Chia Xeng Xiong
served as a soldier through the fighting and escaped to Thailand in 1979, well
after the collapse.
How old are you?
I am 65.
When you were in Laos, what was the name of your
village?
I was in Laos in a village called Ban Kheun.
Was that the only village you lived in?
I lived in that village first, and then I went to live in the village
Bou Nong. Then we lived there until we came to Thailand.
What year did you come from Laos?
We were there when the world exploded in 1975, but we couldn’t move
till 1976. Then we moved to Thailand. We were in one village in Laos when the
communists attacked. Many of us died as we went back to live there. We were the
ones that were going to live there and not go to Thailand, but I was a soldier.
I had been a soldier for about 13 years. We weren’t coming and we couldn’t
come anymore, so we decided to live there. We lived there for awhile under the
communist government. Since we are living under the communists, they wouldn’t
kill us, but the communists slowly kidnapped many of our people. We sent our
kids to school and they questioned the kids. The teachers would ask the children
if their dads had guns long ago and if they were soldiers. They would ask very
nicely and they would write it down carefully and put it away. Then they would
call us and ask us if we had a place to learn and said that we should go learn.
We went to learn and let them teach us a few times. We were afraid, so
that’s why we moved to Thailand and didn’t come to America. Our relatives
that are still over there won’t even move. When you ask them, they won’t
move at all. It was like that, so that is why we moved to Thailand. In January
of 1979, I went to Thailand. I stayed there for about a year. Then late in 1979,
I came to America. I didn’t stay because the soldiers said that they were
going to chase us to Thailand, so I came to Thailand and lived there for almost
a year. Then I filled out some papers, so I could be able to come here. I got to
America on November 23, 1979. I arrived in Seattle, Washington. We stayed there
until 1984 when we came to Wausau. I
have been here ever since.
Do you remember anything when the French were in
control of the country?
I don’t know about those times.
Could you tell us about the custom of marriage in the
Hmong culture, and how it has changed?
Well, there are two parts to this custom. The first part is that the
woman wants to live with the man. Then the parents of the son go and ask for
permission from the woman’s parents. Then, with permission, we have the
ceremony. If the woman doesn’t want to come, but they really like each other,
then the son-in-law pleads with the woman’s parents, and then they can go in
the house. We go tell the parents of the woman, and the parents ask their
daughter if they want to marry. With permission from all, they will finally
marry.
Do you help do any arrangements?
I am one who does this. I do it a lot.
Can you tell us some details about when you did do
these sorts of arrangements for the wedding?
When the Hmong did this marriage ceremony in our country, the woman and
man wanted to get married. They would have to like each other first, before they
got married. We didn’t let the younger people fight or get divorced too often.
Even if they fought, we didn’t let them. We would try to settle things, if
they did get into big fights. If it were not the son’s fault, we would still
lecture him and tell him to not hit or get into fights with his wife. If it’s
the son’s fault, we still lecture him, but we won’t let them get
divorced. If they do get divorced, it’s mostly the son’s fault, but
the daughter is still to blame a little. If you marry someone, you are supposed
to marry that person for life and not get divorced. The main point is that we
don’t believe in divorce.
What if the boy likes the girl, but the girl
doesn’t like the boy and he wants to get married to the girl?
In that case, if the boy liked the girl and the girl didn’t like the
boy, they still had to get married for a couple of years. What I know is that if
the girl stays with the boy for two or three years, she’ll start liking the
boy, but if she stays with him for only a couple months, she’ll still hate
him. If the boy liked the girl, but her parents didn’t like the boy and they
knew that the girl didn’t like the boy, they would tell him that he couldn’t
marry their daughter. In that case, he had to go talk to his parents to let the
other parents let him marry their daughter. Then they would ask if he really
loved her and how he would treat her.
Could you tell us about when you fought with
the United States?
The people I knew in the village had to become soldiers. The
village was called Van Vieng. We walked to other villages to defend them. It
would take us about three hours just to get there and fight there.
Can you talk about your experiences when you were a
soldier?|
The unit I had was really small, and it had 13 to 14 soldiers in it. I was a
leader in that group and the captain asked us to patrol and see if there were
any Vietnamese soldiers around. We would go on patrols for a week or longer. If
we went and there weren’t any Vietnamese soldiers near, we would go back. If
there were some nearby, we would go and warn the captain.
When they are near, we let soldiers advance and a lot of them would
attack the Vietnamese soldiers. We would fight if they were nearby.
Who was this captain, and do you remember his name?
The captain’s last name was Her, and now he lives in California. His
name is Cin Chue Her.
Did you ever meet General Vang Pao?
Yes, I worked for General Vang Pao.
Can you describe General Vang Pao for us?
General Vang Pao had a house where his family lived. He was just a
soldier. We were soldiers, so we didn’t have time to go and see him, but he
did come and see us. Sometimes he came and saw us once a month, but when there
was an emergency; we would go and see him. But it had to be very important
because he had lots of soldiers guarding his house since he was a general. If
there was a war problem, or if we needed money or bullets, they would let you,
but if you went to talk about marriage or something like that, they wouldn’t
let you. Over there is different from here.
As many as 20 soldiers patrolled and stayed up all night. They had fences
up all around, and there were two guards at the door. When you get to them, they
both pointed their guns at you and asked you where you were going. You had to
tell them why you came to see the general and it’s very important then they
would let you go in. The only way to come back out again was to go through those
two guards at the door. They asked you if you had a gun and if you didn’t,
then you could go in. When we went to see him, it was very hard.
Do you remember specific times when you actually saw
the communists coming?
When we were fighting and killing the communists, they tricked us
and told us not to fight and kill anymore. The general and the communists in
Laos came together to sign a paper to not fight anymore and to live like
brothers. Then all the generals came in to sign the paper, and after that the
communist came. We let the communists through because we weren’t fighting
anymore. They came and said that we could always live in the land, but we
can’t carry guns anymore. Only the communists could carry guns. Then since we
couldn’t stay and keep our guns, we moved. Then we got to a village, and
that’s when the shooting started, like I said before. The communists fired,
and many of us died. Then we turned back and went to live in the jungle. Since
we had weapons in the jungle, we fired back at the communists. At that time,
there weren’t a lot of us. There were only four or five people that would go
in a group to go look for the communists, to kill them. At that time, Vang Pao
came to Thailand. I moved slowly to Thailand, and I became a farmer there and
raised a garden. My children died in Thailand.
During the war, did you lose other family members?
My father’s brother died, and two others died during the fighting.
How were they killed?
The communists killed them with their weapons.
Do you have any words of wisdom that you would like
to share?
We
want our teenagers to go to school because in Laos or Thailand, we didn’t get
educated. When it’s time to
study, you have to study. Don’t hate one another; don’t be mean to one
another. When we were in Laos, we saw a lot of that and we don’t want to see
it again. We thought that bringing
our children here would make a difference. We want you guys to go to school and
do well in school. We don’t want you to hate people. It is not like the time
when we had to fight against the Vietnamese, don’t appreciate all of this
hate. Whenever we saw the Vietnamese, we killed them, and whenever they saw the
Hmong, they killed them. After all that killing, we want it to stop now. We
wanted to bring you kids over here to make a better life. We are old, and we
can’t study or get an education anymore, but you were brought to this land of
opportunity, so use that your advantage. We want you to study hard. The one who
can go all the way, that’s good for you. If you don’t, still try to find
something that will benefit you. Make
good friends because we care about you all. I want to tell everyone that we are
living in this country now. That is our message from the elders to the younger
ones. We are living in this country now, and you can achieve anything, so stay
in school and do good in school. You are the lucky ones. You have a good life
here in America, so make the best of it.
Oral
History Project 
