Peace in My Arms

Madeline Tai - US citizen

View Photos (5) Image © 2000 Global Directions, Inc.

My family's journey into the realm of international adoption began with a television broadcast on the plight of Romanian orphans. It became focused with my wife Susan's telephone call to the United Nations in an effort to aid the orphans of the war in Bosnia. The journey took direction after attending seminars from adoption programs. Photos of children from around the world, with their gap-toothed smiles and large innocent eyes, tugged at our hearts. In the end Vietnam became our destination.

The decision to travel to Vietnam and to adopt a child from that country brought incredulous looks from family and friends. The reaction was easily understood. Vietnam disappeared from the national scene after 1975. There were no post-war images of the country to be grasped. Vietnam was trapped in time as a multi-media presentation of war.

As a child of the 1960s, my experience of the Vietnam War was watching black and white images that flashed across the television screen: self-immolating monks, street executions, napalmed children with arms outstretched in agony, body bags and helicopters in hasty retreat.

Last year on the cusp of middle age, my experience with Vietnam became firsthand. My wife and I traveled there to complete the adoption of an infant girl. After eighteen hours of transoceanic flight, the airplane banked and started its final descent. Neatly carved fields of rice gave way to the urban sprawl of Saigon. Rusting Quonset huts lined the airfield like forgotten tin soldiers. Abandoned gun placements, some still bearing the ubiquitous peace symbol of the 1960s came into view. It was an image of Vietnam one might expect.

While waiting to deplane, President Nixon's 1973 promise of "peace with honor" had never seemed more bankrupt. I was acutely conscious that I was entering Vietnam as a citizen of the country that had battled the victors and abandoned the losers. With a great deal of trepidation my wife and I ventured into the throngs at the airport.

Within 48 hours of being "in country" I had exchanged the black and white images of war for a world of color and life. The war that had never reached a conclusion in the U.S. had long since passed in Vietnam.

In the central coastal city of Nha Trang, beautiful young ladies in dazzling white ao dais motorcycled down palm-lined beach boulevards. Elementary school children in blue and white uniforms unhesitatingly smiled, waved, and shouted "Hallo". Electric blue fishing boats with ruby red trim danced upon cerulean seas. Neon green rice fields pressed against the muted greens of the mountains. Street barbers plied their trade while cyclo drivers hustled for fares.

Within a few days I held peace in my arms and found honor in my heart. Peace was a tiny wisp of a child by the name of Madeline Tai. I found a sense of honor in being entrusted with this child's life as her parent. Our hearts ignored the delineations of nationality and war and instead focused on being father and daughter.

Finally this child who had been in our hearts for months was now in our arms. Her entry into our lives was as anxiously anticipated as the birth of our sons Justin and Andrew. The endless paperwork, bureaucracy, delays and tears faded as Madeline fell asleep in her adoptive mother's arms.

Strolling along the beachfront streets with our daughter was an invitation for the citizenry to engage my wife and me in conversation. There was always a great deal of interest in the wellbeing of the child. At times we were scolded for not dressing the baby warm enough despite the 80-degree temperatures. Other times people would stroke our daughter's cheek and sadly predict "baby have a better life."

The animosity I feared never surfaced. Mark Twain said, "Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness." One might add fear to that list. It became readily apparent that the U.S. policy of isolation and neglect of Vietnam after the war was an erroneous one. Too much blood and too many tears had been shed. How could a country that was of such vital importance that our leaders sent young men to die for it then become a nation of complete insignificance?

I thought of a bright young lady at home who had lost her brother to a ship's fire on a destroyer in the South China Sea. The hopes and dreams of her family perished that day. Sorrow denied promise and pain brought alcohol and chemical dependency. After an untimely death it is not uncommon for the survivors to search for some purpose to the loss of their loved one. Ignoring Vietnam for a quarter-century denied many of America's survivors an opportunity for healing. Those left behind might find if they could truly know Vietnam, that their loved ones died for a freedom loving people with a resilient spirit and reverence for family.

At the orphanage in Tuy Hoa it was possible to meet with our daughter's caretaker. My wife and this woman possessed an immediate bond that was able to transcend cultural and language barriers. The maternal love they had for Madeline was palpable. The unspoken language in their hearts was easily understood as they smiled and embraced.

The caretaker gladly held our daughter in her arms. She gently rocked Madeline and kissed her good-bye. In an act more poignant and official than all the bureaucratic procedures, the caretaker, with tears streaming down her cheeks, lovingly placed the child back in my wife's arms.

My own family is now no longer just Polish-German-Dutch-American. It is also Vietnamese-American. Perhaps in a much larger sense all baby-boom families share a Vietnamese legacy. Too much blood was intermingled on the Southeast Asian battlefields for the tie to ever be severed. There is a common ground to be grasped and a need to find fulfillment of Nixon's "peace with honor" promise.

For Americans and Vietnamese the 1972 photo of young Kim Phuc running naked from a napalm attack struck a nerve deep within the heart. Today, her back scarred from third degree burns and 17 operations is a topographical map of war's insanity. Yet her spirit is a beacon of light.

Kim Phuc has held and forgiven the pilot who dropped his payload on the temple in which she was hiding. She has wiped away the tears of the officer who provided the coordinates for the attack. Kim Phuc knows the road that leads to peace with honor. The directions she has given are simple: "We cannot change history, but we should try to do good things for the present and for the future to promote peace."

This nation has long struggled to deal with the Vietnam War experience. The healing process has been a long and arduous one. It began with the nation embracing the veterans who fought and died in the war. It continued with the amnesty granted to those who chose not to fight. What remains is to embrace and assist our former enemy.

There is peace in my arms and honor in my heart. Peace is the restless wisp of a child waving a flag along with 89 other children from around the world. Honor is having her become an American citizen.

The journey into the realm of international adoption has ultimately been a journey of the heart. We have discovered that miracles still exist and that love is a powerful and magnificent force. It is a journey that continues daily in my family.

Published on 1/1/99