Son Dinh achieved professional success as a lawyer in Vietnam. When he emigrated to the United States he could not transfer his law degree here. Fortunately, his ingenuity, diligent study, and hard work enabled him to excel in a new career in electronics at Shands Hospital in Gainesville, Florida. There he met Janet Goode and their friendship and mutual interests in music led to a loving relationship and eventual retirement to Oak Hammock at the University of Florida.
In Son Dinh told me some of his experiences in Vietnam from the time of the Japanese occupation to his emigration to the U.
His written story appears first here followed by a conversation he and I had. Friends often ask me to tell them more about myself. So, this is only a very casual talk, in which I would share some of my thinkings about facts of life, and some real stories happening in my life. When the Japanese came to occupy Vietnam, I was just 9 years old.
I still remember people talking about some kind of blockade of Saigon. Food supplies could not come in. I remember my mother had a substantial rice stock in the house, but for many months, we ate only rice with some watercress and fish sauce. We had a market in the neighborhood, but it was kind of empty.
The Allied aircraft came to bomb Saigon almost every day. I remember many nights we kids came out to look into the skies and see the Bs shining like miniscule diamonds in the moonlight. I thought they were beautiful. I also enjoyed seeing the powerful light the Japanese shone into the skies and fired anti-aircraft guns at the Allied airplanes.
