All throughout May, WTOP is celebrating Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month with stories about the people and places shaping the D.C. region.
Dzung Tran was 17 years old when communist Vietnamese soldiers forced his family to flee his homeland.
The journey for him, his mother and five siblings included monthslong stops in Guam, Arkansas and Texas.
The family ended up in a growing Vietnamese community in Clarendon, Virginia, in 1976. His father, who couldn’t get out of Vietnam quickly, arrived later.
“It was a very hard journey. We never forgot how lucky we were,” Tran told WTOP. “We always look back at escaping Vietnam, and we were able to find friends and family and engage in community.”
This week marks the 50th anniversary of the Fall of Saigon, the moment that ended the Vietnam War. The event caused more than 2 million Vietnamese refugees to flee to safety in the U.S.
Many of them landed in what was then called “Little Saigon” in Arlington.
Since then, Tran has worked in fast-food restaurants, graduated from college, gotten married and raised his own family. He said optimism about the future of Vietnam keeps their community strong.
“One of the things we all strive for is … a better Vietnam,” Tran said. “We all look back to help steer Vietnam to a more democratic society and move away from a dictatorship.”
Vietnamese culture and food have also aided former refugees’ survival in the U.S., he added.
“Every year, we get together for New Year’s festivals and other events for children and families,” Tran said. “And food definitely brings us together.”
Quang Le agreed. He was about 9 years old when his family posed as people of Chinese descent who lived in Vietnam, known as the Hoa people. The communist government implemented policies forcing Chinese Vietnamese to leave the country.
It was the only way out, Le said.
“We are as pure Vietnamese as can be,” he said. “We assumed Chinese identity because there was no guarantee that we were going to make it.”
His family made a stop in Utah before arriving in the growing Vietnamese neighborhood in Arlington in the spring of 1980.
“Never underestimate the power of community,” he said.
After years of struggling financially, his mother got an idea. She began baking and selling bahn mi sandwiches filled with meat and pickled vegetables. It paid the bills, helping her and Le’s father, who arrived a few years later, raise eight children.
“I remember being hungry all the time. There was a lot of uncertainty,” Le told WTOP. “She made sandwiches, and her boys went out and sold them and that’s what we did. It’s a proven formula.”
Since then, the venture has morphed to a successful eatery — the Huong Binh Bakery and Deli. Le’s mother passed away in 2021, but his 94-year-old father still helps with the business.
Le said he still remembers escaping Vietnam but has lived in the U.S. longer than in his birth country.
“Fifty years goes by fast when you’re busy,” he said. “This is my reality now and we’ve done well for us. I don’t know how my life would have been (in Vietnam).”
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