Boat People
Personal stories from the Vietnam Exodus edited by Carina Hoang
‘Boat People’ book review: Voyages of Hope and Fear
Reviewed by Kim Huynh
Refugees who are fortunate enough to find new homes and rebuild their lives tend to fall into two categories. The majority almost never speak of their persecution and displacement. They see little benefit and significant risk in reliving past pains. Often they suspect that people who were indifferent to their plight then would care even less now. Then there are those who have a burning desire to bear witness. These individuals believe that all who are like them must speak and all others should listen. They believe that through acts of remembering we give future generations the best chance of avoiding the calamities of history. [...excerpt]
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Boat People: Personal Stories from the Vietnamese Exodus (1975-1996)
Boat People on display at Boffins Bookshop
Bookbite review and article
From 1975 to 1996 the largest mass migration in modern history occurred when more than a million people left war-torn Vietnam by boat in search of safety. Many were crammed onto decrepit vessels where they endured pirate attacks, theft, physical assault, unimaginably squalid living conditions and death. [Download PDF]
Review in Scoop Magazine
Sydney Morning Herald
Spectrum – Books
In short
Reviews by Bruce Elder
Pick of the week
BOAT PEOPLE
Carina Hoang
Fremantle Press, 240pp, $45
About 20 years ago, I was running a course at a factory in Lidcombe. During a chatty session, one of the usually shy Vietnamese workers recalled how he had fled South Vietnam on a leaky fishing boat that had become becalmed in the South China Sea. The boat people ran out of water quickly and it was decided everyone would urinate into a bucket and small amounts of urine would be ladled out to those desperate for liquid. “I couldn’t come at the idea of drinking everyone else’s pee,” he explained. “I managed to find a plastic cup and I used to urinate into it. I could drink my own pee but not everyone else’s.” His work colleagues were amazed. Until then, they had no idea what he had gone through.
This is the enduring truth about refugees. We, who have never fled war or oppression, simply have no idea about the pain and hardship. Too often we pass hasty judgments that are ignorant and insensitive.
Carina Hoang was 16 when she fled Vietnam. After years in a refugee camp, she was settled in the US. She subsequently moved to Perth, where she is completing her PhD. This book, which she has written and edited, is based on her research. It tells the story, through photographs and personal accounts, of what fleeing Vietnam involved for 40 of the 1.5 million who attempted to leave in the years after the Vietnam War. There is the story of Loc Mai, who had to watch as Thai pirates raped his sister and other women over a period of five days. Don Thu Nguyen tells of being attacked by Thai pirates seven times while drifting on the South China Sea, while David Lee recounts how he found his mother’s grave on an Indonesian island 30 years after she had died there.
Everyone who opposes or questions refugees should read this book.
Sunday Morning Post – Shelter from the Storm
Carina Hoang is proud to have been labelled a “boatperson”, because she credits the experience with having shaped her life. The Saigon-born 47-year-old said it made her stronger, more compassionate and more resilient than she would otherwise have been. It also led to her first book, Boat People: Personal Stories from the Vietnam Exodus 1975- 96, which is being released this month. Boat People is a powerful collection of testimonials by 38 people with direct involvement in the flight of some 1.5 million people from communist Vietnam. [Download PDF]
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BOAT PEOPLE
Personal stories from the Vietnam Exodus – Edited by Carina Hoang
Coffee Table book, 252 pages of 38 short stories with color illustrations, and hundreds of black and white photos.
This important book brings together a collection of survival tales from the largest mass migration of human beings in modern history.
Synopsis
“They piled on top of one another in wooden boats, men, women and children. So desperate to escape their war-torn home, more than a million people would risk everything to tackle the high seas in search of safe haven. Many never made it to land. Those who did endured unimaginable horrors. Told simply in their own words, Boat People gives voice to some of the survivors of the Vietnamese exodus, the largest mass migration in modern history. Their stories will make you weep. They will make you angry. Above all, they will make you wonder at the ability of the human spirit to go on against all odds. This book is a powerful document of a time we should never be allowed to forget – and of a people we should be proud to have given a new home.” THE WEST AUSTRALIAN
The book includes extracts from diaries, letters, and other testimony of former UNHCR officers located in Canada, Indonesia, the US and Australia. Among them is 84-year-old Talbot Bashall, who served as Controller of the Refugee Control Centre in Hong Kong. After so many years, these privileged perspectives on the exodus can finally be shared.
Carina Hoang has also assembled a powerful collection of photographic images, most of which are published for the first time. They are vital to the book’s first objective, which is to preserve the historical record for the education of future generations of the global boat-people diaspora.
The book’s other goal is to tell how the survivors of the exodus have been, on the whole, able to make valuable contributions to the societies that accepted them.
“Although many stories about boat people have been documented, Boat People will offer possibly the broadest account of the historic exodus, to enhance general understanding of what we, the boat people, went through. It will be especially beneficial for our children; they need to know about this significant part of their heritage, and to appreciate the sacrifices made by their forebears.” Carina Hoang – 2010
