Photos Reclaim Student's Childhood in Vietnam
Originally appearing in The Union College Chronicle: March 31, 2000 Volume 49 Number 1
Photos Reclaim Student's Childhood in Vietnam
In between the weekly headaches, Khang Vodinh '00 has rich childhood memories, snapshots of his first 19 years in Nha Trang, a picturesque coastal community of white sand beaches in south central Vietnam.
It is this childhood – much of it lost during the imprisonment and torture that causes the headaches — that the visual arts major has captured in photographs taken during his homecoming last fall.
His project "Return to Nha Trang, Vietnam" is a photo documentary of some 50 works. The exhibition runs through April 8 in the Arts Atrium Gallery. The opening reception is Friday, March 31, from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m.
Khang spent last fall in his homeland, fearful at first that his project might not happen at all. He describes the terror of seeing uniformed personnel upon arriving at the Saigon airport: "Since my failed escape attempt and subsequent imprisonment, I have always feared people in uniform." Some civilians, knowing he had fled Vietnam, assumed he was a spy and threatened him physically. Others threatened to call the police.
But he found
ways to get his photos, hiding his camera and taking shots surreptitiously or
impersonating an English-speaking Chinese tourist.
The black and whites show a range of experiences: his grandparents in their
garden, children riding their bikes through a flood to school, a barber awaiting
customers at his outdoor shop. Khang, born after the Vietnam War, also uncovers
vestiges of the conflict: gunnery turrets now converted to parks, disabled people
selling lottery tickets. One photo shows a homeless mother holding a severely
deformed infant (a consequence, Khang says, of chemicals used in the war). "There
is no shelter for people like us," the mother said.
Khang, 26, is older than most of his classmates, owing mainly to having been imprisoned after two failed escape attempts. The first time, in 1978, his parents and three siblings were held for four months. (His father, a pilot for South Vietnam, was imprisoned a total of eight years.)
A decade later, Khang and his brother were intercepted by soldiers who shot and killed a number of their fellow boat passengers. This time, Khang's two-month imprisonment included torture, beatings and solitary confinement. The recurring headaches, he says, are from the injuries his captors inflicted when they beat him in the head with a rock. With the headaches come a flood of painful memories from a time that was "like nothing on earth."
Khang's family was finally allowed to leave in 1992, eventually settling in Albany, where Khang finished high school. While volunteering at an Albany nursing home that the idea for the project was born. "I met an elderly woman whose family had mostly left her," he recalls. "We talked about life and the idea that you can preserve the memories of happier times. It touched my heart.
"I do this in the hope that my American friends can learn about the people and culture of Vietnam," he says. "I have met some students who don't even know where Vietnam is. I hope that one day we can talk about culture and interests and ideas and we can be closer.
"Prof. (Martin) Benjamin (Khang's advisor) has shown me all the technical aspects of taking a good picture," Khang says, "but he also has taught me how to take a picture that reflects and relates what I feel."
"Although I am happy here, memories of my birthplace often arise," Khang wrote in the introduction to his exhibition. "Frequently, I reminisce about what I left behind, friends and relatives, the culture and the environment. (My) return to my homeland created pictures that explore and reveal my former life."