go back. It will be terrible if I turn back now. She looked around for the Cuban and his daughter. She could see them nowhere. She fought to control her panic. I cannot rely on anybody, she told herself. I am going to have to find my own way. She signaled to Toan, who was chatting with a Vietnamese passenger, that she was going to the washroom. In a locked cubicle, she contemplated, briefly, staying hidden there.

  Back outside, she closed her eyes and prayed: “God, please open a door, please.” When she opened them, she noticed a set of double doors, not the same ones by which deplaning passengers had entered the concourse. On the other side she saw, in the midst of seven or eight Cubans and Russians, the Cuban and his daughter.

  Kim pushed through the doors, and asked the group, in Spanish, what they were doing there. “¿Que estan haciendo aqui?”

  “Queremos quedarnos aqui en Canada,” several replied in unison. They wanted to stay.

  “¡Yo quiero tambien!” Kim was exultant. “¿Que tengo que hacer ahora?”

  “Usted tiene que dar su passaporte a ese hombre.” In telling her what to do in order to, like them, stay in Canada, someone pointed to a gentleman behind a window. Kim went back out the double doors and called out to Toan.

  Kim took two passports and pushed them towards the man. She switched to English: “I want to stay.”

  “Welcome to Canada.” The Canadian customs agent used the greeting dictated by Canadian regulation for foreigners entering Canada. As he was instructing Kim and Toan to wait with the others, one of the Cubans broke from the group and lunged at the window. He asked for, and got, his passport back. Kim, tension drained from her body, spoke gently to the Cuban. “Why are you crying?” His voice breaking, the Cuban said he would miss his family in Cuba. “You can sponsor them later,” Kim urged. “Staying here is the best way.”

  Some minutes later, a Canadian official led the group, minus the Cuban who’d changed his mind, into a small waiting room. Its windows on one side looked onto the hallway through which they had entered the concourse, on the other, onto the runway. Kim watched the passengers from their flight pass along the hallway, then reappear to board the Cubana aircraft on the tarmac. Behind the last passenger, the door closed, and the plane taxied and took off.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  NANCY POCOCK WAS MYSTIFIED BY the message left. Her staff said a Vietnamese woman who spoke Spanish—Nancy’s office help answered her telephone in that language—had called from Gander, Newfoundland: please call back. Must be a mistake, Nancy thought.

  And now the woman was calling back, speaking this time in English. “You know about the girl in the famous picture from the Vietnam war—the little girl running in the picture?”

  “Yeah!” Nancy’s voice was low, gruff. “I’ve been to Vietnam, and I know the picture.” How many times had she seen it, and the same thought had crossed her mind: I tremble at the wrong done to a child.

  “Well, I am the girl in the picture.”

  IT WAS MERLE RATNER WHO HAD SUGGESTED Nancy. Kim’s first call from Gander had been to Merle in New York, to ask her for a contact in Toronto. Having studied the wall map in the lobby of their motel, Kim and Toan had chosen Toronto as a city to settle in. The word from other refugees was that Canada’s warmest city was Vancouver. But, seeing that Vancouver was at the other end of the country from Gander, and that the bus fare there would be more money than they had left, they had looked for something nearer the middle of the map. Kim’s pronunciation of Toronto had come out toronja, meaning pomelo [grapefruit] in Spanish. “I like that sound,” Kim told Toan. “We’ll go there.”

  Though they had not met, Nancy and Merle were known to each other from the antiwar movement, when Nancy took in American draft dodgers and, later, Vietnamese refugees who landed on her doorstep. She’d since become just as well known for helping refugees fleeing El Salvador during the violent eleven-year civil war that began in 1979 when leftists clashed with government forces there. She had personally ferried several through the United States to a country that would have them, Canada. In Toronto, she established and ran several programs, mainly for refugees, under the auspices of the Quaker organization.

  Kim and Toan’s first concerns in Toronto were both urgent and mundane: getting on social assistance, finding somewhere to live, enrolling in a government-sponsored English course for new immigrants. Nancy was there every step of the way, and she guided them through the process of applying for refugee status and, eventually, citizenship. Unlike most who arrive in Canada claiming to be political refugees, Kim and Toan were spared a hearing to decide whether Canada would permit them to stay or would return them to their home country. The immigration lawyer Nancy found for them successfully argued that the Canadian government should grant quick and confidential approval on “humanitarian grounds.” In the written application, the lawyer detailed Kim Phuc’s strong objections to having been made a propaganda tool of the Vietnamese regime, the upheaval and misery it had brought her, and her desire, in seeking a haven for herself
and her husband in Canada, in her words, “to make my life quiet.”

  The one-year waiting period to obtain permanent papers after being granted refugee status came and went for the couple. Immigration officials shrugged off a few weeks’ delay as normal. But the couple felt their idle lives to be on hold; residency entitled one to work—they could not afford a work permit—and to attend college at the lower tuition fees of a domestic, rather than foreign, student. Another six months passed, and still there was no sign of the papers. Finally, the immigration department concluded the family’s file to be lost; the paperwork would have to be redone. Long before then, Toan had been reduced to pleading with the landlady not to go through with a rent hike that would put them out on the street, and lining up weekly at a charity food bank for food and clothing, including food and diapers for their new baby. Their son, born in April 1994, was named Thomas, a name Kim chose from the Bible. He was given a Vietnamese name as well, Hoang, meaning “good prospects.”

  Driven by their desperate financial straits and their guilt at being unable to send money to their families in Vietnam, Kim relinquished her plans to “stay quiet.” With Nancy’s introduction, she sought the advice of the lawyer who would become her agent, Michael Levine, who helped set up her first foray into publicity: a portrait in the May 1995 issue of Life magazine.

  In the spring of 1995, the couple’s permanent papers finally arrived. By this time, news editors from around the world were planning stories to mark the upcoming twentieth anniversary of the fall of Saigon to the Communists. One British tabloid, The Mail on Sunday, decided to try to revisit one of the war’s famous pictures. Acting on information from a confidential Canadian immigration file obtained from a top-level American source, it dispatched a reporter and photographer to Toronto, in search of a woman named Kim Phuc.