It is 1979. Minh Trang* is three years old. In the cover of darkness, his family boards a makeshift boat on the coast of Vietnam. The boat is meant to hold 20 but 70 frightened people are crushed together, shoulder to shoulder. It is dangerous in the rickety vessel because it can capsize in a heartbeat. But to suffer at the hands of the communist regime is worse. Minh’s parents decide to risk this flight in the dark.
Thus began more than eight months at sea. Minh has never forgotten that terrifying time. Eventually, after many trials and a circuitous route, his family landed in Canada. They had escaped death but not misery. It was a struggle for Minh’s parents to rebuild their lives. They had been doctors in Vietnam but now in Quebec, they had to be re-qualified as Canadian physicians. There was a quota system for foreigners so both parents struggled as they learned French, worked at menial jobs, took care of the children and laboured towards being certified as doctors.
Minh remembers those difficult years. His parents eventually qualified as doctors and inspired by their perseverance, he too has become a physician. But even as life improved, Minh was searching for something more. He wanted answers to what life was all about.
Lorna* had been bedridden for years. The cold walls of hospitals and nursing homes were all too familiar to her as she lived day after day in a routine of doctor visits and prescriptions. Lorna’s fragile health was the result of years of physical abuse from multiple men in her life and teenage alcoholism. Lorna had come from a traditionally religious background, but she knew so little about hope and freedom. And with few friends and a family who didn’t bother visiting her, each passing day accentuated her loneliness and isolation. She felt like a prisoner in her wheelchair.
Stephen and Geraldine* wanted to share their testimony. They wrote us the following email as an encouragement to other families who are going through, or have gone through similar circumstances: