A Refugee Mother

In honor of the 20 year anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, I would like to share this poem. I wrote the poem in my last year at Stockton State College in New Jersey in the fall of 1983. The cold war was something I didn't think would end.

She carried her baby in one hand
Walking as fast as she can
While the thunder grew closer and closer
She walked as though she was running

There was a wave of people
Some were dragging
Some were dying once
Some were dying twice

She laughs and she keeps talking
Of how she had survived
From North to South
It was some forty years ago

When people were just using swords and guns
Now as she sits and wonders
Just how she ended up here
The land of dream and tomorrow
The land of wines and roses
The land of pointed noses and blue eyes
The land of mixed black and white
Trying to understand where she will land
If there ever is
A thermonuclear bang!

Odette Kim Cao - Fall 1983
Brigantine, New Jersey

Jacqueline E. Dunn

I received many nice gifts from my mother and father-in-law, perfume, clothes, cash, and jewelries. But the best gift I ever got from them was their annual invitation to bring my mother to their home each Christmas. Soon my husband and I moved 3000 miles away, but whenever we were home to visit during the holidays, my mother-in-law never forgot to invite my mother and my younger brother to their home for the holiday dinner. This went on for many years until my in-laws moved out west and my mother moved to Florida to live with my younger brother.

I remember one particular dinner; my mother wasn't sitting next to me, she was sitting next to my father- in- law. My mother, with her broken English, was telling my father in law about her adventurous mishaps during her younger days and how she had lost her second child during WWII. Afterward, I overheard my father in law telling my husband that my mother has such interesting stories about her life and how he didn't know that she had survived the Japanese invasion of Vietnam during WWII.

The gift my father in law gave me was his time spent listening to my mother's stories. My older siblings and I seem to avoid my mother's stories from Vietnam since we came to the USA in 1975. My motive for not encouraging the stories was that I didn't want my mother to relive her loss of my sister during WWII, and my two brothers from an accident. But that particular dinner, my in-laws gave me the gift of a lifetime. They listened to my mother's stories without any conditions or restrictions. Both my father in law and my own mother had since passed away. My mother in law was a survivor of breast cancer. I am thankful for my mother in law's generous love for me. She included my mother because she knew it would make me happy. She gave me the gift of happy memories with my mother. I look forward to give my husband the same gift his mom gave me; spending time together and creating beautiful memories with loved ones.

My mother in-law passed away from breast cancer on April 20, 2009.  Jacqueline, thanks for your kindness and love.

Yellow Ribbon

The 12 laps around the track

As we said good bye at the Honolulu airport, my young niece said to me “Aunt Odette, you never did show us your gold and silver medals”. I kissed her and said it’s the same one that my other teammates have that she has seen at the party. “But I never saw yours” she continued. I told her because I wanted to share with her my very first yellow ribbon, the one that I have wanted for a long time.

Walking to my gate to fly back to San Francisco I just couldn’t believe how fast the last four days have been. It seems like I just landed at this airport few hours ago, nervous about how many hours of sleep I was going have before my very first event at Cooke Field. It was 9:50 pm on a Wednesday night when my flight landed at Honolulu airport for the 2005 USA Masters Outdoor Track and Field Championships. By the time I checked in my dorm room it was past 11 pm.

My roommate, another runner from a different state, said to me as I opened the door “I don’t care if you turn on the light and all the lights, I just don’t want any conversations or noises. OKAY?” Aloha to you roommate. I turned on the light and be as quiet as possible. But I quickly turned off the light faster than I could run 100 meter dash. What I saw was my roommate’s three pairs of racing shoes on the table. The people I knew that would pack three pairs of racing shoes were the five or six minute per mile runners in my team. What if she has to run the 5000 meters the next morning, is my late check in going to cost her the second, the minute, the point, the medal. I unpacked two pairs of running shoes, one for the steeple chase and the other one for every events, just two pairs of running shoes.

I set my alarm clock and my cell phone for 6:00 am but I never heard either one went off. By the time I got up and put on my uniform, it was 6:45 am. My three-pairs-racing-shoes roommate was up and asked if I was running this morning. I afraid to open my mouth but I answered “yes, I need to go to declare myself. I’m doing the 5000 meter this morning at 8:10”. To my surprise my three-pairs-racing-shoes roommate was going to walk me down to Cooke Field.

I saw some familiar faces as we were near the stadium, I saw our tent, I saw my 5000 meter teammates. I recognized other 5000 meter runners from Hawaii. One of my teammates jokingly asked me if I was ready for the 12 laps around the track. We practice on the track very week but for some reason running 5000 meter on the track that morning sounds so difficult and impossible to do at that moment. What happen if I lost count? What happen if the official miscounts my laps? What happen if I was the last one in? I remember my coach said to me “just go out there and have a good run and have fun!” Yes, I have great fun sitting on the beach of Waikiki with a maitai or two and my feet are playing in the sands.

After all the 5000 meter runners checked in we followed the official to the track, the official gave us quick etiquettes of running on the track, be polite to your competitors, don’t block, don’t spit, don’t kick, don’t push, don’t curse, and everyone win. Our 5000 meter were to start at 8:10 a.m. but we were asked to wait until the last runner from a different age group finish. While we were watching an eighty something female runner to finish her last two laps on track, a short skinny runner came up to me, took a look at my back for my age, then asked me what is my expected time. I told her “don’t worry! you will be ahead of me”. She then looked at other runner’s back for their age (in most road race, people would wear their bibs with their number in front of their shirts or shorts. In the track meet we all have three bibs to put on our body, our bib number, goes in front of our shirt, our age-bib goes on the back of our shirt, and our place number on the track goes on the left side of our short, it is our identification number, so the official can count our laps by looking at our place number on the left side). While we were all line up and waiting for the official to start the race, all I could think was a nice hotel room with a comfortable bed and air condition, television, telephone, a nice shower, and a view of the ocean or Diamond Head. Randy, the coach, suggested that I register for the 5000 meter few weeks before; he guaranteed that I will have such a great time running the event, now that I’m on the track, I don’t see any fun is coming my way.

After the gun went off we started the race, I was with my two teammates, the three of us running together with me in the back of the pack. I heard some of my team members yelling to me “Don’t lose them Odette, stay with them”. The clock showed my first mile was at 7:59 minute, not bad for under 8 minutes but can I keep up the pace for the next 2 miles or just 8 more little laps. I started to feel good about myself and wonder about my 10,000 meter event two days from now. I mentally get myself ready for the 10,000 meter race while I was on my second mile of the 5000 meter. Teammate A does have a nice bottom and legs, teammate B has nice bottom but her legs are skinny. Slowly and surely, I started to lost sign of my teammate’s bottoms. On my last mile of the 5000 meters, they were two tiny little dots ahead of me. I was wondered if there was a wish that was granted to me right then, I wish I could run as fast as the lead runner. I looked around the track, the first turn where all the people, all the guys, young and old were watching and waiting for us to finish, I guess the men 5000 meters is next. The second turn where all the officials were counting our laps, each official is responsible for each runner. I looked at them and wonder which one was responsible for number 13, I was the 13th runner, I yelled out “number 13 is jogging by”. A voice yelled back at me “I got you number 13, you got 3 more laps”. By the third turn on the track, I tried so hard to run a little faster away from someone behind with the heavy breathing, the kind that gasps for air, the kind that so contagious that by the time I reached to the fourth turn on the track, I started breathing very heavy. When I ran by the official tents I have no idea how many laps I did. To my much disappointment, I heard a voice yell out “number 13 you got 2 mores laps, pick it up!” What two more laps? I didn’t hear the heavy breathing behind me any more, but I still heard her footsteps, pound! pound! pound! on the rubberized track. I felt my heart beating so fast that any minute now it will just pop right out of my chest, wouldn’t that be something. I will make the news not for the record breaking but I will make the news if that happened. I looked up around the track again and saw only few runners ahead of me and I was afraid to look behind me. By now most of the fast runners are finished. I started to feel all eyes were looking at me and the pounding heavy breath. I started to wonder what did all the fast runners think when they run 5000 meter on the track, what was on their mind? I am running as fast as I can or feel like I’m running as fast as I can.

I wonder if I could fake a bad fall and not finish the race last or fake a twisted ankle, then I could just hop away from the track in pain and no one would have to wait for me to finish. Would that be cheating the team or cheating myself? As I turned on the first corner of the track to my next to the last lap, I remembered.

The ranking system

When I was a cute little girl, my parents put me in the French-Vietnamese Catholic School in Saigon. We didn't have A, B, C, or D, or F as our grade. We had the ranking system, if the class has 40 kids and if you were in the top five ranks, then you get to wear the Yellow ribbon on the shoulder of your uniform. If you were last in your class like the 40th place out of 40, then you have to wear the black ribbon for few days to let the other kids know you were the dead last in your class. I was the bottom part of the cook rice. Of course, I had a boxful of those black ribbons. I was the yesterday rice. If you ask any Chinese cooks, they will tell you that yesterday rice is the best and perfect rice for making fried rice. After a while, at the end of the each month I just put one on just out of habit, even when I was next to the dead last. But I do like to put it on because it would be much easier for my friends to spot me in the school yard at recess.

Some month, I came very close to get the yellow ribbon but the problem was I could only be an angel for few days, and a whole month can last a long time when you were 11 years old!

Few days later before the morning mass session started I was asked to go and visit Sister Phoung, I knew right there that whatever it was, it was not a good thing to visit Sister Phoung. Sister Phoung was the head nun of the school. If anyone ever visited Sister Phoung, they always came back to class crying or one side of their face is bright red. There was this girl, her name was Mai, and she was a quiet person, never said a word and didn’t have any friends. One day a teacher asked Mai to go up the blackboard to solve an easy math problem, she refused to do it. She even refused to hand in her assignment. Few days later during our quiz, she was caught opening and reading one of her notebooks; the teacher came over to her desk, took the note book from her and said out loud to the class “cheating is a sin”. Mai started to whimper and held her face with her two hands. We all watched the teacher and felt bad for Mai, the humility of getting caught cheating on a quiz. The girl looked up and reached out and grabbed the note book back from the teacher and put it back in her desk drawer, the teacher took her arm and led the girl out of the class room to see Sister Phoung. At recess, few of us went over to Mai’s desk and tried to see what was inside the notebook. I flipped through all the blank pages and could not believe why the teacher made a big deal out of it, the notebook was blank. How can a student cheat when there were no written math formulas or answers. The first page of the notebook was a short note from her dad wishing her the best school year with a dried violet flower taped to the front. Few weeks later, Mai came back to class and her face was still red. I found out years later that Mai’s father was killed in the war a week before the "cheating is a sin" incident, the notebook was the last present she got from her dad.

On my way to visit Sister Phoung, I tried to think what I have done, may be one of the nun caught me passing a note to one of the friends in class, may be they found out that I didn’t wax my desk, or they found out that I felt asleep during mass last week. I came up with two set of answers in my head. One for Sister Phoung and one for my dad, just in case I got to send home early that day. Outside of Sister Phoung office, there was a screen door to block out the mosquitos, I can’t see who was inside but I could hear voices, I recognized the soft spoken voice of Sister Phoung to someone about the singing lesson. I knocked lightly on the door, I heard someone said “please come in”.

Inside Sister Phoung office, there was a big desk against the wall and two chairs on the opposite side of the desk. There was a fan blowing at full speed on the desk and my young teacher was sitting on the guest chair next to the loud fan. Sister Phoung motioned me to come closer to her. Sister Phoung asked me if I have a sister named Odile. Inside my head, I was so relief; it was Odile they're after. I wanted to say “yes, Odile is home right now and she is not as sick as you think she is, she’s home and sleeping in”. My heart sank when Sister Phoung said, “Odile is the best student, a very smart young girl”. My teacher looked at me and said “Odette, do you know why you are here?” “no” I whispered. Whatever it was please don’t torture me, just whip me and let me go back to my class. Sister Phoung said “Odette, do you know how lucky you are to be in this school?” “no” I said while looking down at my shoes, I need new shoes. Sister Phoung said “Odette, since you have been to this school you have worn the black ribbons very month”. No! I said in my head, I wish the school allows red shoes as part of the uniform. That hurt, I didn’t realize Sister Phoung has slapped me in the face, I was stunt, no one had ever hit me. Sister Phoung said “How many times have you been suspended?” “no” I started to cry. The non-nun teacher stood up and held my upper arms and moved me to face her “Odette, do you know how well you did this month” “no” I said and wished my shoes were red. The teacher said something in French to Sister Phoung then said to me “you were doing very well this month, do you know that you may get to wear the yellow ribbon at end of this month” “no” I said, right now I just want to go home and never come back to this school again, I wanted to faint, I wanted to pretend to fall down and to preserve the tinkling pain on my face for my parents to see. I wanted to end these questions where I didn't know how to answer. I could feel Sister Phoung’s hand on my face now and I could feel the left side of my face swollen. May be they will let me wear red shoes after all.

The nice non-nun teacher explained to me the reason that I was up here because yesterday during recital of one of the poems, I was faking a cough to avoid being called on and disrupting the class. I didn’t remember I was coughing or disrupting the class yesterday and I didn’t remember if there was a recital of poem session. So they called me in Sister Phoung's office for something I didn’t remember doing. Wait until I tell my dad and my mom about this.

Place

When I finished the last lap I finally met my lap counter. She was all smiles and I can tell that she was happy that I actually finished, I thanks her for keeping her eyes on me the whole 24 or more minutes. Now that the race is behing me, I was pleased that I wasn’t the last one in but I wish I was picking it up a little on the last mile. I knew then that I came in fourth in my age group. Not bad since I haven’t place in any race in a long time.

After I got my first YELLOW ribbon from the 5000 meters for fourth place, I remember how desperately I wanted the yellow ribbon when I was young.  I wanted to earn the yellow ribbon and wear it to prove to my parents that I was a good student and I wanted them to be proud of me. But really, I wanted to wear it so most of the popular girls in school wanted to be my friend and wanted to hang around with me in the school yard at recess.

When I turned around from the award table to go back to my team’s tent, the 4'11' woman from So-Cal, whom was wondering about my time before the race, was right behind me, I congrats her on the race and she just nodded her head to the side to acknowledge me. I wanted to thank her for concerning about my time. But she was busy reliving her race with other runners. I don’t know what I would do with the yellow ribbon, but I know when I get home after showing it to my husband, the yellow ribbon will be stored somewhere in my desk drawer with other keepsakes I have collected over the years.