Translator: Ken Harvey Reviewer: Denise RQ
Today, I'm simply a messenger.
I'm here to share the values
my parents have instilled in my siblings and I,
but they are also the core values of the business they own today.
My parents are the owners of R&B Enterprises,
a machining company that has been awarded Boeing Supplier of the Year three times,
out of the 23,000 businesses Boeing has worked with.
(Applause)
But it wasn't always like this.
Keep these two words in the back of your mind
throughout this talk: risk and determination.
Today, I'm here to speak on behalf of my parents
to share you their story.
My parents were among the 2 million people
who escaped Vietnam after the fall of Saigon in 1975.
My dad escaped in 1981, and my mom escaped in 1983.
The first time my mom escaped,
she was actually caught and jailed for two weeks
before being able to bribe the guards with jewelry to set her free.
My parents, like a lot of the Vietnamese people,
escaped by fishermen boat, a lot like this one.
These boats were crammed with people, sometimes 60 people on the lower end,
but as many as 150 people in some cases.
This is where the term "boat people" was derived from.
People were fleeing Vietnam, because after the fall of Saigon,
South Vietnam faced a lot of persecution and dangers.
Former government officials, soldiers,
and supporters of the Vietnamese government,
the Southern Vietnamese government,
were sent to reeducation camps where they were tortured,
faced hard labor for many years, and even execution.
And at a lot of the times, these executions were carried out
without any formal convictions or trial.
If somebody accused you of being a supporter
or of any relationship between the Southern Vietnamese government,
you were going to be sent to this reeducation camp.
An estimated 150,000 people died in these camps,
so people were fearing for their lives,
so they took the risk and escaped the country.
While two million people escaped Vietnam,
400,000 people did not make the trip.
My uncle, my mom's brother, was among the 400,000.
While in Thai waters, his boat was attacked by pirates
where goods were robbed,
women were raped and taken as sex slaves,
and then the pirates sank the ship, leaving the men for dead.
It's really unfortunate to say that my uncle's story is not rare.
Many boats faced pirate attacks, storms, starvation,
and sometimes, they were just at sea for so long,
they never made it ashore again.
For people who did make the trip,
they stayed in refugee camps in neighboring countries
such as Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines.
My dad's boat sailed to Malaysia
where he stayed in the refugee camp in Pulau Bidong for a couple months
before relocating to another refugee camp within the country.
My mom, who escaped two years after him,
actually stayed in the exact same camp as him
in Pulau Bidong before resettling to Seattle.
That's Pulau Bidong.
The Orderly Departure Program, spanning from 1975 to 1994,
helped Vietnamese refugees resettle to Western countries,
with the majority, like my parents, relocating to the United States,
and others emigrating over to European countries and Seattle.
Refugees who had priority in being relocated,
had family already in the Western countries.
Because my mom already had her sisters in Seattle,
she only stayed in the refugee camps
for a couple months before emigrating over.
My dad, on the other hand, he faced somewhat of a bit --
he faced some situations.
Because he didn't have blood relatives over in any of the countries,
almost every Western country rejected him.
He ended up staying in the refugee camps for two and a half years.
After that, the United States finally caved
and gave him the thumbs up to emigrate over.
And he said it was because he was there for so long,
they felt bad for him.
(Laughter)
So now my dad was in California, and my mom was in Seattle.
My dad's uncle helped him enroll in technical college
where he pursued machining, because at the time,
he didn't speak English very well,
so machining didn't require a lot of speaking,
but a lot of technical skills,
so he thought it was a good suit for him.
He ended up graduating top of his class,
scoring a 96% on the final exam
where the final average was only a 56%.
My mom, she went to Ingraham High School in Seattle,
and then went on to graduating at North Seattle Community College
and became a certified medical assistant.
In 1990, when tensions between the United States and Vietnam eased,
Vietnamese refugees who escaped
were able to go back to Vietnam to visit family.
During the long flight, everybody was so nervous,
and there was a lot of talking, and-- you know where I'm going.
(Laughter)
Yes, my parents were on the exact same flight,
and after a little bit of talking, they found out that their village
was only 20 minutes away from one another.
So, the plane landed,
and my dad went back to visit to his family,
and he decided to pay a little visit
to my mom and her family in her village.
And you know what's really cute?
They booked the same flight back,
and they managed a long distance relationship
and married two years later in 1994.
Two years after that, they had their first child,
and that was me.
(Laughter)
So, fast forward,
after they had my twin brothers, we decided to move to Seattle
to be closer to my mom's intermediate family.
At the time, my parents were working both full time,
my mom as a medical assistant in the International District,
and my dad was working day and night shifts as a machinist.
After moving between companies,
he got a job at R&B Enterprises.
But after a dispute with an employee, he decided to leave.
When he was working at R&B, though,
the owner briefly mentioned about wanting to sell the business to him.
But when my dad left, and after a couple months,
the owner unexpectedly died of cancer.
So my dad went back to the son asking
if he was still willing to sell the business.
And R&B Enterprises was very profitable at the time,
so the son refused.
There was no reason to sell the business that was profitable.
Fast forward two and a half years later
and R&B Enterprises was on the brink of bankruptcy
and the son finally came back asking my dad to buy the business.
And let me add this really quickly.
My dad really wanted to own a business.
I remember growing up,
he would bring home so many franchise brochures
because he was actually thinking about opening up one.
So, my dad took the opportunity, took out a mortgage,
and used it as a down payment to buy the business.
And when it was finally his, he realized how bad it was.
(Laughter)
The previous owners was so behind in production
that the phones were ringing off the hook.
And on the other line,
angry customers were threatening to sue.
But my dad apologized, explained the situation,
and strategized the best plan to start production.
Within two weeks, the phone calls stopped,
and that's because product started leaving the shop
and into customer hands.
My dad was working 20 hours a day, seven days a week,
and my mom was working full time as a medical assistant
and still was helping him at the shop while juggling to raise us kids.
My parents bought the business in 2008,
and that's when the recession hit.
Bad luck, right?
So, you remember how bad the recession was.
Houses were up for foreclosure; small businesses were closing.
But R&B Enterprises was still in business.
It was actually increasing 10 to 15% every single year,
and that's because the businesses my dad was working with
was spreading word to other businesses
that R&B Enterprises was never short on projects or jobs.
My parents were able to pay any accumulated debt
in three years' time, and in 2012, they were awarded
Boeing Supplier of the Year for the first time.
In 2013, they were awarded another award.
And in 2014, they won
another Boeing Supplier of the Year Award.
And my parents are pretty confident they're going to win again this year.
(Laughter)
(Applause)
This Vietnamese boy who didn't even have a high school diploma
managed to climb his way up to be a successful business owner.
My parents, after going through what they've been through,
they never gave up.
At the beginning of this talk, I told you to remember these two words:
risk and determination.
Those are the two values my parents have taught my siblings and I,
and they're also the core values of their business.
My parents risked their lives to come to this country
in hopes of a better one,
not knowing whether or not they were going to make the trip.
Once here, despite of the language barriers and obstacles,
they were determined to make a living for themselves.
Furthermore, R&B Enterprises focuses on prototyping,
one of the riskiest specialties to be in
because of the increased rate of failure.
Sometimes, projects just didn't go as planned.
Final products just didn't fit in the machine right.
But my dad never gave up.
He didn't give up when others would've.
And he would spend countless hours at the shop or at home
until the final product was perfect.
Being a child to Vietnamese parents
that have gone through what they've been through,
the values they have taught me is prominent in my everyday life.
My parents are my best friends, so I come to them for everything:
life problems, school problems, or just doubts in general.
And they always say the same thing over and over,
and this is my mom's favorite saying,
"If you think you can, you can."
Sometimes,
your goal is just going to be risky, but you just have to be determined.
Sometimes the path to your goal is going to be short,
but oftentimes, you're going to have to take a detour.
Be determined;
and sometimes, your goal is going to be risky.
But my dad always says,
"You miss 100% of the risks you don't take."
So, risk and determination; those are the two things
my parents and I want you to take away from this talk.
Thank you.
(Applause)