Phạm Tín An Ninh

I returned to visit my motherland more than fifteen years after I escaped out of Vietnam by sea as a boat people. The decision was made after many sleepless nights. I did not have any relatives left in Vietnam. My mother passed away when I was only three. My father died in the Đá Bàn Re-education Camp in late 1976, when I was also in another prison in the deep Việt Bắc jungles, and until five years later did I learn of the sad news. My young sister, whom I loved more than anything in the world, the spitting image of my mother whose image was only a vague shadow in my memory, also ended her life at an age where she’d think the immense sky always shines bright and blue in front of her. Some of my friends had died and some were all over the world. I knew that the return this time would not be much different from the day, sixteen years ago, when I returned from a prison from North Vietnam. I would be just as lonely and desolate in my very native place. Neither did I have the intention to be back in search of old memories. Our “childhood caves” were gone after suddenly being struck one year long ago…Now there just remained a few things for a person exiled to foreign lands. I had too many pains and losses in this city that was once so beautiful. I dared not look at the horrifying and tragic past again. I returned for only one thing that, should I fail to get done, my conscience would not let me rest. Without getting this done, I would not be at peace and when I depart this world I still can’t close my eyes.

I returned to look for my father’s and my sister’s graves, then rebury their bones next to my mother’s grave in our family cemetery in Vạn Giã. It was my Dad’s wish whenever he told me about my Mom and their love story, quite romantic but also full of pain. He was buried in a hurry, on a mountain in Đá Bàn, outside the reeducation camp where he had been. As for my sister, a close friend of hers took care of the funeral, and she was buried at a cemetery in Đồng Đế. Against quite a few hurdles but with some luck, I finally got some information regarding their graves, after more than twenty years. Thanks to a friend of my father’s, who was in the same prison with him and who personally dug the grave for him, and thanks to the family of a close friend of my sister’s, who left Vietnam as boat people in 1978 and who resettled as refugees in the Netherlands, I got sufficient information and even maps for my search.

During the flight, I was worried about many things. My sister’s grave was in a cemetery, and though not quite finished, still had a cement headstone and should be fairly easy to find. My father’s, however, was in the mountains, and the former reeducation camp later became a new economic zone. Almost thirty years had passed, and changes happened everywhere…

Finally, my wish was half accomplished. Contrary to my earlier apprehension, it was easy to find my father’s grave. The landscape changed a lot; however, most of the people in this new reclaimed land were previously city residents, and were forced to “volunteer” to relocate to this area, and some of them were former government officials. They knew that the graves belonged to the prisoners of the reeducation camp, and out of compassion they tried to protect them by building a fence around. At the end of each year, they burnt incense, tidied up the graves, and retouched the names on wooden headboards, even those that were covered with moss or were dilapidated with time. My sister’s grave, however, I could not find after trying for more than two weeks. The whole cemetery had changed quite a bit. There were so many deceased! Numerous new graves were built, and many old ones were dug up and moved somewhere else. Houses were built right next to the cemetery. The living cohabited with the dead. I followed what our ancestors would do. I prayed to my sister to guide me to where she was laid, but my prayer was not answered.

I hired people to exhume my father’s grave and move his bones. I went from house to house in the new economic zone to thank the families for their kind act. I placed my father’s remains next to my mother’s in our family cemetery. I hired workers to rebuild all the graves that were neglected all those years.

 My visa expired in a day. I wanted to take a tour of the city, hoping to find something left from the Nha Trang of the past. The summer in Nha Trang now I felt hotter than in the past. I hired a cyclo driver to give me a ride along the formerly Duy Tân Street. I wanted to get some cool breeze and to look at the aspens of our youth, where my friends and I met up after school. Some rows of aspens were still there, but depressingly bare and desolate. I asked the cyclo driver to take me to Võ Tánh School. The young driver stopped in surprise looking at me at a loss. I understood why, and told him that I’d give directions. My old school, where I had had so many memories during my three years, now not only lost its name but also became unrecognizable. Nothing remained of the row of trees in front of the school. The building stood lonely, all of its romantic grandeur of the past was gone. I felt more disappointed than nostalgic.

Suddenly I thought of my sister. My pretty, lovely sister had given me the warmth of a family, during all those days when we orphans grew up together without our mother. She was in the Girls’ High School, but often came to my school to wait for me, and then we went to the beach together after class. She loved swimming but was not comfortable going by herself, and always asked me to go with her to escort. I enjoyed giving a hard time to admirers who want to get acquainted, flirt with my sister. I walked along the beach, to the area with many coconut trees, in front of the formerly Bá Ninh School, where my sister used to sit.

 I took a sweeping look around. On the concrete steps leading to the sandy beach, an amputee was struggling with his only arm to keep balance while sliding down. He looked like a frog. Weaving in and out of swimmers, he moved in my direction. A duffel bag filled of books hung on his back, and another one, also full of books, was dragged along the sand. He inched up, little by little. Suddenly he looked up. As I nodded to greet him, he looked at me and his face brightened up with a smile, showing white teeth. He was handsome; looked intelligent, with a square beard, a broad forehead with some hair hanging across, giving him an artist’s look. He used his only hand to pull out a book from the bag on the sand and opened it slowly. I took a glance. The tittle was in English, the story of the Titanic.

 I remembered the movie with the same tittle, advertised widely on Norwegian TV, but I did not have a chance to watch it yet. All of a sudden my eyes opened wide with surprise when he greeted and presented the book to me in very fluent English, as good as that of a Vietnamese who had lived a long time in English speaking countries. He mistook me for a Japanese or a Korean. I was so impressed and told him that I was Vietnamese, residing in Norway, and my English was good enough for some simple conversation, but not enough to appreciate its literature. I thanked him and pulled out my wallet to offer him some money, but he quickly stopped me by his hand.

– Thank you, but it’s better that you save it for those who need it more than I. He said softly in a friendly and polite tone.

His words and action surprised me. Since I presented my passport to enter the country, in front of officials of high ranks, representatives of the regime, nowhere did I find manners as fine as his, and, could it be that in this pioneer city for tourism, there were people under more dire circumstances than this bookseller? 

I chose to buy as book from him as a pretext to pay him. He kept searching in all his pockets to get enough change for me.

I wanted to ask him more questions, but he bid goodbye with a smile and hurried over to other foreign tourists who were sunbathing on the chairs at the front row.

Since that day, the image of the handicapped bookseller at Nha Trang beach was in my head and followed me back to Norway. And since, whenever somebody said something bad about poor people in Vietnam, I felt as if they were insulting the respectable bookseller that I met by chance in Nha Trang.

The following year, I took a month of vacation to return to Vietnam. This time I booked tickets for me and the father of my sister’s friend from the Netherlands, who I asked to travel with me. He was the person who helped with my sister’s funeral. I didn’t expect to return to Vietnam this second time. It was something I had not planned. But I had to fulfill the responsibilities of a big brother to his little sister. Had I been able to take better care of her, she might still be with me now and save me from being utterly alone these days. 

After long hours on the plane, I was dead-tired. I came from chilly Northern Europe and went right into the sultry tropical weather. After checking into a hotel, I immediately rushed to the beach. Lying down on the sand, I suddenly thought of the bookseller I met last time when I was here. I wandered along the beach, in the direction of the tents where I spotted some foreigners who came down from nearby hotels. All of sudden my eyes lit up when I saw a handicapped man dragging himself behind them. He got the two book bags too. It really WAS the man from last year, certainly no one else. I felt a secret joy as I would soon see the person who I had held in high regards. I was thinking of how to persuade him to accept some aid from me. But he was following foreign tourists. I noticed that they did not buy books from him either, but gave him some money instead. I was really surprised to see him smiling, gladly accepting their money. He did not use the gracious answer that he used with me last year, “Thank you, but it’s better that you save it for those that need it more”. Something beautiful shattered in me. I felt intense heat. I did not know whether it was the burning midday sun or anger that rose in me. I ran and plunged into the furious waves thrashing on the beach.

The water was clear and blue; the waves were like big arms embracing, fondling, soothing me. The immense ocean spread out to the pale green mountains in the horizon. I seemed to hear the song “The Day I Returned to Nha Trang” played from a distance. Nature helped open up our minds and boost our compassion.

Ater After playing with waves for quite a while, I forgot the handicapped person who disappointed me earlier in the day. However, as I just got back on the beach, I saw him again, trying to please to the tourists and even begging for their leftover foods. I wondered if this person was the same one I met last year. I came to him to inquire. But I hardly finished my question when he cursed, “That fucking guy? starving to death and still playing noble? He’s long dead…”

Just hearing his rude voice, I was certain that he was not the handicapped bookseller I met last year.

I followed this man with the intention to inquire, but I could see he was not interested. He was moving slowly, but his eyes keenly observing groups coming down to the beach in the distance. And when he passed by a woman selling boiled crabs, he turned up his chin, saying: “There! That’s his wife!”

I jumped on the opportunity in the hope of getting more information. However, when I came closer, I did not know how to start my inquiry, for this woman was serious in her attitude, and was different from ordinary street vendors. I bought one crab after another but didn’t eat any. And each time she was about to carry her merchandise away, I called her back to buy one more crab just to keep her with me. Just as she noticed something strange about this customer, I let it slip out:

– Are you the wife of the handicapped bookseller who was at this beach several years ago?

She was taken aback and looked at me quietly. Perhaps she was wondering why a stranger wanted to ask about her private life. Then I told her he impressed me when we met last year. That I would like to somewhat ease his suffering in being a handicap. That I truly wanted to know more about him. It seemed she was touched by my heartfelt words. She looked at me with sad eyes:

– I am not his wife. We were in the same situation and were helping each other. Some people just jokingly called us a couple. He passed away over eight months ago. I buried him.

I heart sank, from feeling sorry about his misfortune and desolation, and from regretting not trying to help him out the year before, perhaps I could have saved him. I asked her to take me to his grave to burn incense for him. At first, she was reluctant but finally agreed. She would meet me at 4:00 p.m. in front of my hotel.

I rented a taxi, and asked her permission to sit with her on the back seat for easier conversation. On the way to the cemetery, she poured out her feelings to me, as if she had not been able to confide to anyone what she had had kept in her heart. Her name was Trang. Her father, formerly a sergeant from local armed forces of the ARVN, was wounded in the Mậu Thân New Year battle in 1968 and was discharged. Her mother died when she was a young child. Her father did not want to remarry,  and raised his only child by himself.

 Thanks to the initial compensation, the father bought a house with a corrugated tin roof in the veterans’ compound behind the train station. He got a job as a ticket sales clerk for the Phi Long Bus Company at Xóm Mới Bus Station. With a fixed meager salary plus his monthly pension, he saved up to fund his daughter’s education. In 1974, after high school, she passed the entrance exam to the School of Pedagogy.

After the “liberation” of Nha Trang, she was dropped from the school because of her father’s past service in the former government. The family then endured real hardship. Naturally , her father’s pension was cut, and she could not find employment. Eventually, her father had to sell half of the house, already so small, to buy a cyclo as a means of living. As for her, she became a street vendor since.

– Is your father still a cyclo driver? I asked out of curiosity.

– He was gone for a long time. Poor man, he really loved Bá like his own son.

I asked in surprise:

– Who is Bá?

– The disabled bookseller you met.

Now I finally learned his name.

 She said Bá was a first lieutenant in the Air Force. His plane was shot down during the days Saigon was in critical danger, while covering Long Khánh front of General Đảo’s Division. He was rescued by the infantry soldiers, but was so seriously wounded he had to be taken to the Cộng Hòa General Military Hospital. After a long surgery, he woke up. However, when he found out he had lost both legs and an arm, he fainted and fell into a coma for a week. Shortly after Saigon was “liberated”, he was kicked out from the hospital even when the wounds had not healed.

–         Nearly two months later my father met him at the Xóm Mới Bus Station. Knowing his sad situation, my father put him on the cyclo and drove him home to take care of his wounds, and he lived with my father and me ever since.

– He had no relatives? I asked.

– He had a sister living in this city too, but she passed away a long time ago. He didn’t say anything at first. Later I saw a picture of a young girl at the head of his bed that he worshipped. There were many very late nights I saw him sitting motionless in front of the picture. My father asked several times, and finally he revealed it was his only sister.

– He doesn’t have any friends?

– I heard he was taking aviation training somewhere in the US, then thanks to his good English, was retained in the US as a liaison officer. Hearing that South Vietnam was in danger, he volunteered to return to Vietnam to join combats. No sooner had he returned than he went to the battlefield. He The plane crashed while he was on the second mission. Maybe that’s why we didn’t hear him talk much about any of his friends.

The taxi stopped. I paid the driver and told him he could wait for us or to return in thirty minutes. I walked to the cemetery in sadness, hanging on to the sad story. The church bell in the distance plunged me in even more sadness. After a few turns, Trang stopped and pointed to Bá’s grave, located next to his sister’s. Both graves were simply built of stone, on each headstone there was also a picture.

  I was surprised to see a cross on Bá‘s grave, because this was a Buddhist cemetery. I stood in front of his grave, lit three sticks of incense, and prayed that he would be at peace in a world without hatred, and expressed appreciation from one soldier to another. I looked closely at his picture on the headstone, the one taken when he was an air force cadet, with a look of gallantry and endurance. His face looked familiar to me, perhaps because of the uniform, which reminded me of the faces of friends in the old days.

I walked to his sister’s tomb, and lit three sticks of incense for a person I did not know. I curiously walked up to get a better look of the picture on the headstone. Suddenly I was in a daze, my eyes blurred. I could not see anything in front of me. Oh God, could there be a mistake? The person in the picture was An Bình, my beloved sister.

 I tried to regain my composure, opening my eyes wide to look closely at the picture one more time. It could not be a mistake. It was the same picture on the alter at my home, together with those of my father and mother. It was the same pictures I often stood for a long time in front of, whenever I felt so lonely in a foreign country. How could I have not recognized the picture?

 All of a sudden I was sobbing quietly.

Trang looked at me in surprise:

– Do you know Bá’s sister?

I kept quiet and could not answer, and asked her to leave with me. The taxi was still there, waiting for us. I looked for the address of the father of my sister’s best friend in my wallet. He arrived from the Netherlands two days earlier, and I was going to meet him the next day. He stayed at his brother’s house in the Xóm Bóng Bridge neighborhood. I gave the address to the driver. Just over five minutes later, he found it. Luckily, the man was home. I apologized to him for coming earlier than expected. I informed him that I found my sister’s grave unexpectedly. And I asked him to come with me to the cemetery to re-locate the grave of my sister, whose funeral he had the kindness to take care of.

 Back at the cemetery, I suggested that he lead the way; I wanted to make sure he knew the grave for certain. It took him a long time, almost twenty minutes walking around, and he finally found my sister’s gravesite. He surprised because that day he was only put up a wooden headboard on a mound of earth at the grave with only a name engraved on it, without her picture, not the headstone as it was now .

Trang was at a loss, not understanding what was going on. Why was this young lady Bá’s only sister and at the same time mine?

I apologized to her as I was so emotional, but let her know I’d explain everything on the way home.

 I took the father of my sister’s friend back to his place; thanked him and said I would see him a few days later. On the way back, I told Trang about my family’s situation. I was in the military services, away from home, and only went home on leave a couple of times a year. An Bình, my only sister, lived in Nha

Trang with my father. My father was a teacher at a French-Vietnamese school since I was three years old. After his retirement, he was appointed president of the commune council. He was taken to Đá Bàn Re-education Camp after the “liberation” of Nha Trang. Then due to his poor health, he could not endure tortures and died almost a year later. My sister followed his career, and after graduating from Qui Nhon Pedagogical School, on account of my family situation, she was assigned a teaching post in Nha-Trang.

Once of my home leaves, she told me about her love story with an air force cadet. She showed me his picture and promised she would introduce him to me when he returned from the United States. She worried because he was a Northerner who immigrated to the South and was Catholic. She was wondering if there would be obstacles to their getting married. I told her not to be worried, that our father was French trained and followed Western traditions, and that he would have liberal concepts about religions.

 After my father was sent to the re-education camp, our house was confiscated by the new government to establish a trading cooperative. My sister was not allowed to continue teaching, so she moved to Xóm Bóng to stay with her old schoolmate, saving any money she could set aside to visit my father and provide for him. Shortly after the fall of Saigon, she did come to Sài gòn to visit me and her lover.

 During more than two weeks of searching everywhere, my sister came back crying for many days. She told me that her lover had died at the Battlefield of Long Khánh and his body was not found. I comforted her, asking her to go back to Nha Trang to try to take care of my father in my place and waiting for my return so we could be together again. During the six months I was in prison I was allowed to write home twice, but did not receive any reply from her.

 Before I was transferred to the North, I received a letter from her best friend, informing me that my sister could not get a job, was destitute, desperate, and finally took a whole tube of sleeping pills. Her friend’s family took her to the hospital but could not save her, as the hospital was unable to undo the harm.

Trang was thinking long and hard and suddenly remembered something. She said that when Bá was with them, he did not work on Sunday. He attended mass at church and went to the cemetery all day. He saved money, hired people to rebuild the grave and bought the adjacent lot for himself. After his funeral, she found a diary well hidden, under the headboard of the bed. She still kept it on the altar, waiting for the first anniversary of his death to burn it. She told me to go home with her, so she could hand over the diary to me, the only thing left from a person who had lived under trying circumstances with her father and her for nearly thirty years, and it took her until now to know he was my beloved sister’s lover.

She told the taxi to stop in front of a shortcut behind the train station. I paid, then followed her. We crossed two railroads and a few sinuous alleys and arrived at her house. I asked permission to light incense at the altar of her father and Bá, on a small wooden shelf hanging on the wall. I insisted that she take some money from me to take care of her father’s, my sister’s, and Bá’s gravesites, and some more to start a business to be free from the hardship she had endured all those years.

I asked to adopt Trang as my sister, and from now on she would be my only family  in Nha-Trang. I took leave of her, walked back to the hotel, taking the diary with me. I felt as if I had just received the most precious gift from a beloved family member from a far away world.

May 2nd

— The wound is still painful and blood oozes out through the bandage, but they kicked me out from the Cộng Hòa Military General Hospital, even when I am homeless, and all alone without family. Fortunately, a poor but kindhearted benefactor came to help, provided for me, and took care of the wound.
Many times, in the depths of distress, I don’t want to keep living any more, but I always look to Jesus Christ, and I entrust myself to Him.

……..

Jun 20th

Finally, I decide to return to Nha Trang, for I don’t have anywhere else to go to. I come back here to look for the most beautiful memories of my life, the days when An Bình was still with me. When I met An Bình, I instantly thought that I belonged to Nha Trang, a land of aspens and romances. It’s so painful that I am not the person I used to be, but only pathetic handicap. I will never see her again, but just wish to be back here to live with memories of her.

July 08th

Today might be the most sorrowful day in my life. More painful than the day when I regained consciousness in the military hospital and realized that I had become an handicap. I went everywhere to ask for information about An-Bình, and found out that she committed suicide… My dear, please forgive me. In the great misfortune of our country, and as I am just a humble insignificant soldier, how can I keep Nha Trang’s sky for you, and for our memories...

A church bell startled me. Looking up, I realized I was in front of the Christ the King Cathedral (Nui Cathedral).  I dumbly stepped on to the steps, and stood in front of the Virgin Mary statue. I was not a Catholic and did not know how to say prayers. I joined my hands on the chest, respectfully praying God Almighty and Maria, Mother of Mercy, to save the souls of two poor people and help the resurrected with Jesus, so their love could be everlasting in a peaceful world, free of hatred.

I no longer wanted to move my sister’s grave to next to our parents’. I went back to our home village; knelt down at our parents’ graves to ask their permission to rebuild my sister’s and Bá’s graves together in the same compound. No one should separate them anymore, even in the afterworld.

Like the last time, on my last day, I hired a cyclo for a ride along the old Duy Tân street, the most beautiful street of Nha Trang. Government buildings and mansions of high ranking cadres stood gallantly.

 Looking at the red flag on the roofs, a chill crept up my spine. Does it make sense that those “great changes” were realized on blood and sweats, on sufferings and painful separations of people that used to build this beautiful city? All of sudden, I did not see the city of Nha Trang any more. In front of me, I only saw a necropolis stretching indefinitely. I heard in the wind the melody of the song Nha Trang, the song that the Nha Trang Radio Station played to start the day every morning. I thought of the tragic death of composer Minh Kỳ, author of the song. He was killed in August 1975 while incarcerated with me in An Dưỡng Reeducation Camp in Biên Hòa. 

Phạm Tín An Ninh

Translated to English by Thuy Messegee

Truyện Người Bán Sách Trên Bãi Biển Nha Trang (Việt ngữ):

người bán sách trên bãi biển nha-trang