Hoang, Mong Thu (Megan)

Mong Hoang was sixteen years old during the Fall of Saigon. Previously, her family owned a restaurant that had served American troops near an airbase. She and her family was sent off to work in a rubber tree plantation as part of a communist agricultural reform program, where her father managed village workers, who risked their lives every day to earn enough to survive. She ran away after avoiding being sexually assaulted and ended up escaping the country by boat. She recounts her harrowing journey to a refugee camp in Malaysia. She also discusses her daughter's losing fight with leukemia and her subsequent efforts to improve access to bone marrow banking services.

2013-07-27