Across the Mekong River (2 page)

Auntie Nhia
washed Mother down, wrapped her lower half in sarongs, and gave her a small piece of brown medicine collected from the poppies in our fields. She told me to stop crying and help her, taking my hand and leading me into the forest. We searched for dark green mint leaves that grew in the shadows of sweet-scented white orchids. When I rubbed them between my fingers, the pungent, cooling smell filled my nostrils. Next we gathered golden chrysanthemums along the bank of a streambed where water bugs skittered across a pool in a game of tag. Auntie Nhia patted my head and reassured me my mother would be fine. What a big girl I was, she said, to help her find the medicine. When we returned, she boiled the plants into a yellow-green potion. She roused Mother from her stupor and forced her to drink slow sips every few minutes. An hour passed and the bleeding ebbed, finally stopping late that night.

Mother slept a full night and day without waking as Father chanted
prayers and stroked her hair. The rest of us gathered firewood to keep the blaze burning. Auntie Nhia and I washed the blood-stained sarongs in the stream and hung them to dry near the fire. At last Mother sat up, her face pale and worn. Father fed her some of the last rice and more of the herbal drink Auntie had made. I nestled under Mother’s arm, grateful she was alive and proud that I had helped to save her. She held me close and kissed my head. Two days later we set out again.

The rice was gone.
My stomach gnawed with a constant ache. We scavenged for brown mushrooms shaped like elephant ears, the white larvae of giant ants, grasshoppers and beetles to roast, tender bamboo shoots, and if we were lucky, an occasional rat or bird--anything to stay alive. One day Father lassoed a small brown monkey with a rope. Another day we passed near a village, and a kind farmer brought us a basket of rice and bitter melon from his wife’s garden. I ate so fast it came back up.

The
full moon came and passed, and still we walked. On a hot day when the sun filled the sky and steam rose off the ground and leaves like wisps of smoke, Grandmother Her and her grandson, Blong, stopped to fill their water jugs in a stream. They waved for us to join them, holding up bright red berries that they stuffed in their mouths.

Auntie Nhia clucked her tongue and ran toward them, warning them
. “Stop. They may be poisonous. The birds have not eaten them.” Grandmother Yang just laughed, her teeth stained vermillion, a trickle of juice dripping down her chin. Within an hour, they complained of stomach aches and began running into the bushes to relieve themselves. Soon they fell to the ground, writhing with pain, pink foam forming at the corners of their mouths. Their eyes fell back in their sockets, and their insides emptied out. I clung to Mother and hid my face in her skirt as we stood by helpless. In less than three hours they were both dead. We buried them in the rich dark soil next to a stream and piled stones on top to keep the wild animals from digging them up. Father said even if we could not give them a proper burial, we would pray for their souls to find their way back to their birth place, then to the heavens with their ancestors.

I often cried, but silently, so the evi
l soldiers would not find us. They found us anyway.

A few nights
later sharp bursts of light erupted as we picked our way across a steep mountainside nearly impenetrable with dense pine trees and clinging vines. Whistling noises and loud pops swept past my ears. At first I thought someone was throwing rocks. But the noises multiplied into a drum roll of deafening bangs and pings that caused my body to jerk. I felt the heat of bullets whizzing past and ricocheting off the trees. Mother grabbed my hand as we ran through the forest with the others. A thorn caught my arm. A twig scraped my eye. A huge earthquake rocked the ground, obliterating our path. Dirt and rocks and leaves flew through the air and showered down, hitting me about the head and shoulders. The air smelled of metal and fire and rotten eggs. And then another blast. In a flash of light, no brighter than the palest moon, my cousin Chao and Aunt Nhia fell to the ground, their faces full of surprise. A scream formed in the back of my throat, but I could not make the sound come out. We ran and ran and ran until finally the shooting and explosions ceased. And we kept running.

At last Mother stopp
ed, and we fell on the ground. Her entire body shook as she wrapped me in her thin arms. The warmth of her body melted into mine and calmed my pounding heart. I lay there as she rocked me back and forth. Fue soon found us. We huddled together, listening for the others. Our terror settled over the hum of crickets and mosquitoes and a thousand crawling creatures living in the dark.

In the first shadows of dawn, the remaining
members of our group gathered. Mother wept with relief when Father and Fong appeared. A bullet had grazed Fong’s neck, leaving a red burn. Yang Shoua had a bullet in her arm. Her husband wrapped a cloth around it, and a slow trickle of blood oozed through. Four were missing. Father, Fong, Uncle Boua, and Chia crept back to look. An hour later Fong came for us. We found the men digging graves beneath the leaves and moss, gently placing my cousin Chao, Auntie Nhia, and Yang Kim, and Yang Lia to their rest. We cried and prayed for their souls.

Mountains
receded into rolling hills and dense pines gave way to coconut palms, monkey pod, and acacia trees. Fruit orchards dotted the land. I happily gorged on breadfruit and mangos and corn stolen from fields in the middle of the night.

L
ate afternoon a plane buzzed over the stand of mango and palm trees where we had stopped to rest. A fine yellow film seeped through the leaves like the white clouds of mist that had often veiled our village and mountain early mornings until the sun burned through. The yellow powder seared my eyes and lungs. Father lifted me into his arms, and we scattered through the mango trees into the hibiscus bushes and ferns and away from the choking fog. We reached a stream where Father dunked me repeatedly, scrubbing my skin. The water turned pink around me, and when I touched my nose, blood covered my hand. Like many in our group, I retched for hours that night until there was nothing left in my body. My muscles quivered and convulsed. Mother gave me a small piece of the brown medicine, and I floated in and out of consciousness. Three days later I ate a bit of rice, then a banana. But my young cousin Chay was not as lucky. He had bled from his ears, eyes, nose, and mouth, and died the first night.

At last we reached the flatlands
of flooded rice fields. For a week we crept along the narrow levees at night, hoping not to encounter poisonous water snakes or Pathet Laos soldiers, one as deadly as the other. During the day we hid in groves of bamboo or oleander. It wasn’t far now, Father said.

Only twenty-
two of our original group reached the Mekong River. Seven had died, and Youa had left with her baby for her brother’s village near Luang Prabang after Choa was killed. We hid among the bushes, waiting for our chance. I knew that when we touched the lights in Thailand, we would be safe.

Father talked with local fisherme
n and learned there were no boats to ferry us across, no matter how much silver he offered. The soldiers kept close guard and shot anyone who ventured onto the water. So Father and the other men crawled on hands and knees through the darkness to the riverbank, cut bamboo poles, and fashioned crude rafts by lashing them together with rags and reeds. Once they were ready, Fong rushed back for the rest of us.

We ran bent low to the ground, but Bee Yang’s baby girl, tied to her back, woke from t
he sudden bouncing and wailed. Within seconds, bright shafts of light swept back and forth across the meadow like giant sunbeams trapping flies. Gunfire erupted over our heads, followed by rockets. A swirl of yellow and blue and red filled the night sky like Chinese fireworks at a New Year’s celebration. Mother dragged me by the arm, my feet tripping over mounds of dirt, my lungs burning as the world exploded around us. I never noticed the spark that set my pant leg on fire.

If I close my eyes, I can still feel the shock of cold water rushing over my body
as we crashed into the river. My memory plays tricks now; those next moments stretch into endless minutes like a film in slow motion. I could not find a footing as my body became weightless. Father held the raft with one hand and grabbed my arm with the other, but the swift current caught me. I felt his grip slip down my arm to my wrist and over my palm, his fingers sliding away one by one until I sank into the depths. I could not lift my arms and legs. Water filled my mouth and lungs. Muffled screams, perhaps Mother’s, drifted down. A hand thrashed through the water and pulled me up. Somehow Father caught my hair and then my shirt, grasping, lifting me to him and onto the raft, pinning me under his left arm. I coughed up water and gulped for air. Father had saved me. I believed he always would.

Father helped Mother roll onto
the fragile hollows of bamboo. She cried out for my brothers to hurry, her arm stretching out to them. Ten feet away they struggled onto a smaller raft, swirling around like a top. Rockets whistled overhead and a huge wave crashed over them. A machine gun echoed in my ears, bullets bouncing off the bamboo and splashing on the water around us. A searchlight passed and in that moment of illumination, Fue jerked up to his knees, his hand flying to his chest. Mother let out a piercing wail as he fell into the river. The light brushed away and the world turned black once more. Our raft was swept into the rushing waters. I tried to keep my eyes pinned on the spot where my brothers had been, but they had disappeared into the dark expanse.

Father whipped his arms in the water, trying to guide our raft across the
rushing current, avoiding floating logs and debris that bounced past. We clutched at the sharp edges of bamboo, spinning and rolling. I squeezed my eyes shut. I had no sense of how long it took--minutes or hours--before we finally washed up on the opposite shore. I remember being passed into a strange set of arms and then sitting on sand and rocks. My body shook. My limbs felt numb, too heavy to move.

Fourteen others from our group struggled onto the riv
erbank in Thailand that night. My aunt, four cousins, and half the Yang family, were all dead. My brothers Fong and Fue floated somewhere in the depths of the murky, blood-stained waters, never to reach the shore across the Mekong River.

The judge shuffles the papers into a neat pile and puts them aside. The muscles in his face go slack as he lets out a long sigh. The air is filled with static, the heated anticipation of what will come next.

“We’ll begin with
a statement on the filing and the report from Social Services,” the judge says at last. “First, Miss Lee, would you state your name as you wish it to appear in the court record. Do you want to be referred to as Nou Lee or Laura Lee?”

The court recorder, a younger woman
with bleached blond hair cut into short spikes, turns to me. Her hands are poised above the keys of her machine, waiting for my response. She blinks several times with a bored indifference.

The
question catches me off guard. I am confused, unsure how to answer. I am not one or the other, but a strange fusion of both. I do not know how to split apart the pieces.

Of course, I am here today becau
se I am being forced to choose. The American flag hangs on a pole to the side of the judge’s bench, an unspoken promise. A reminder: nothing is given without a price.

PAO

If only we had fled Laos as soon as the civil war ended. If only I had not been lulled into complacency by the charade of peace the communist insurgents offered the Royal Lao government. If only I listened to my heart and not their empty promises. If only. So many times I have wept. If only.

February 22, 19
73. A date etched in my mind. My men and I received a radio message. C
ease fire in effect. Return to headquarters
. An agreement between the two sides had been signed, yet I never believed anything would come of it. The enemy was still shooting shells at us, and that morning U.S. bombers had flown over as usual. I knew the communist Pathet Lao, buttressed by North Vietnamese troops and guns, could not be trusted.

The conflict ceased without ceremony, a candle snuffed out, leaving only a
momentary halo in the darkness. The five men in my unit stood before me, shock and disbelief swimming in their eyes. For over three years I had led them on covert missions behind enemy lines. We shared the bond of fighting side by side, surviving despite the odds. I was their commander, friend, and counselor. I had tended to Xiong when he fell ill with a fever and to Nao when a bullet lodged in his stomach.

The week before, I had chanted a blessing in a
bai si
ceremony to protect us as we headed out on an assignment to track Pathet Lao movements. We still wore the strings we had tied on our wrists to keep our souls tethered to our bodies. I touched my frayed strings, brown with dirt, understanding the unspoken questions that muddied all our thoughts. What of the brave soldiers, our Hmong brothers, who had fought for our land and freedom, only to be shot or blown up and buried in unknown graves on forsaken mountainsides? What had they died for? After our sacrifices and blind loyalty to the Americans, how could they leave us to the mercy of the Pathet Lao? This time, I had no reassurances to offer my men.

My rifle suddenly felt heavy in my hands, cold and unnatural. Yet the mind grasps for ho
pe even where there is little. In that moment, my thoughts turned to more immediate concerns. I would be home with Yer in time for the birth of our third child. I did not want to think of anything beyond this happy event.

Over the next two days we made our way back from
the jungle east of Sam Thong. An eerie silence had settled over the forest. No planes. No explosions. No gunfire. I grew keenly aware of the trills of thrushes and woodcocks, the swish of a civet cat slinking through the ferns, and leaves whispering the sorrow of those who would not return from this long, bitter war.

Late afternoon we reached the airstrip on the hilltop at Lima Site 201 and caught a Huey for the short hop back
to headquarters in Long Chieng. It was the start of the hot season with clear skies and warm hazy air. The helicopter’s front and rear rotors whirled in competing tempos as we skimmed above the mountains. The scarred landscape below sagged as tired and worn as I felt. Faded green forests clung to the hills, punctuated by gaping pits, some over twenty feet wide, trees stripped of foliage, and swaths of barren land, the legacy of rockets and bombs and napalm. Occasionally the crumbling remains of abandoned villages appeared. The chopper climbed over the jagged peaks of Sky Line Ridge and dipped precipitously into the long, narrow valley of Long Chieng with its single paved runway. The CIA building sprouted a forest of antennas, and haphazard shacks sprawled in every direction.

The base was alive with nervous uncer
tainty. Even though I was anxious to see my family, I went directly to my friend and superior officer, Blong. He would know the truth behind the cease fire.

Blong shook
my hand and offered me a seat. He was a square, stocky man with a broad face and ready smile. His spirits never flagged no matter how grim the war had become. I needed his enthusiasm. He nodded his head and spoke quickly, “The agreement is good, I think--a coalition government. Both sides keep the territory they hold now. They will work for reconciliation.”

“After twenty years of fighting, the Path
et Laos sings a song of peace?” I could not keep the disdain from my voice.

He lifted his
hands in the air with a shrug. “The government has no choice but to accept. Since the Americans signed a treaty with Hanoi, they’ve been pressuring the ministers. They are leaving.”

He was right of course.
The desperate Royal Lao ministers had nowhere left to turn. They would wear their best faces with smiles and handshakes and endorsements for the agreement based on nothing more than prayers that it would work.

“All foreign troops must withdraw within sixty days,” he said.

“The Vietnamese will never leave.” The anger rose in my chest. Nothing would change with signatures on a piece of paper.

“We can hope.”
Blong hesitated a moment, staring down at his hands. “The Special Forces must be disbanded as well.”

Here was the core of my fear.
The Pathet Lao hated us. It had never been the small and undisciplined Royal Lao Army that kept them from taking over Laos, but the guerilla troops of the Special Forces made up of Hmong, Mien, and Khmu, the ethnic tribes that lived in the hills, separate from the ruling lowland Lao.

The trouble began after World War II when Ho Chi Minh’s communists defeated the French and forced them to cede colonial rule.
The 1954 Geneva Conventions granted Laos full independence, banning foreign interference. But this did not stop the North Vietnamese. They slipped in and out of our eastern provinces, recruiting poor farmers with no education or thoughts of their own and propping up fledgling Lao communists groups. Other countries flocked to Laos—China, Russia, the US--all vying for influence as governments came and went. The world leaders tried again with the 1962 Geneva Conventions to stop the manipulation and military aid from outsiders. But no one paid attention.

Intrigues
and skirmishes turned into civil war, and we were pulled into a conflict of shadows and deception while the world pretended the fighting did not exist. The CIA recruited us to fight for them, knowing how we treasured our independence high in the mountains of Laos and that some of our people had fought with the French against the Vietnamese years before. They fed our fears, arguing the communists would destroy our way of life and force us to give up our land. The point had come when we had to choose one side or the other. While some Hmong were fooled by the communists, most understood the threat and the logic of siding with the powerful Americans. Surely the U.S. would win. The American military trained our troops and provided us with arms and air support. The conflict widened.

At the United Nations, foreign diplomats
twisted and bent the truth, spinning away from scrutiny like Chinese acrobats. No, there aren’t any North Vietnamese troops in Laos. Why would anyone think the Chinese and Russians are providing arms? No, the American military does not have planes in Laos. These are private contractors delivering humanitarian aid. What bombing? America isn’t bombing Laos.

I had been a student attending the French high school i
n Vientiane during those days. I read the official reports in the newspapers, but they did not match the reality of what I witnessed, the hundreds of foreigners drinking in the bars, skulking around town for secret meetings, while pretending to be tourists.

“What does the General say?” I asked Blong at last.
The leader of our Special Forces, General Vang Pao, the only Hmong general in the Royal Lao Army, held great sway in government circles. Or at least, he had.

“He tried to persuade the ministers against the agreemen
t, but no one wanted to hear.” Blong tamped his pipe on the bottom of his shoe, the old tobacco spilling out on the dirt floor. “The Americans are already preparing to take their planes to Thailand.”

My body sagged.
The Americans had forced us into defeat, their promises as worthless as those of the Pathet Lao.

My oldest son Fong, almost eight years old, held up the bamboo pole. His tongue worked at the side of his mouth with the effort, and his arms strained from the weight. I tied the pole in place around the front door of our new home. Over the past few weeks the other men in the village and I had worked together, chopping down sturdy bamboo poles, stripping them smooth, and framing each family’s home. Bamboo, cut into thin slats, lined the walls and roofs. Fong insisted on helping at every step, his face serious and intent on whatever task I assigned him. My heart swelled with pride.

I stood on the threshold of our house,
each side six meters long, solid and sheltering. Hmong homes had no windows, only two doors. And as was necessary, we had a sweeping view from the front door of the densely forested mountains that rose and fell across the narrow valley. Yer had already tamped down and swept the earthen floor until it was hard and smooth, but there were still many things to do. I needed to complete the loft for storing rice and the stove in the center of the room, and install the woven dividers to section off the sleeping areas. The next day we would attach thick layers of thatch to the roof to keep out the rains when the monsoons arrived.

There were
other projects as well. I would spend a day felling a pine tree and sawing timber to help build Uncle Boua’s shaman’s bench, a simple plank sanded smooth and attached to splayed legs at each end. We would craft an altar with two shelves to hold his tools—the cymbals, gong, drum, and buffalo horns. Auntie Nhia and Yer would cover the altar with paper stamped with intricate patterns.

The following week we would light incense and make offerings to Sou Kah, the protective house spirit, and the other spirits of the front door
, central post, and fireplace. We would ask them for blessings and good health.

As sweat ran down my back, I thought how happy I w
ould be to finish these tasks. The hot season was still upon us, and we had fields to plant. I put a hand on Fong’s shoulder. “Son, we are done.”

“Look how much you helped!”
Yer said to Fong, and he grinned. She sat under the wide umbrella of the monkey pod tree, our daughter Nou sleeping on a quilt at her side. She was weaving swaths of thatch, her quick, nimble fingers gathering and wrapping the yellow-green stalks of grass. A silky shawl of black hair hung down her shoulder. She had grown more beautiful with each child, maturity strengthening and defining her delicate features. I stared at the curve of her neck and chin that fit perfectly against my shoulder in bed. Her dark eyes shined brightly as she gazed up at me.

Through the hardships and terror of combat, her love had been t
he constant that kept me alive. Each night when the children went to sleep, we renewed our passion for one another. It reminded me of the first years of our marriage when even a moment apart felt too long and I could not get enough of her love. The night before she held me close and cried, begging me never to leave her no matter what happened. The intensity of her plea caught me by surprise. She never complained when I left for duty during the war, but now I understood how difficult it had been living with the constant fear and uncertainty, the pall of death hanging over their tenuous existence. I vowed to stay with my family.

Yer rose to check the pot of vegetables simmering over the fire as Fue darted past, laughing and chasing the
crows that pecked at the ground for stray grains of rice. He raced in circles and clapped his hands. As he neared the tree, his bare feet kicked dust into Nou’s face. She woke with a start and wailed.

“Oh, Fue, look what you’ve
done,” Yer scolded, lifting Nou into her arms and wiping her cheeks. She opened her blouse and guided Nou’s mouth to her breast. “Boys, go wash. It is time for dinner.”

I smiled
and scooped Fue into my arms. “I’ll take them to the stream.”

I cherished small, or
dinary moments with my family. This simple beginning was all I had dreamed of during nine years of combat. At times, I struggled to put the horrors of fighting behind me, but nightmares woke me in the middle of the night. Unexpected sounds in the forest made me quake. I could not escape my fears of what the future might hold. Yet for the time being, calm prevailed.

General Vang Pao had complied with the conditions of the cease fire and disbanded the Special Forces over the six weeks following
the signing of the agreement. He urged us to go back to our lives, settle with our families, and once more become farmers. Our compensation on leaving included new tools and corn and rice seed. I rejoiced at the chance. Our family was lucky after all; we had survived when so many had not.