Woman finds her Vietnamese past, and mother who gave her away
Part I
MORNING READ: As a little girl, Mary Mustard Reed was sent by her mother from Vietnam to America. As a woman, she’s written about making her way home.
By DEEPA BHARATH
Mary Mustard Reed is a grown woman looking for her mother.
She is in a car driving from Little Saigon to the office of the American Red Cross in Santa Ana. It all feels unreal.
Reed times her drive to 601 N. Golden Circle Dr. where the Holocaust and War Victims Tracing Information Center is situated.
Exactly 21 minutes, she counts nervously.
She looks at a faded, wrinkled piece of paper with her mom’s name and address written on it: Nguyen Thi Thanh, 376 Phan Dan Phung.
She clutches in her hand a gold treble clef necklace her mom gave her as a parting gift and a black-and-white passport photo of her 7-year-old self – a baby-faced girl with black hair and deep almond eyes.
That was Hien. Little Hien, who giggled, danced and smiled when her mom grabbed her and held her close to her heart, showering her with kisses or singing her a sweet lullaby.
Where is that Hien now?
Reed has asked herself that question much of her adult life.
Reed doesn’t know who she is looking for now – her mom or that little girl who left that little brick house in pre-communist Saigon 29 years ago.
Part II
A daughter finds her mother and then her voice
Finding her mother after 29 years of separation made Mary Mustard Reed dizzy with happiness.
The Vietnamese-born, American-raised pharmaceutical rep had found her mother, Dao Thi Thanh, and seven half-siblings. They were alive and thriving in Paris.
But the discovery also left her feeling strange and emotionally exhausted as she attempted to communicate with a woman who had raised her until age 7, but whom she had not seen in nearly three decades.
Their initial reunion, at LAX on Sept. 3, 1993 was powerful. But once they got beyond the hugs, tears and profuse I-love-you-s, mother and daughter realized how different they’d become.
Dao spoke only Vietnamese and French, very little English. Reed spoke mostly English and broken French.
“I’m Christian, she is Buddhist,” Reed says. “The differences in language, culture and religion were just too overwhelming for us to handle.”
Reed didn’t even know how to cook rice, a Vietnamese staple. She watched the shocked expression on Dao’s face when she opened a box of Uncle Ben’s. Reed, who had been sent to America by Dao, had forgotten the aroma of nuoc mam, a pungent sauce she had enjoyed as a child…
Related: Oceans Apart: A Voyage of International Adoption
An almost fatal bout of small pox. A sobbing farewell to her mother at Saigon’s Tan Son Nhat International Airport. A traumatic flight to the United States with adoptive parents. An abusive childhood filled with neglect and emotional turmoil. Yet, despite these agonizing upheavals, within the lonely child lives an unwavering quest for survival.
Is this the fictitious plot of a best-selling novel? “Certainly not,” says Mary Mustard Reed, author of Oceans Apart: A Voyage of International Adoption. “This is the uncensored story of my fight to overcome and triumph as one of the first Vietnamese children-if not the first-to be adopted in the USA in 1964.”
Beaten and forced to grow up on her own, the author dramatically details every aspect of her harrowing journey from barefoot toddler living in an unfurnished one-room hut to adopted daughter of a nasty, heartless woman-Margaret Mustard, who, from day one, never tried to hide her hatred for Mary.
“Festering in Margaret’s mind,” says Ms. Reed, “was the belief that her husband, Sam, agreed to the adoption because of his ’special fondness’ for my young, beautiful mother, Yvonne.” Filled with jealousy, Margaret used physical and mental violence to vent her anger, forcing young Mary to negate her Vietnamese legacy.
“This is a big issue in international adoptions,” says Ms. Reed. “The United States handles over 20,000 foreign adoptions a year. I felt it was necessary to write Oceans Apart as a cautionary vehicle to inform parents of the importance of accepting the cultural heritage of their adopted children by encouraging them to keep who they are intact.”
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Sume, this is very interesting to read and thanks for post this. I especially would love to get in touch with her as it correlates to what I’m writing about. Again, thanks for sharing this.
Wow, what an incredible story. Both beautiful and heartbreaking. Thanks for the link to the story.
A definite must-read. I’ve contacted my local library to buy this book. Thanks for the heads-up.