A New Beginning

These four pictures were taken in Laos back in May of 2009 when I got the chance to go back to Laos and visit my parent’s homeland and cousins I have never ever met before for the very first time in my life. It was an amazing experience and coming back made me realize how many opportunities I have living in America versus the people that live in present day Laos. To sum up my family history my parents left their homeland, Laos, back in 1975. They resided in Thailand as refugees in the Nam Yao Refugee camp and they converted over to Catholicism with the help and aid of U.S. missionaries and left their traditional Shaman cultural practices behind. They soon came to America in 1983 with three children. From 1983 to 2011, my family has resided in the U.S. since and we have converted back to our traditional practices. My parents are the only ones (out of all their siblings) that came to the United States. All their other siblings still live in Laos. I was born in 1990 and all my life, the stories my parents and uncles told me (about Laos) was how I envisioned the country to be. My father fled the country with my mother because he was a Secret War soldier serving the U.S. CIA and Royal Lao Government (RLG). The American CIA set up secret guerrillas of armies to fight Pathet Lao and these armies consisted majorly of Hmong people. This was known as the Secret War. The Secret War was basically like the Asian Holocaust in my sense because Vietnamese communist troops saw RLG servants and Hmong people as the two subgroups interfering with Pathet Lao turning Laos into a communist country. The communist party set out to wipe Hmong people to their very last seed because they have no country anyways and they served the U.S. as well. Of course that did not happen to Hmong people although the Vietnamese did win the country turned into a communist party after all. As I look at my family history, I would not be here today if it was not for my father and mother. Spending a month in Laos, I sure knew what was already coming. No electric washing machines, hot water, cell phones, myspace, and McDonalds… boy was I in a whole new different world!!!! After about four days adjusting to the hot weather and daily life routine of these people… I realize it was not as bad as people say it is. The war left the country in turmoil and there are still war bombing sights and caves present for tourists to check out. Craters and empty missles lay in the fields and temples are made to worship and release the trap souls that still walk among the living to guide their souls to peace. Seeing Laos made me realize after all that Laos is a beautiful country with a rich history after all. The harsh struggle my parents endured to get my family to America. The Secret War left my father’s life at risk and he did not want to be taken to Vietnam and be persecuted. He fled with my mother and because he served the U.S. his identity as a CIA secret guerrilla soldier lubricated his way with easy access to gaining citizenship for himself and his family. Since them my father has not ever gone back to Laos. In my perspective I see that warfare, the struggle from oppression, and American influence in the refugee camps made my parents flee to the U.S. Living in America was the result of what my parents wanted for their children. They did not want us to struggle as how they did. They wanted a better life for their children. They wanted us to have what they could not have and that was education. They want what was best for me and my siblings and coming to America (as the slogan goes) was the land of freedom. I would not be where I am today if it was not for my parent’s past struggles with warfare and the harsh reality of not having a country and force to seek asylum from the physical and mental warfare struggles that left many people in hope and fear of survival.