So he went to ask these youngsters, "Who are you?" They told him they were Amerasian. "Amer what?" He’d never heard that before. But after a few words, he found out that he had met some very unique people. He asked them where they lived. Some lived in Ho Chi Minh City; some moved there from the countryside and lived in the street. Others lived in a camp named Amerasian Transit Center (ATC) in the Damn Senh area.
Amerasian Transit Center—hmm, it sounded like a prison to him, but he decided it was worth trying to take a look at. He went out there with his new friend and future partner in this mission, Hung, who at this time was working as a cycklo driver. The whole area around the center was filled with people making a living from the Amerasians, selling food, bars, paperwork, copies -- anything that made money.
The ATC had an entrance with guards. The main street had smaller side streets with small homes where the Amerasians with families were living, plus offices, shops, and workshops. The center and area were full of people all over. Brian became fast friends with the Amerasians. They were so friendly that he started to work in the camp doing volunteer work.
After 4 months in Southeast Asia it was time for Brian to go home; no more money, no more funny. But the memory of the Amerasians wouldn’t leave him! He had made a good Amerasian friend named Arnold; he and his friend had shown him a great deal concerning humanity, something that he wouldn’t get in his own country, where "everything was working fine."
1993. Brian had enough money for living abroad and did some searches for his Amerasian friends before leaving. He found no word on their whereabouts. So he took the cheapest airfare to Bangkok and went on living back in the hood on Khao San Rd. Armed with the refugee number of his Arnold, he went to the main office of ODP (Orderly Departure Program) based in Bangkok. It contained at that time all files of Amerasians, former South Vietnamese military personel, and former South Vietnamese government politicals--all those that applied to leave for the US or other western countries.
In the office they told him that his friend had left Vietnam for the Philippines. Philippines--for what? He was supposed to leave for the USA. But the nice people in the ODP told Brian that all people going to the US were supposed to stay in the Philippines to learn English and wait for a final destination. Back on the Khao San Rd, he went to a travel agency to get a ticket to Manila with Air France via Hong Kong. After a hairy trip, he made it to Manila and stayed in a Malate pensionne (a cheap hotel), closer to his friend. But I had no idea where he was, just that he was in a refugee camp.
In the pensionne, Brian met a Filipino lady that used to work at the Philippine Refugee Processing Center in Balanga, Bataan. She didn't know about the center, but when she saw the photos of Arnold and the other Amerasians she told Brian she knew his friend. She used to teach Arnold English, and he was a good man--a man people respected. Besides that she gave me the address of the center and how to get out there. It sounded like a trip to the moon.
After waiting for 2 hours in a hot minibus for it to be filled up with people and then getting bashed between a chicken and human being for 6 hours, Brian was finally at the big gate that said "Welcome to Philippine Refugee Processing Center."
The camp, a country inside a country, had 11 areas--shops, offices, small housing, and everything you need for a normal life. After registration, Brian was off in a police car to his friend's address. The shock of seeing each other was big, the same with the happiness.
During his time in this special world of madness, Brian met so many new Amerasians. He had the time and space to talk to people. So when one Amerasian lady asked him to help her, he thought why not? What’s the problem? What can I do? She told me that her friend from the village wanted to look for her American father. She needed to find him to leave for the US, but she had no idea what to do. So Brian promised to do whatever he could when he went back to Vietnam, knowing that he had no idea when or if he would go back to Vietnam again and how to help her friend if he could.
Time passed and in 1994 Brian was still in Europe trying to live what you might call a "normal" life. Some Amerasians from Vietnam had contacted him and asked him to help look for their fathers. But Brian had no idea what to do, and he wasn't really motivated to do it at that time.
1995. It was time to return to the battlefield, fighting for the heart and mind. Off for Ho Chi Minh City via good old Bangkok. The sight of the Amerasian Transit Center in 1995 made him both sad and happy. A few Amerasians had left for the US, but those left behind were in a miserable mood. They knew they didn't have a chance to leave; they lost their chance for leaving for the promised land. All they had was a broken dream in the Amerasian Transit Center. Most had no other place to go, and they didn't know what to do with their lives.
After a few days in Ho Chi Minh City, Brian went by minibus uphill to a small village between Bien Hoa and DaLat named Tan Phu. A shabby, poor village, just a stop on the way to DaLat, but with a fairly big Amerasian population at that time. He went to see the friend of his Amerasian friend from the Philipines, the one he had the address of. With the help of his friend, they did a house-to-house search for the Amerasian lady, who was supposed to live there.
Finally after a long search, they found her. She looked really surprised and happy that someone cared to help her. After some days with her and her family we had all the information we could squeeze out of her.
Home in Denmark, I contacted the US Embassy and they gave me the address of the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis (Missouri ). Brian sent them a nice letter with all the information he had for the father. (We were lucky; we had his SSN and military number.)
Six weeks later Brian got a letter back with the father's DD 214 and with that he got the name of the father. Using Yahoo, Brian got an address for him. He sent a letter to him and waited again. Four weeks later the father wrote Brian back telling him he was so happy; he knew he had a daughter in Vietnam, but he didn't know what happened to her. So with Brian's help they started to write to each other.
The news about that spread fast, like a fire, and soon many Amerasians started to write Brian. Lighted up by my success, Brian created a Missing Persons Agency, but soon after changed it to Amerasian Relief Agency, and made his first Home page. From 1995 to 1999, he kept working on cases but didn't go back to Vietnam for economic reasons.
1999. Back to Vietnam again, armed with the papers from the first case and with a dream of getting her and her family an exit visa for the US. The center was closed and the remaining Amerasians were scattered around Ho Chi Minh city and in the countryside.
Brian met with the Amerasian woman and her family outside the Orderly Departure Program (ODP) office.
They had no appointment; they needed to meet the American officials and talk to them directly. Many people were waiting, a mixture of Amerasians with their families and people that had relatives in the US.
1 hour turned into 5 hours and then 7 hours without anyone saying her name. So here we were, 3 adults and 3 children in a huge, hot room without air conditioning and nothing happened at all.
So Brian had enough of waiting and went though the doors in to the long hall where the doors for the interview rooms and the American officials were. Brian grabbed the first American, a guy named " Lawrence." He forced him to see all the papers about the father, and he saw the light at the end of the tunnel, which meant that her Amerasian case got a "Yes. " Filled with that success, Brian started to look up the remaining Amerasians, a task harder than before because they had no meeting place.
2000. Brian was back again in Vietnam and the Orderly Departure Program (ODP) was history, the office closed. It had become the Amerasian Resettlement Program, based in the newly opened American Consulate. It was placed on the ground of the old American Embassy.
Basically, every Amerasian that applied for a visa for the US had to pass through the gate in the wall of the consulate. And the people working at the gate could extort the Amerasians for money. Outside the consulate, there were many cafe shops and small bars. In those places, a small industry was working to sell false papers and false marriages. Many Amerasians were hanging around those places trying to apply again and again to leave for the USA, but in vain.
Meeting so many Amerasians made him feel more alive than ever in his life, and at the same time sad, because they were still in Vietnam. During his time in Vietnam, he was doing interviews around the clock, so many Amerasians needed help. But so few had information about their fathers.
2002. Brian was in South Carolina, USA, visiting a Viet Nam veteran. Brian received an email from a Viet Nam veteran named Clint. He wanted to help the Amerasians, so Brian asked him to call at my friends place. He did ! It was the start of a new agency, a new direction. They created a new agency named Amerasian Childfind Network, Inc, and they were getting better and bigger results in finding the fathers.
2005. After 5 years Brian was back in Vietnam with his family. It was a changed Viet Nam and a changed him, with a wife and a child. Meeting up with Amerasians that Brian hadn't seen for a long made me feel like special. Brian had been doing this for so long, a life story.
2007. Brian had started the new Home page and was in his 15th year of helping Amerasians. He still felt compelled to do it. Amerasians still need his help and as long they need him, he has to be there for them.
At last Brian would like to thank all those that have helped him during that long journey, especially his best Vietnamese friend Hung. Without him, Brian couldn't help the Amerasians.