Vietnam Highlands. Free Image by ThuyHaBich from Pixabay.

Quarantatré anni

Si credevano morti. 43 anni dopo, i due amici d'infanzia hanno scoperto di essere sopravvissuti alla guerra.
United States, Northern America

Story by Y-Danair Niehrah. Translated by Anita Landolfo
Published on July 25, 2022.

This story is also available in GB kr



Listen to this story:


Quarantacinque anni fa mio padre, Y-Luin, lasciava il Vietnam nascosto nella stiva di un Lockheed C-141B Starlifter. Qualche giorno dopo, Saigon cadeva e questa è la sua storia…

Y-Luin appartiene alla tribù Rhade della popolazione Degar - Montagnard (figli delle montagne), minoranza etnica che considera casa l’altopiano centrale vietnamita. Suo padre, Y-Thih, fu rinchiuso in prigione più volte, battendosi per l’indipendenza e la parità di diritti del popolo Degar. 

All’inizio degli anni’70, Y-Luin era l’unico studente Degar nel suo liceo a Saigon; lì suo padre trovò lavoro presso il governo vietnamita, mentre sua madre rimase a Buôn Ma Thuột.

A quel tempo, Y-Luin era al settimo cielo. Era presidente dell’atletica del suo liceo, vinse numerose cinture nere in diverse arti marziali, conseguì il diploma di maturità e superò il test di ammissione alla facoltà di medicina. [1] Il suo sogno era quello di andare a studiare in Francia, forse a Parigi.

Al suo migliore amico, Thế Huỳnh Hữ, raccontava con entusiasmo dei suoi progetti futuri; insieme trascorrevano le notti di luna piena praticando arti marziali, studiando per gli esami e sognando le loro case future.

Il 25 aprile del 1995 Y-Thih disse a Y-Luin di lasciare la città, senza mai spiegargli che l’Esercito del Vietnam del Nord (NVA) avesse preso la base aerea di Biên Hòa. Y-Luin pensò che si trattasse di una sorpresa e che suo padre avesse messo una buona parola per lui, riuscendo a farlo accedere in una scuola in Francia. Così salì a bordo di un Lockheed C-141B Starlifter per Guam come rifugiato, ignaro della morte di sua madre, uccisa da una trappola esplosiva a Buôn Ma Thuột.

Y-Luin non disse mai addio a Thế e quello fu uno dei più grandi rimpianti della sua vita, una delle cose di cui mi parlò quando, anni dopo, mi ritrovai a chiedergli della sua infanzia davanti ad una bottiglia di vino. Ogni giorno, io e mio fratello cercammo senza sosta Thế sui social media, ma tutto fu inutile. 

Thế e Y-Luin si credevano morti.

Quarantatré anni dopo, mio padre trovò il video Youtube della rimpatriata delle classi 1970-1975 del suo liceo e scoprì che qualcuno lo stava cercando, in quanto aveva commentato lasciando i propri recapiti per essere ricontattato. Dopo alcune email e telefonate i due amici d’infanzia si erano finalmente ritrovati. 

Il giorno di Natale del 2018 si rividero per la prima volta. Dopo quasi cinquant’anni, scherzavano ancora l’un l’altro, soprattutto perché mio padre aveva perso quasi tutti i capelli dall’ultima volta che si erano visti. La guerra aveva distrutto le loro case e, dopo la caduta di Saigon, Thế aveva persino trascorso nove anni in un campo di lavoro forzato, fino a quando non riuscì a fuggire dal paese salendo su una barca nel 1984.

A seguito della tragedia, entrambi hanno avuto successo in America; hanno messo su famiglia e costruito una nuova casa, ritrovando una delle più grandi benedizioni: l’amicizia, quel forte legame che pensavano di aver perso nel 1975 e che finalmente sbocciava più forte che mai. 

 

Note a piè di pagina

[1] Per accedere alla facoltà di medicina è necessario sostenere un test di ammissione.


How does this story make you feel?

Follow-up

Do you have any questions after reading this story? Do you want to follow-up on what you've just read? Get in touch with our team to learn more! Send an email to
[email protected].

Talk about this Story

Please enable cookies to view the comments powered by Disqus.

Share your story

Every story we share is another perspective on a complex topic like migration, gender and sexuality or liberation. We believe that these personal stories are important to better understand what's going on in our globalised society - and to better understand each other. That's because we are convinced that the more we understand about each other, the easier it will be for us to really talk to one another, to get closer - and to maybe find solutions for the issues that affect us all. 

Do you want to share your story? Then have a look here for more info.

Share Your Story

Subscribe to our Monthly Newsletter

Stay up to date with new stories on Correspondents of the World by subscribing to our monthly newsletter:

* indicates required

Follow us on Social Media

Y-Danair Niehrah

Y-Danair Niehrah

Y-Danair Niehrah is a Degar/Montagnard-Vietnamese American living in Charleston, SC. Outside of his editorial work in the publishing industry, Y-Danair loves to write historical and genre fiction and hopes some day to teach craft to other aspiring writers. 

Other Stories in Italiano




Show all

Get involved

At Correspondents of the World, we want to contribute to a better understanding of one another in a world that seems to get smaller by the day - but somehow neglects to bring people closer together as well. We think that one of the most frequent reasons for misunderstanding and unnecessarily heated debates is that we don't really understand how each of us is affected differently by global issues.

Our aim is to change that with every personal story we share.

Share Your Story

Community Worldwide

Correspondents of the World is not just this website, but also a great community of people from all over the world. While face-to-face meetings are difficult at the moment, our Facebook Community Group is THE place to be to meet other people invested in Correspondents of the World. We are currently running a series of online-tea talks to get to know each other better.

Join Our Community

EXPLORE TOPIC Migration

Global Issues Through Local Eyes

We are Correspondents of the World, an online platform where people from all over the world share their personal stories in relation to global development. We try to collect stories from people of all ages and genders, people with different social and religious backgrounds and people with all kinds of political opinions in order to get a fuller picture of what is going on behind the big news.

Our Correspondents

At Correspondents of the World we invite everyone to share their own story. This means we don't have professional writers or skilled interviewers. We believe that this approach offers a whole new perspective on topics we normally only read about in the news - if at all. If you would like to share your story, you can find more info here.

Share Your Story

Our Editors

We acknowledge that the stories we collect will necessarily be biased. But so is news. Believing in the power of the narrative, our growing team of awesome editors helps correspondents to make sure that their story is strictly about their personal experience - and let that speak for itself.

Become an Editor

Vision

At Correspondents of the World, we want to contribute to a better understanding of one another in a world that seems to get smaller by the day - but somehow neglects to bring people closer together as well. We think that one of the most frequent reasons for misunderstanding and unnecessarily heated debates is that we don't really understand how each of us is affected differently by global issues.

Our aim is to change that with every personal story we share.

View Our Full Vision & Mission Statement

Topics

We believe in quality over quantity. To give ourselves a focus, we started out to collect personal stories that relate to our correspondents' experiences with six different global topics. However, these topics were selected to increase the likelihood that the stories of different correspondents will cover the same issues and therefore illuminate these issues from different perspectives - and not to exclude any stories. If you have a personal story relating to a global issue that's not covered by our topics, please still reach out to us! We definitely have some blind spots and are happy to revise our focus and introduce new topics at any point in time. 

Environment

Discussions about the environment often center on grim, impersonal figures. Among the numbers and warnings, it is easy to forget that all of these statistics actually also affect us - in very different ways. We believe that in order to understand the immensity of environmental topics and global climate change, we need the personal stories of our correspondents.

Gender and Sexuality

Gender is the assumption of a "normal". Unmet expectations of what is normal are a world-wide cause for violence. We hope that the stories of our correspondents will help us to better understand the effects of global developments related to gender and sexuality, and to reveal outdated concepts that have been reinforced for centuries.

Migration

Our correspondents write about migration because it is a deeply personal topic that is often dehumanized. People quickly become foreigners, refugees - a "they". But: we have always been migrating, and we always will. For millions of different reasons. By sharing personal stories about migration, we hope to re-humanize this global topic.

Liberation

We want to support the demand for justice by spotlighting the personal stories of people who seek liberation in all its different forms. Our correspondents share their individual experiences in creating equality. We hope that for some this will be an encouragement to continue their own struggle against inequality and oppression - and for some an encouragement to get involved.

Education

Education is the newest addition to our themes. We believe that education, not only formal but also informal, is one of the core aspects of just and equal society as well as social change. Our correspondents share their experiences and confrontations about educational inequalities, accessibility issues and influence of societal norms and structures. 

Corona Virus

2020 is a year different from others before - not least because of the Corona pandemic. The worldwide spread of a highly contagious virus is something that affects all of us in very different ways. To get a better picture of how the pandemic's plethora of explicit and implicit consequences influences our everyday life, we share lockdown stories from correspondents all over the world.

Growing Fast

Although we started just over a year ago, Correspondents of the World has a quickly growing community of correspondents - and a dedicated team of editors, translators and country managers.

94

Correspondents

113

Stories

57

Countries

433

Translations

Contact

Correspondents of the World is as much a community as an online platform. Please feel free to contact us for whatever reason!

Message Us

Message on WhatsApp

Call Us

Joost: +31 6 30273938