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No Comments [ Add Comment ]Paying forward: Former Vietnamese refugee appreciates opportunities, reaches out with her teaching
By Carolyn LoseeKAYSVILLE
-- The first time Trang Le saw the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C., it was a stark reminder of her childhood.
Trang was 6 years old when the war ended in 1975. Since then, the Le family has learned to leave the horrors of war behind and never look back.
Because her father, Ngoc Le, fought alongside American forces and was a prisoner of war for 10 years, her family was not treated well by the communist government, she said.
As political refugees, Ngoc and wife Minh Phan and their seven children came to Utah seeking a better life in February 1994.
Today, Trang, 38, a Kaysville resident, has two master's degrees from the University of Utah, in mathematics and statistics. She teaches full time at Davis Applied Technology College in Kaysville and part time at Salt Lake Community College.
"I'm feeling grateful for the opportunities given to me by the American government and the people here," Trang says. "I always wanted to do my best and contribute to society through my profession. My teaching gives me the opportunity to reach out more and return what was given to me."
Trang's sisters also entered professional fields. Kieu, a West Jordan resident, is a dentist; Kim has degrees in mechanical engineering and computer science and lives in Chicago; and Thanh, living in Oklahoma, has an associate's degree as a medical assistant.
Of the brothers, Tuan lives in Texas, has two bachelor's degrees, in computer science and mathematics; Tu lives in Chicago and has a degree in computer science. Long, 18, is currently attending the University of Utah, majoring in pharmacy.
Asian teaching style
Trang and her family learned a different culture and language, said Dale Nelson, assistant math professor at SLCC, where Trang tutored while she completed her work at the U of U.
"She has had to learn a new math culture as well as a language culture," Nelson said. "Math is not a universal language as some people think. Trang had to change her way of thinking about math. Having to learn those changes has helped in her teaching."
Students say she is helpful and focuses on how to help students solve math problems, Nelson said.
While teaching at West High School in Salt Lake City between 1999 and 2002, she introduced to her students the Asian way of teaching and class discipline. The students in Asia run the classroom. They take the roll, decorate the classroom and make the teacher feel welcome, she said.
At West High, the students would stand and say "Good morning." At the end of class, they would stand and say "Good day," Trang said.
"How to behave in the classroom is to respect ourselves, others and the teacher," she says. "I feel students like to show they are good people."
The Vietnam years
Trang says she has learned a lot from adversity. The family got out of Vietnam alive, and she is not sad about their experiences.
"I consider the challenges have strengthened me and made me who I am today," Trang said. "I'm not afraid of hardship."
Those challenges began in about 1960, when Ngoc Le left medical school and went into the South Vietnamese army.
He married Minh in about 1966.
"Mother had to take care of the children alone," Trang says. "During the war, she was strong for the children, but inside was nervous about the situation."
Bombing and gunshots were a regular occurrence where they lived in Phan Thiet, in central Vietnam, Kieu said.
They ran for cover under the beds or behind the doors, Kieu said. After the war, looting and chaos broke out in the streets.
To find a safe place to live, Minh took her children and traveled 180 miles to Phan Rant, where her parents lived.
Kieu says it was a dangerous journey, traveled by foot, truck and boat. They passed by large piles of guns in the check areas and saw people shoot at each other, Kieu says. At the time, Minh was pregnant with Tu.
During and after the war, Minh worked in the rice fields and ran a coffee and tea shop to support her family. Because Trang was the tallest child, she was the only sibling who worked in the rice fields. All of the children attended school.
Ngoc rejoins family
When Ngoc Le was released from the Hanoi concentration camp in about 1986, he joined his wife working in the rice fields in Phan Rant.
In the concentration camps, Ngoc said, the prisoners were starved to keep them weak, and many died. Those hard years have taken a toll on his health, he said.
"When I was released, my family was very happy," he said. "No one thought I would come out alive."
Ngoc and Minh encouraged their children to finish their education. The communist government made that difficult, Trang said.
"Students must be the top 10 percent to pass the college entrance exam," Trang said. "These exams are very hard and the standard score was higher for POWs children, to push them out. But we made it anyway."
During that time, Long, the seventh child was born.
Immigrating to Utah
Before leaving Vietnam, Trang taught physics for three years at a junior high. Kieu was teaching at the only dental school in Vietnam.
Kim and Tuan completed their educations just in time to leave Vietnam. When they arrived in Utah, they had to start all over again.
In 1995, the family's hard work paid off, and they qualified to finance a $100,000 home in Salt Lake City.
Ngoc Le, 70, retired as a custodian from Little America in 2003, and Minh, 65, retired as a custodian from ZCMI. Today she works as a receptionist at Kieu's dental office in West Valley City.
There are six grandchildren. It is important to the family that the grandchildren keep their Vietnamese heritage and culture.
"The grandchildren are not allowed to speak English at home. Living in Utah, it is easy to lose their culture," Trang says. "However, the grandchildren attend school and learn English."
Trang said the more she worked, the better she became at communicating and learning the subject of mathematics.
In Vietnam, the family didn't have the same kind of opportunities even though they worked hard, she says.
"I have a message to everyone, especially to minority people, to be brave," Trang says. "And if they have a dream, they can have anything they want, if they work at it. You can overcome anything in this country."
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