Word: liens
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...economy's boisterous recovery has put shoppers in the mood to buy the best and the brightest, from $600 home computers to $300 cashmere bathrobes. At Manhattan's Bonwit Teller, customers have already taken home 2,300 pairs of mink earmuffs at $85 each. According to Lien Dang, a Neiman-Marcus sales clerk in Houston, consumers want "something wild, something different, something out of this world...
...December 1978 the Vietnamese launched a massive invasion of Cambodia, by then renamed "Democratic Kampuchea." Cambodians welcomed the conquest of their homeland by their historical neighboring enemy, just as they'd embraced the Khmer Rouge only a few years earlier, Lien credits the Vietnamese with rescuing her from certain death: the flux and confusion accompanying the incursion allowed her and her brothers to escape one night across the reedy, mountainous border into Thailand. Behind in the camp they left a cavernous pit, which Lien had learned was to be a mass grave for the workers...
...lived inside refugee camps in Thailand and the Philippines. Although they were no longer terrorized, they continued to sleep in the dirt and catch colds while less hardy escapes succumbed to the squalor and despair. Some refugees gobbled down food with a hunger that caused shrunken stomachs to burst. Lien watched one man groan and writhe after eating several bowlfuls of rice; he died that evening in his sleep, by his wife's side. According to Lien, he had simply become "too hungry...
THROUGH THE WORK OF an American refugee resettlement organization, Lien and her brothers were brought to the United States a year and a half ago. Now ages 18, 19, and 25, they live under church sponsorship in a small clapboard house in a New England sea town. There are bicycles on the porch, a struggling tomato plant in the yard, bright white T-shirts on the clothesline, and a fully stocked refrigerator in the kitchen. During the summer months they bicycle everyday past candy and clothing stores to their coffee shop jobs. During the rest of the year the boys...
Despite appearances, however, the three have not resumed their former lifestyles. With their backgrounds, it should be easy for them to fall into the American rhythm--Lien's idea of fun remains unchanged: "Four, five friends, go to movies." But she and her brothers must contend with the isolation imposed by their past trials and their flawed English. On top of it all, Ty and Van endure daily harassment and ridicule from their schoolmates...