Late Blossom

by Laura Lam

  While exploring ways to leave the country legally, I was compelled to tell Andrew the situation in Sai Gon. I wrote to him on 20 March:

  “It’s 1:30 pm and I am at my office. Tonight the curfew will start at 10pm and last until 6am. Yesterday we learned that the Viet Cong had already taken four provinces of Central Highlands and people are fleeing to Sai Gon. They are advancing at a fast rate and I think they will take over Sai Gon in a few weeks time. I couldn’t sleep last night because of worry. Did I tell you that I had bought a smart suitcase from the Central Market (first time that I own a suitcase!)? It’s dark pink, with strong gold locks. It’s just about big enough for my new day-clothes, some photo albums, and all your letters.”

  The ARVN regime was still in control of two areas in the Central Highlands: Hue, the former imperial city, and Da Nang, the most important seaport in Central Viet Nam. However, President Thieu issued an order to withdraw from Hue and to defend Da Nang, “at all costs.” Ironically, when more government troops arrived in Da Nang, instead of defending the city, they started looting and raping, taking advantage of the chaos as civilians tried to flee. Four days later, a women’s army of the National Liberation Front marched on Da Nang, captured the city, and restored order.

  Two days before Da Nang fell, civilians and ARVN soldiers had tried to escape. They fought for space on any plane or ship out of the city. In one of the more violent incidents, ARVN soldiers opened fire on each other. They forced their way onto a plane sent from Sai Gon to rescue civilians. More than a thousand civilians tried desperately to board that plane. It finally took off with two hundred ARVN soldiers, two women, and a baby whose mother had been left behind, crying hysterically on the tarmac. Before the plane left the runway, an angry ARVN soldier on the ground threw a grenade at it, damaging one of the wings. The plane flew into a clear sky and banked southward. It fell into the South China Sea, killing all those on board.

  A letter from Andrew, dated 29 March, was full of urgency. He mentioned Mr Terry Cope, a New Zealander, who would be contacting me sometime soon and would get me out. He would suggest marriage as a way of getting me through the immigration formalities, and I was to go ahead with it. We couldn’t afford to be sensitive and Mr Cope, Andrew added, was reputedly a nice man and not looking for someone to sleep with. “As soon as you land in Hong Kong,” Andrew said, “you become my responsibility and he knows that, so you will probably not see him again after his work is completed. That is the arrangement.”

  Andrew assumed I’d received my air tickets by this time. In the event I couldn’t contact him about my travel date, he gave me emer- gency phone numbers and addresses of possible contacts in Hong Kong.

  “There is a further plan, love, in case anything goes wrong. If all other plans fail, then I will arrange for transit by sea, but that is as a final resort. I am sorry I am going away next week and cannot write from Jakarta but I think we now sit and wait for developments. This is the most difficult time of all, for you Jasmine, and I understand the mental agony you are going through, but I think we are going to succeed. I know you will write, I know I will see you soon, I know you will soon be free. You know that I love you.”

  The air tickets came and I was most anxious to meet Mr Terry Cope. But to my great disappointment, he never arrived. He had informed Andrew that there would not be enough time for the Vietnamese government to issue the necessary exit permits or passports. At the same time, a marriage blanc with a Frenchman living in Hong

  Kong was arranged by Andrew, but that too failed for the same reason.

  Andrew then attempted to secure a passport via the Viet Nam Consulate in Hong Kong by using a friend of his in the Hong Kong Immigration Department as an intermediary. This friend also had a Chinese friend who came to Sai Gon regularly on business and who, in turn, would try to get me out. But this plan never materialized either.

  On the evening of 8 April, I wrote to Andrew and described the bombing of the Presidential Palace. I woke up in the night and wrote a second letter to him:

  “Two nights ago sixty rockets hit Sai Gon and many were killed, including a family of seven. Some witnesses were interviewed by the media and they said how terrified they were at the scenes. If people don’t get killed, they will die from fear. Shortly after the bombing this morning there was an announcement that all government agencies and businesses will not be open tomorrow. I don’t imagine there will be any letter from you until the 24 hours curfew is lifted and things re-open.”

  I received a telegram confirming Andrew’s plan for me to depart by sea on 12 April. He had advised me in an earlier letter to disguise myself as a poor Chinese widow for the journey. He told me not to bring along a suitcase but rather a small travel bag. That day, I waited anxiously at my office and counted the hours, but Mr Law Keung never appeared. When I turned up again at home, my family were shocked to see me. I told them that the ship had not yet arrived and that I was still planning to leave the country to find better work overseas. They were happy to see me back home. My little sister clung to me, insisting that she did not want me to leave home at all.

  A series of letters from Andrew continued to arrive about various escape methods, including the following one:

  Another plan which I have started is as follows: A Hong Kong Chinese man with a British passport will come, and go through a marriage ceremony. After a time, if the government then allows people to leave who are married, you could then go out. This may be safer than marrying a Westerner because even if the Viet Cong take over the government, they are still likely to let married people out and a Chinese man is likely to go in and out more easily. I will know more about this when my friend rings me tonight and will send another letter about it.

  Another plan I have started is through the Canadian Embassy in Sai Gon. My friend has asked his friend in the Canadian Embassy to help you out by whatever means he can. If a Canadian rings you then do all you can to help him. I do not know how he will arrange things but he will be able to judge best.

  Another possibility is to transfer you to an American company and exit under American protection. I am having dinner tomorrow night with John Durkin of Esso to ask him about that, but it will depend on how certain the American protection is.

  There is another possibility with passports which I do not want to discuss in a letter, but which I am also working on. It is very complicated.

  “One of these methods must succeed. But an important thing, Jasmine, is for you to keep trying yourself in Sai Gon, in any way you can think of. What about your American friend who offered to help sometime ago? Can you talk to him? Americans have privileged status and they may approve an exit permit if you marry him. Try it, please, it is so much easier from Sai Gon than from here.”

  The “American friend” mentioned by Andrew was Arjay, whom I had met earlier at a USAID party. Arjay was an American civilian with olive skin, in his late fifties. He was highly emotional, and given to outbursts of anger for reasons unknown to me. Sometimes his face would turn lobster red from having consumed a large amount of alcohol. He was fluent in several languages and talked a great deal about himself. He offered to help me get out of the country and suggested I bring my suitcase and stay at his apartment. According to him, the US Embassy would soon gather Americans in groups at a special location, and evacuate them by helicopters in the night. The US authorities did not want to deal with the problem of picking up individuals from his or her residence because of the curfew. Although given no specific date for the evacuation, he believed he would be leaving Sai Gon within a week or so. Arjay said, “If you are not here when they call me, I will have to leave without you. With the curfew, it would be impossible for me to find you or to get you to the departure point at night.”

  “In that case, can I bring my suitcase and stay at your apartment from tonight?”

  “Certainly.”

  I arrived at his place and met his maid, a woman in her forties. After explaining my situation, I asked, “Auntie! May I stay with
you in your room until my departure?”

  “Of course you can, my dear! You are very welcome to sleep in my room. However, there is a guest bedroom and Sir may want you to stay in the guest room. In either case, I am happy that you come here while waiting.”

  Arjay was very pleasant toward me and he talked about his wife and children in America.

  When I returned to his apartment on the second evening I found him reading one of Andrew’s letters. I’d told him about my relationship with Andrew and that Andrew was trying to get me out of the country. Caught by surprise, Arjay was now clearly embarrassed. He immediately handed the letter back to me.

  “How dare you do this to me?” I said in an angry voice.

  “I’m sorry,” he stammered and started to walk away.

  I was seething, but I couldn’t find the right words to convey my anger. I simply wanted nothing more to do with him.

  Shortly before midnight, while sitting in his guest bedroom with a book and still trying to calm myself, Arjay appeared in the doorway. He invited me to join him for a drink. I thought he wanted to apologize. He’d already had a few drinks and was tipsy. He talked for a long time about himself, then finally rose from the couch and came over to me. I got up and walked into the kitchen. He followed me and tried to put his arm around me.

  “It would only be fair to exchange sex for freedom, honey!”

  I stood there in silence. He said, “If you’re really serious about getting out of the country, honey! I will be equally serious, but there has to be something in return.”

  I was strongly tempted to walk out of the apartment. But I was desperate, and he knew it. I spent the night in his bed, biting my lips with suppressed rage until they bled.

  Two agonizing days passed and Arjay announced that he loved me, and he hoped that I would become his mistress when he returned to Washington, DC. I didn’t respond. I fled his apartment on the same day. In frantic haste, I left behind two albums of precious photographs, never seen again.

  I couldn’t bring myself to tell Andrew what had happened. He still assumed this “American friend” was still helping me.

  The war situation worsened day by day. My boss, the deputy minister, grieved over the loss of his own brother, the brother’s wife, and their four children. They had been hit by a rocket while sleeping in their house. Ba Chieu market near my house had been hit twice, but luckily, neither bomb exploded.

  Mother Chin, who had earlier been so kind to me, was now working for a new employer, Colonel Donnelly, who had something to do with security at the American Embassy. After our failed trip to the Cambodian border she said she would see Donnelly and ask for help. She and I would meet him in the evening of 21 April.

  * * *

  The colonel seemed a decent man, middle-aged, chubby, with a sort of Winnie-the-Pooh look about him. He listened to me attentively, then said, “I understand your situation and will do my best to help you. First I must check with the embassy, to see if it will be possible for you to join me during the evacuation. If I can get you out of Sai Gon, you should be free to travel to Hong Kong. I will let you know about my contact with the embassy tomorrow.”

  That night I wasn’t able to sleep. I thought the colonel appeared to be sincere but I still had my own doubts. What if the embassy won’t let him? And he may change his mind too. I have never worked for him and I am not his mistress. Why should he have any obligation to me?

  The next morning, to my great surprise, the colonel arrived at my office! The minute he saw me, he pulled out a stack of papers from his briefcase, “Here are the papers from the US Embassy, for you.”

  I was so thrilled and I couldn’t believe that he had made such an effort. How lucky I was to have met a thoughtful gentleman, a stranger who honoured his word.

  Donnelly instructed me about the papers, “One original and six copies. Each requires an ID-sized photograph. The original and three copies will go to the Mission Warden Office. One copy for the embassy, one for me, and one for you to keep. Can you get seven photos and fill out everything within the next couple days or so?”

  “Thank you so much, Colonel! I will get everything ready and will bring them to you by tomorrow.”

  He assured me he would arrange to pick me up as soon as the embassy informed him when he was leaving the country. But he warned that he might be one of the last Americans to leave Sai Gon.

  I was elated and wrote a quick note to Andrew about Donnelly’s kind offer. Nobody was in the office that morning. I filled in all the papers. Then I walked to a photo studio and had my ID photo taken. I offered to pay double the price for seven copies if they would be ready that evening.

  I took all the papers to Donnelly’s apartment and met with him. Mother Chin came with me. He asked for Andrew’s address in Hong Kong and said he would write and let Andrew know about our arrangement. Mother Chin asked him if I needed to stay at his apartment while waiting but he said it would not be necessary. He added that the embassy would give him enough time and he would be able to inform me before the departure.

  * * *

  On the morning of 23 April, Nhan went to the neighbourhood bakery to buy bread. He heard that elements from the regular North Vietnamese army had already infiltrated into the suburbs of Sai Gon, and that a senior ARVN commander had shot himself. My mother also learned from the neighbours that the chief of our precinct had been murdered by the Viet Cong in the night. I felt a chill in my spine. But instead of staying at home, I left for work as usual.

  On that same day, US President Gerald Ford spoke in New Orleans and announced that the “Vietnam War” had finished. In Sai Gon, the last evacuation of Americans under Option IV would begin on 29 April.

  ACROSS THE SEA

  “None who have always been free can understand the terrible fascinating power of the hope of freedom to those who are not free.”

  Pearl S. Buck

  I woke up in a state of high anxiety, after a very strange dream: a postman had arrived at the door with three letters from Andrew. One was small and square, the other two were large, rectangular and equal in size. I opened the square envelope first and found a thick green card with my photograph at the top right hand corner, and the message. “Here is your passport, Rabbit!” Delighted, I opened the next envelope, a number ‘2’ was written on the outside in bright red ink and inside there were two little bamboo mats. The third envelope, with a number ‘4’ written on the outside in red ink, contained four little bamboo mats. I placed the first two mats on the left side of a table, the other four mats on the right. Why did he pack only two in one envelope and four in the other? Why didn’t he divide them equally, three and three? I picked up the two large envelopes and placed them side by side, with the number side up. The two red numbers jumped off the envelopes and started dancing: ‘2’ and ‘4’, ‘2’ and ‘4’ again and again. At the same time I heard a woman singing from afar, “Who sends the bird across the sea, to flee its cage, to find freedom? Who sends the bird across the sea…” I woke up with a chill running down my spine. Was it a good or a bad omen? What was the meaning of the bamboo mats? What was the meaning of ‘2’? and of ‘4’? ‘24’? Perhaps, ‘2’ and ‘4’ equal ‘6’? And the song? Did this imply that I would have to take a sea journey to gain my freedom?

  It was four in the morning and I couldn’t get back to sleep. I thought of my paternal grandmother, who used to interpret my dreams and predict their meanings. She had often told me not to ignore warnings from the gods of fortune.

  One of my brothers had seen the flag of North Viet Nam – red background with a gold star – in Xom Gieng. Everyone began to panic. My mother calmly and cheerfully said to me, “Didn’t I tell you that when you were a new-born baby, I wrapped you in one of those flags?” Tears came into her eyes, which she quickly wiped away. I stood there in awkward silence for a moment. I then went up to the attic. I heard my mother searching for something in one of the drawers of her sewing machine. She was trying very hard to conceal her emotions. Th
e wife of Bay Ca appeared at our front door and whispered into my mother’s ear, “They’re coming, the Viet Cong are coming. Let’s pack our things now!”

  We didn’t know where to go. But later in the day everyone seemed to return to an uneasy kind of normality.

  I had tea with Mother Chin in the maid’s quarters on 23 April. Having filled out the papers from the US Embassy, I felt more optimistic about the possibility of leaving. But Mother Chin looked quite disturbed that day. She told me that friends in one of the districts in Sai Gon had been acquiring food for members of the Viet Cong hiding in that area. “The Viet Cong expect victory any time now!” she said. I reported to her what I had heard in my neighbourhood. We began to talk about my plan with the colonel. I told her that despite his promises, I worried he might not succeed in getting me out of Sai Gon. We discussed other things, including my dream. Mother Chin said to me afterwards, “You will be leaving, but I don’t know how.”

  The song in the dream reinforced my fear of dying at sea. I thought perhaps the American colonel wouldn’t take a plane after all, and we would end up on some kind of a warship sent to rescue people; or I would have to escape alone by boat.

  In fact, it had proved impossible for me to obtain a Vietnamese passport, and without a passport it was impossible to apply for a visa to go to any country. Was the colonel so naive to have made such a promise?

  On the morning of 24 April I woke up with a headache. Mr Tu, the water carrier, had told us that Northern troops, spearheaded by the National Liberation Front, were advancing rapidly toward Sai Gon, and that the Southern capital would soon be “liberated”. Mr Tu seemed delighted. He respectfully referred to the NLF as “our liberation army”. This didn’t surprise me at all, given the recent trauma he and his family had suffered. The rape of his niece by the ARVN soldiers was obviously still fresh in his mind. It was clear he loathed the regime.