Sing’s escape

My second brother Sing had a different story. My father arranged for him to escape Vietnam more than once. My father paid $40,000 for a deposit with a friend but at the end they took the deposit and ran. My father arranged for him a second time and this time he needed to escape twice. My father paid $850,000 for him to escape this time. Sing left Vietnam when he was 18 years old but failed. Somehow he couldn’t connect to his ship and got sent back home. I remembered he came home with his whole body wet and filled with sand. He said they dumped him on Long Hai beach and he didn’t even know how he managed to make it home. He sat on the staircase and cried. He said to our mother: “I will never go again.” So we hid him for a few more months on the roof top. Every time the local police came to search for the young male in each household, my parents worries became out of control. The hiding place was on the roof top but he needed to crawl over with a thin wobbly bamboo ladder. Once he was over on the other side of the roof top we removed the ladder. He made the escape again when he was 19 years old. He was lucky to reach Hong Kong. At least Kong was already there. My father again sent more US dollars to his friends and our cousins in Hong Kong hoping they would look after the two young boys but the money was never given to my brothers.

Kong was furious with our father’s decision. He said why trust other people compared to your own sons but they could not understand our father’s worries. Our father actually worried that if they had money, they might do drugs and alcohol. Kong is still upset to this day. He will not forgive our father for not trusting them.