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Listen   Huy Pham talks about his journey

Journey
- Huy Pham -

"My family, we lost a lot of money through those 7 attempts to get out of the country, because each attempt would be very costly. I remember one attempt, I almost got burnt, in a boat. I was in the lower deck and I think the captain was just going inside the lower deck to see how everyone was going and he actually had a lighter in his pocket and then next to me was also a carton of petrol and then for some reason it was just alight. Luckily the man sitting next to me, used his hands to cover that light right away. Otherwise, like I don't know where would I be today."

click to enlarge » 1988 Refugee camp Thailand, Huy at the front in striped shirt

"But, we finally succeeded, so I got out of the country, with my mother on a boat with twenty six other people, and we got to Thailand, after three days of travelling on the high sea, then we stayed in a refugee camp for two years."

"Some other attempts we just got deceived by the organisers. You'd go on a small boat and then hoping you'd get onto the big boat, that big boat, it's not like, you know the Fairstar, or a cruise ship here. It's just another fishing boat, another wooden fishing boat. But on many of our attempts we never got to see the larger fishing boat, so those attempts were unsuccessful, then we came back and just try to live life and find the next opportunity to escape, so it was like gambling, you know like just from one gamble to another."

"I think I was lucky because at that time I was very young, so I didn't go through a lot of thoughts and worries and fear. I'm sure that my parents and other people that were older than me, they would have been very fearful and very scared. But I was just on the boat. Even though I was young, I could still have some fear, you know because you're in the water, you look left, right and back in front and you don't see any land, you don't see any buildings, you don't see anyone, It's just you and a dozen more people and a fishing boat on the open sea."

"...They set up like Buddhist temples in the refugee camp as well, so I joined the Buddhist Youth Association there. I think when you're in a camp faith is extremely important, you have to look positive and think positive, and believe that one day you're going to get to get out of the camp, you're going to start a new life, the life will be filled with, you know, wonderful opportunities, Otherwise, if you don't think like that, I just can’t imagine how would you be able to survive."