The Eaves of Heaven

by Andrew X. Pham

  “Instead of nickel?”

  “Instead of copper. This is a special type of clay from China. It’s baked to be thin and very light so your arm won’t get tired holding it. Clay won’t crack like the enamel of ceramic. Over time, opium sap will creep into the cracks and make a ceramic bottle ugly. Can you tell that the lamp is also very expensive? Both the shade and the oil pot are crystal, and the base is silver.”

  I asked him if they were antiques. He said they were from my grandfather’s generation. I glanced around his room at the other luxuries he could have taken: tailored suits, watches, imported hats, antique porcelain, paintings, and priceless poem scrolls. In the third drawer of his dresser were his silk mandarin robe and headdress, the official ensemble he had proudly worn at public functions in Tong Xuyen. I asked him how much his opium kit would fetch on the market. Father flinched and replied that people never parted with such items unless they were in very dire straits.

  He was sharing with me his most treasured possessions—the things he would keep until the day he died.

  IT was our last day in Hanoi. Tan and I rented two Motobecane motorcycles—we could have bought them. Our pockets were stuffed with rolls and wads of French piasters, notes that would soon be worthless. We cruised around the city, looping through one district after another, visiting all our favorite haunts. The French were vacating their neighborhoods. The regal mansions looked desolate. The rest of the city was bustling, restaurants and shops thriving. Peasants streamed into Hanoi by the busload looking for missing family members separated by years of war.

  At the new open-air market, prospective émigrés sold all their belongings. Normally secondhand stores handled such goods, but there was no time. Folks laid the entire contents of their homes on the ground: clothes, mirrors, combs, dishes, pots, pans, furniture, bedding, souvenirs, and knickknacks. One could almost read people’s lives in the things they laid on the ground for sale at ridiculously low prices. It was a bizarre essay of desperation, these spoils of war.

  I saw a spyglass and heaps of books I’d wanted to own. Tan wanted to buy a Japanese sword, but he knew he could never take it on the plane. We had more money than we could spend in months, but what was the point? It was like showing up at a feast where we weren’t allowed to eat.

  Bargains could be had throughout the city. Stores slashed prices to reduce their inventory. The wealthy liquidated their assets. Luxury items suddenly became very cheap. Those who weren’t emigrating south were on shopping sprees. Even the poor did their share of window-shopping. Homes went for a third of their purchase prices. Mansions cost no more than an ordinary shop house, but there were few takers. The future was too uncertain for big investments.

  Dealers went door-to-door, inquiring if the inhabitants were leaving, hoping to buy anything at a steep discount. Others came with offers to pack and ship émigrés’ belongings south. Agents competed to be caretakers of homes and businesses. Hanoi took on a frenzied, almost festive atmosphere for those who stayed.

  A week before, four village elders from Tong Xuyen had made the long trip to Hanoi to convince my father that his ancestral land still belonged to him. They urged him to stay; however, if Father were determined to leave, they would gladly, for a healthy percentage, be the leasing agents for his land. They had brought the same offer to Aunt Thuan in Hung Yen. She had also left the ancestral estate with her children to live with her relatives in the French-controlled area. Father treated them well and said that he was undecided. He knew the Communists had sent them and worried that they might try to stop him from going south.

  Father had anticipated much of this. His foresight saved us from the madness and disaster awaiting those who evacuated later. The time would come when the Communists would rally the populace to physically halt the exodus of hundreds of thousands to the South.

  OUR favorite restaurant on Umbrella Street was packed with a well-to-do lunch crowd. Tan and I waited for a table near the front so we could have a view of the pair of pretty sisters selling umbrellas just outside the restaurant. In the two years we had been coming here, neither of us had the courage to talk to them. It seemed silly to try now.

  Instead of sharing as usual, we each had an order of cha ca, a northern delicacy we were unlikely to encounter in the South. A waiter brought us two platters of raw sea bass filleted paper-thin and heaps of fresh lettuce, vegetables, pickles, cucumbers, and herbs. The cook followed with a sizzling pan of turmeric and garlic oil. He cooked the fish by pouring the hot oil directly on it. The fragrance of garlic and fish was heady. We chopsticked pieces of fish onto sesame crackers and topped them with basil, cilantro, lettuce, purple herbs, and a dab of an ash-colored sauce made with fermented fish, fish sauce, chili, lime, and garlic. We quenched ourselves with liters of icy beer.

  “I heard the weather in the South is much hotter than here. They might not have cha ca in Saigon,” Tan muttered ruefully as he stacked another sesame cracker.

  “Then there will be a lot of good ice cream,” I reasoned.

  “They say Saigon is like the Paris of Indochina. There should be plenty of good French restaurants.”

  “I don’t know if we will have money for French restaurants.”

  Tan sighed. “We may have to quit school and work.”

  “Oh, don’t say that! I want to go to college,” I moaned. “Please, just enjoy your fish. We may never get to eat real cha ca again.”

  We never did.

  WE rode down to West Lake and rented two boats. I lured Tan into a race. We sped up for a few lengths and then abandoned the game. Neither of us was in the mood. I sculled out to the middle of the lake and lay down at the bottom of my boat. It was hard to imagine that I would never see this place again.

  Disheartened, we returned the boats. We went to Lake Nghi Tam, where we had swum every summer since we moved to Hanoi, but once there, we didn’t feel like swimming. We sat on the shore and watched bathers splashing in the shallows. Somehow the view had changed completely. It was as if a silk screen had been drawn between it and us. The lake was no longer ours. We got back on the motorcycles and rode to the city stadium where we used to run and lift weights. The muscle boys were still sweating and grunting over the irons.

  Tan declared to the bunch, “Please, boys, hold the tears! Just thought we’d come and tell you we’re going south where the food is tastier and the girls are spicier.”

  “Fool, you’ve got it backward!” one guy retorted. The whole place hooted with laughter, and the banter started.

  “Ah, Tan, you’ve been exercising that mouth of yours again.”

  “There’s no smoke and you’re already running from the fire.”

  “Deserters! You’re leaving us here to clean up the mess?”

  “That’s fine, have your vacation,” shouted another. “We’ll see you in a few months.”

  “Au revoir! Bon voyage, cowards! See you in the next life.” They all laughed.

  Not one of our friends’ families had planned to leave. It was the strangest farewell.

  WE took the main road out of the city, the throaty single-cylinders hailing our passage. We needed to fly, to feel the planet pass beneath us. I glanced at Tan. He smiled, his eyes saying it all. We were losing our fortunes, our ancestral fiefdoms. First sons, we would be lords and barons no more. Side by side, we hammered down the impossibly straight highway, throttles wide open, engines howling at their limits.

  The sun dipped low on the horizon. Miles from the city, we didn’t want to turn around. For us at that moment, all the great avenues led away from Hanoi. In youth, motion was everything. We roared through the sunset, unimpeded. The flaming sky turned inky, but we pressed onward, it mattered not where. Behind us, the graves of our mothers, the homes of our forefathers, the fishponds of our childhood, the famine, the wars, the vulgar legionnaires, the soldiers and their whores, my dumpling-cheek peasant girl.

  The farther we went, the easier it became. The twilight wind watered my eyes. Something within shattered.
So much to lose, and yet before us, all the unlived years of our lives, a whole new world.

  I was too young to understand the first taste of dignity and freedom.

  THE SOUTH

  JANUARY 1976

  36. THE RELEASE

  The overloaded bus squeaked to a halt at the riverbank. Exhausted passengers stumbled down onto the copper-tinted dirt. The dockside clamor of vendors and livestock was overwhelming. We were late. The rickety ferry had eased into the wide creamy currents, leaving a wake of coiling butterscotch and a streaming scarf of black smoke. On the bank, the stench of the jungle and shanty decay stewed under a wavering sky of pure heat.

  This was my rebirth. I caught a glimpse of myself in a shop window and saw the image of my father decades earlier looking back at me—that shadow of a man the French had released, the emaciated body, the sun-charred face, the cracked lips, the sunken red eyes, wrinkles as deep as scars. Barefoot and penniless, we were equally impoverished across a generation.

  In the pocket of my pajamas was my release paper. Last night, I went to sleep not knowing that today I would feel the breeze of the Mekong on my skin.

  I owed my life and freedom to Uncle Ha, who had placed himself in considerable risk on my behalf. We met only once, when he visited me at Minh Luong Prison. He had called in favors to secure my parole. During his first visit with Anh at our house in Saigon, he had sat in my study, perused my bookshelves, and read the quotes I had taped to the walls. He had told Anh that even though he had never met me, he judged me worthy of his help. He had pointed to a line from Voltaire above my desk: “The comfort of the rich rests upon an abundance of the poor.”

  The assistant warden had asked me in the last interview if I had learned my lesson, if had I changed my behavior, if I had decided to become an honest person, if I had repented.

  He knew nothing. What was my crime?

  Seven months of psychological torture, brainwashing, brutal imprisonment, starvation, physical abuse, and hard labor had not changed my confession: I was a draft-exempted teacher who, in fear, had fled from Saigon without any intention of leaving the country. I had wanted to ask him for which part should I repent? That I was a teacher or that I had fled Saigon?

  I wanted to dance, laugh, howl like a madman. I stood in the dirt under the full weight of the sun. I was ill, lice-ridden, shrunken, no better than a beggar, but I knew two things with certainty: First, absolute power did, indeed, corrupt absolutely, regardless of race or political ideology. Second, I would risk prison and death all over again to escape the Viet Cong’s brand of communism.

  I FOUND my benefactor, Mr. Tu Sanh, standing in the shade of a diner on the riverbank. Mr. Sanh was in his late sixties with salt-and-pepper hair and a weathered face that had known the sun for a lifetime. He wore clean peasant pajamas and sandals made of used car tires. Earlier this morning, he had overheard me pleading with an unsympathetic ticket agent for a fee waiver. I had just been released from jail and had no money. I was terrified of being caught sleeping on the street at night and imprisoned again. I needed to get home and report to the neighborhood constable the following day or I would be violating my parole.

  “Mr. Sanh, I want to thank you again for buying me the ticket. I don’t know what I would have done. I didn’t know how I was going to get home,” I gushed. I couldn’t help myself. I had spent the whole time standing at the back of the bus. His seat was up front. I hadn’t had a chance to thank him properly.

  “It’s nothing. We all need help sometime.”

  “May I have your daughter’s address in Saigon? I would like to repay your kindness.”

  “Don’t worry about that. Someday you will have a chance to help someone else.”

  “I will. Still, I’d like to repay you.”

  He steadfastly declined and invited me to lunch. I said I couldn’t impose on him any further, but he was very sincere in his insistence. The smell of grilled pork was irresistible. We joined other passengers under the tin shade of the shack diner. A grinning woman with curly hair served us two beautiful plates of white rice heaped with stir-fried morning glories and grilled pork ribs marinated in fish sauce and garlic. I never prayed before a meal, but this time I thanked Buddha and my mother’s spirit.

  Mr. Sanh was a landowner, but his holdings were not large enough to be targeted by the Communists’ land redistribution program. He was going into Saigon to see his daughter and grandchildren. Her husband was a former South Vietnam government official, which meant that they suffered discrimination and persecution under the Communist regime. Mr. Sanh asked about my background. I told him my family had also been landowners in the North, but we lost everything in the French War.

  “Were you in the army?”

  The food turned sour in my mouth. Was he a spy? Could I repay his generosity with a lie? I searched his eyes. It was a matter of decency. For the first time since I was captured, I said, “I was in the army.”

  For the kindness of a stranger, I surrendered the single secret that could cost me my life.

  The old man nodded solemnly, picked up the tin pot, and refilled my cup. I nearly wept as I accepted the tea. I savored the meal he bought me. Grilled pork ribs had never tasted better.

  “Mr. Sanh, do you have other children?”

  “I had a son. He would have been forty-four this year—just a little older than you.” He smiled. “He joined the Resistance in 1950. There was so much national pride at that time. After the Geneva Accord, my son went north with many young men from our village.” The old man canted his head, looking out on the long expanse of the river. His eyes had gone watery with age. “He died early on in the American War.”

  The ferry horn sounded. We rose. He grasped my hand and said, “Take care of your family. There are hard times ahead. Beware. The best of luck to you, son.”

  My throat felt swollen. I could not find the words to thank him, to comfort him. I bowed deeply. I wanted to remember the gnarled contours of his bony farmer’s fingers. The weight of our tragedy, its horrific immensity so vast I dared not peer into its depth.

  It wasn’t over; not for my people, not for me.

  This river led to the sea. Could it take away all the poison, all the hate in this land?

  There was no safe shelter left. Nothing here beneath the eaves of heaven remained untouched by war.

  I could feel the pull of the ocean, violent and unforgiving—that dark expanse of wind and waves I must cross with my wife and children. For life, I must risk everything precious to me yet again. May the gods be merciful. May our ancestors watch over us.

  The bitterness was but an aftertaste. Freedom, however precarious, remained very sweet. My final journey had just begun.

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  Bates, Milton J. (compiler); Lawrence Lichty (compiler); Paul Miles (compiler); Ronald H. Spector (compiler); Marilyn Young (compiler). Reporting Vietnam: American Journalism 1959–1969 (Part One). Library of America, 1984.

  Jamieson, Neil L. Understanding Vietnam. University of California Press, 1995.

  Karnow, Stanley. Vietnam: A History. Penguin, 1997.

  Oberdorfer, Don. Tet!: The Turning Point in the Vietnam War. Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001.

  Young, Marilyn B. The Vietnam Wars 1945–1990. HarperPerennial, 1991.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This project began as a short story about the games my father had played in the countryside as a child. It only became a book through his generosity, dedication, and good intentions. I thank him for everything, for his trust, for this opportunity to know him.

  For their invaluable contributions, I’d like to thank my readers, Mark Pomeroy, Elizabeth McKenzie, and Sue Lawton. Writing is a long, lonesome journey. It’s a pleasure to be in the company of such fine writers.

  My agent, Jandy Nelson, has been a dear friend, confidante, deft reader, and brilliant champion in every way. She is without equal. Many, many warm thanks.

  Once again, it has been a privilege to work with my editor, John
Glusman. I am very grateful for his confidence in my endeavors.

  For being a friend to a stranger, my heartfelt gratitude to Dr. Ted Achacoso.

  For their generous support, I’d like to thank QPB, OBA Literary Arts, Kiriyama Prize, and the Whiting Foundation.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ANDREW X. PHAM is the author of the memoir Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam, which won the Kiriyama Pacific Rim Award, and the translator of Last Night I Dreamed of Peace: The Diary of Dang Thuy Tram. He is the recipient of a Whiting Award and lives in Hawaii.

  ALSO BY ANDREW X. PHAM

  Catfish and Mandala:

  A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam

  TRANSLATED BY ANDREW X. PHAM

  Last Night I Dreamed of Peace: The Diary of Dang Thuy Tram

  Copyright © 2008 by Andrew Pham

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by Harmony Books, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

  www.crownpublishing.com

  Harmony Books is a registered trademark and the Harmony Books colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Pham, Andrew X., 1967–

  The eaves of heaven: a life in three wars / by Andrew X. Pham on behalf of my father, Thong Van Pham.—1st ed.

  1. Pham, Thong Van. 2. Vietnamese Americans—Biography. 3. Refugees—United States—Biography. 4. Vietnam—History—20th century. I. Title.

  E184.V53P4554 2008

  973'.0495—dc22

  [B] 2007033894