Minh T. Nguyen

Bill Gates - Last month Bill Gates came down and visited our campus. I was sitting pretty much in the front row as he talked about the company’s direction. What I found more interesting though is how he describes his work on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and its goal to eradicate human diseases. He applies a Microsoft-business-like mentality to the philanthropic world by attracting the world’s brightest scientists and providing them with the tools and finances that they need to achieve their goals. I always had a deep admiration for Bill Gates and Microsoft since high school, but his decision to leave Microsoft and spend his full-time life on the foundation starting July 2008 leaves me with awe. He says that “with great fortune, comes great responsibility”. Seriously, Bill is the new Spiderman.

School – So I finished my first semester at Carnegie Mellon West last Friday. While it was very time-consuming, as I find myself doing school work in my office, on flights, waiting in airports and even when I am “on vacation” in OC or New York, it wasn’t all too difficult. I attribute this to being part of an excellent and high-performing team and that the first semester was an intro course to what is yet to come over the next five semesters. The harder part of my first semester was actually to balance school, work and personal life. Programming C# at work all day with hard deadlines, only to come home to work in Java all night with hard deadlines and trying to squeeze in time to fly to New York or Redmond or practice piano in between leaves my schedule of 15-minute granularity filled up to the gazoo. Where do I only find the time to shave my cats?!

Vacation projects – So what’s Minh doing over his Christmas vacation? Well, for one, a complete revamp of the Journey from the Fall website is due by year’s end. Fortunately, I’ll be given a design by the art director over at ImaginAsian, so I only need to code and implement it, but I am looking forward to developing my first real ASP.NET 2.0 application. However, the more interesting and exciting project this vacation is a simple WPF-based computer puzzle that I started developing the day before yesterday. This was more a personal project for me as I wanted to get my hands dirty with the 3D aspects of XAML, but after having completed a playable prototype today, I realize that this can actually be a cool casual game, so I might make it available in January 2007. I don’t want to reveal too much, other that this is a mathematical puzzle. So Dark the Con of Minh.

After winning Audience Award at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, Best Cinematography at the Milan International Film Festival, Special Jury Award as well as Best Actor Award at the Newport Beach Film Festival, Jury Award at the Asian Film Festival of Dallas, Grand Jury Prize at the San Diego Asian Film Festival, Grand Jury Prize at the Amazonas Film Festival, Audience Award at the Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival, Best Producer Award as well as Best Director Award at the Asian Film Festival of 1st Films and Best Feature Film at the Anchorage International Film Festival, Special Project Award by the Princess Grace Foundation, Best Feature Film at the Boulder International Film Festival this Official Sundance Film Festival movie about the Vietnamese boat people and refugee camp experience by Ham Tran is finally coming to theaters this Spring 2007. 

Do I need to say more?

Life continues to be busy. The last ten days prior this past weekend was spent from 9am to roughly 2am every day at work to finish coding the components I was responsible for in our next version of our Microsoft IPTV product. I generally don’t like to work on weekends or in the evening, and generally that doesn’t happen often, but the past two weeks have been pretty busy. Fortunately this code complete milestone coincided with my one week vacation at school. Beep. I flew over to Boston this weekend and met up with PT, Nhat, Tony and a few other old friends. That was short and fun weekend gateway for me, but upon returning I am now back swamped with school work. Beep. I finally finished reading the incredibly boring “Shadow Puppets”. Oh, how much I dread reading “Shadow of the Giant” just because my obsessive compulsive disorder in me forces me to read all Ender books as a devoted Ender’s Game fan. Beep. I am closing my MySpace account. The popularity-contest-like friends feature is so overrated, the add-me-requests annoying, the “hey, just stopping by to say hi” comments useless, and no one seem to be using the blogging feature of MySpace, which is what I am mostly interested in to keep me up to date with what’s going on in my friends’ lives. Above all however, MySpace is the most unintuitive, user-unfriendly, inconsistent, buggy, unreliable piece of crap I have ever seen succeed in the online world. Beep. In the spirit of election day today (I voted. Did you?), check out my new bumper stickers on my car below. Meow.

 

Two weeks until November 7th, and there’s quite a lot of Buzz in the Vietnamese political arena, this time making national headlines, so let’s get right to the point with the much-talked about voter intimidation letter...

Tan Nguyen’s voter intimidation letter

In short, Tan Nguyen is a Republican coming-out-of-nowhere-financial-advisor-turned-politician who is running for the 47th California Congressional District, where long-time Vietnam supporter and Democrat Loretta Sanchez is currently holding the seat. If you live in Little Saigon, I am sure you have seen the many green Go-with-Tan signs at every street corner. Well, about two weeks ago, this bilingual mailer was sent to about 14,000 foreign-born Hispanic Democrat households warning them that voting as an illegal immigrant will result in jail time and that they will be deported. The letter states that a new computer system is being installed to allow anti-immigration organizations to obtain voter’s names, and that voting is dangerous and that they should stay home. This mailing was traced back to Tan Nguyen’s campaign and has stirred much controversy making national headlines, receiving condemnations from both parties of the house. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has called the letter "a despicable act of political intimidation and a hate crime." Tan Nguyen’s office has being raided last Friday in a state probe, while members of both parties are urging Tan Nguyen to withdraw from the race.

Tan Nguyen, on the other hand, denies any wrongdoings and refuses to withdraw from the race, despite the public’s immense call for him to withdraw (especially that of Orange County Republican Chairman Scott Baugh). While he has prematurely fired the campaign worker who has apparently sent out that mailing without his approval, he has invited her back, also noting that the English draft of this letter was incorrectly translated into Spanish. Uuuhh... so why was this only sent to 14,000 foreign-born Hispanic households?

I am tired of politicians who come out of nowhere and expect our support because they carry our last names. Very much like the Lynn Daucher vs. Lou Correa race that is being watched in Little Saigon, I am asking the Vietnamese public to look at candidate’s track record of what they have done for Vietnamese community. To those involved in the Vietnamese community, the name Loretta Sanchez is pretty much a household name, while none of us ever heard of Tan Nguyen until this year.

Jed Levine’s satire gone wrong

Speaking about controversial letters, Jed Levine is a contributor to the University of California, Los Angeles newspaper The Daily Bruin. In a recent article named A modest proposal for an immodest proposition he responds to a recent student rally to ask for more diversity at the campus, and writes a complete satire on why the growing Asian population at California universities should be capped to allow the underrepresented white minority students to attend the school. While his article was a complete satire, he uses analogies and statements that could have easily been interpreted as racists remarks if taken out of the context of the satire, and that’s exactly what happened. The Asian student population is not impressed, nor amused, again causing national headlines among Asian student groups across the nation.

Vietnam hosting APEC and ascends to the WTO

The Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation is an annual forum facilitating economic growth, trade and investment in the Asian Pacific region. Unlike WTO, APEC does not have any treaty obligations and is based on suggestions and non-binding conventions only. Well, the annual APEC forum is going to take place in Hanoi next month and the President Bush is scheduled to attend as well, making this a rather high-profile event for the second fastest-growing economy in Asia. Bush is expected to also meet with Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet and Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung. The Vietnamese Diaspora is having an eye on Bush, as many pro-democracy groups have met with White House officials in the past weeks urging Bush to address the question about human rights at this upcoming trip.

Remember a few years ago, when former President Clinton made a speech in Hanoi, and when the interpreter on the Vietnamese TV carrying the live speech suddenly had some translating difficulties when Clinton was talking about the differences that they would have to overcome when it comes to human rights? Let’s see what next November will bring. Oh, and speaking about WTO, a draft report by the World Trade Organization obtained by the Associated Press yesterday states that Vietnam is ready to become the trade body’s 150th member. Hanoi has been seeking membership since 1995, and the country will be able to officially enter the WTO as early as December. One of the biggest hurdle of Vietnam’s ascension into the WTO is the question about labor rights, but this draft has not addressed this at all.

Journey From The Fall wins more awards and gets distribution

And now... to answer the question you all have been waiting for. Ham Tran’s boat-people drama/documentary “Journey from the Fall” has finally found a distributor. After winning the Jury Award at the Asian Film Festival of Dallas and the Grand Jury Prize at the San Diego Asian American Film Festival last month, distributor ImaginAsian has purchased the rights to the movie, paving the movie’s entry into American main stream theaters and stores. ImagineAsian works together with the famous Weinstein brothers, so we’ll be able to see the movie coming soon to a movie theater near you .... as early as Spring 2007. Can't wait until next year? See it this Thursday on an IMAX theater in Austin!!! After the theatrical release, expect to find the DVD at regular stores like Best Buy, Walmart or Fry’s. Now, that’s the news I’ve been waiting for for the past two years when I first saw it in 2005 at the San Jose pre-screening. I am dead-serious when I say that this movie has the potential to snap up a few Academy Awards at the Oscars in 2008 the way underdog Crash has surprised everyone a year after its original release. Go Pig Meat!

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Past Vietnamese Buzz entries: September 2006 July 2006 June 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006

Here’s the post to answer the question I’ve been asked so many times lately and to explain the lack of online presence and blogging activity.

 

Keeping a full-time job while doing a part-time grad school program sure keeps me busy, but overall it’s nothing that I can’t handle. The software engineering program at Carnegie Mellon West has kept its promise so far and delivers a demanding and rich curriculum where I get to learn about the best practices of software engineering while getting my hands dirty with new technologies and design patterns I am unfamiliar with—all while interacting and working in a highly-motivated team of fellow students and software engineers.

 

So, what classes are you taking?

 

I don’t take any classes, nor exams. It’s a practical approach to software engineering, so instead we pretend to be in a fictitious company. My faculty acts as fictitious stakeholders (say VP of Engineering or VP of Marketing), and we negotiate requirements with them and deliver the products at the end of the semester. It’s a very holistic approach as you learn more than just computer science and coding and you get to improve your people and leadership skills as you interact with them and your teammates.

 

So, how do you like it?

 

I love it so far. Besides the practical and very fun approach to learning, I welcome the non-Microsoft aspects of this learning community, as I find myself expanding my horizon by stepping out of my comfort zone and using many open source tools such as Tigris, Java, Hibernate, JUnit.

 

The networking opportunities that CMU West offers is superb. Albeit missing my chance to getting tickets to have breakfast with former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiona the other day, I got to shake hands with Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak at one of CMU West’s events last month. I value the networking opportunities with my co-students who come from companies such as Apple, Boeing, Google, Lockheed Martin, Oracle and Cisco.

 

However, sitting in front of the computer most of the day at work, only to come home and sit in front of the computer all evening can be very tiring and monotone. I do enjoy coding, just not 24 hours a day. So next time you see me at the few selected outings where I come out, please don't talk to me about computers. :)

 

Dang, where do you find the time?

 

Well, in case you haven’t noticed, I haven't blogged much and don’t go online often anymore, as I find chatting such a waste of time. Of course I had to sacrifice a lot of other things as well. My weekly piano lessons have become bi-weekly lessons (and even those had been cancelled a few times already). I have not gone jogging at all since school started two months ago, and I used to do that for two hours per week! My quest to finish reading the (rather boring) Ender’s Shadow series has been put to a complete halt, and whenever I travel to OC or NYC, I find myself locked in a room to finish homework instead of going out. Ah well, at least, I can’t complain about not making productive use of my time.

 

Hey, Minh, I know you are really busy, but can you [fill in the blank] for me?

 

Nice try... but no.

Piano experiment #12's task was to compose a happy melody for a change (most of my previous piano experiments are more nostalgic/sad in nature). Well, I drew inspiration from my piano time and I am very happy with the melody that I came up with. Hope you enjoy my latest composition.

Pacific Time

Right-click here to download

I went to the Save Darfur Rally today in San Francisco. We heard from different speakers and entertainers, but I found it quite empowering to learn about this single University of California student who was shocked to hear that the UC system was doing business with the Sudan government, including the sale of firearms, but was quick to point out that this was not the UC's fault, but mainly just the fault of the way business works in America.

 

He then started to work with student groups on his campus to ask the UC system to divest from Sudan, and with a lot of effort from many student groups, this divestment was then adopted by the entire University of California system. The efforts were then continued state-wide and the Darfur Peace and Accountability Act of 2006 is currently sitting on Arnold Schwarzenegger's desk, with almost 15 other acts in other states pending approval as well. Now, that's people power starting from “me“.

 

Pictures from the San Francisco rally at the Justin Herman Plaza:

 

 

Background on the Darfur Genocide

taken from ourpledge.org

 

Entire villages bombed and pillaged; countless women raped; wells poisoned; humanitarian aid blocked; hundreds of thousands murdered and more than 2.5 million civilians displaced---this is the culture of impunity that continues today in Darfur, a region in Western Sudan. Today the region is the site of an ongoing genocide and---according to the UN---the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

 

The witnesses to atrocity can speak for themselves: "There was also another rape on a young single girl aged 17: M. was raped by six men in front of her house in front of her mother. M's brother, S., was then tied up and thrown into [the] fire."

 

Since February 2003, the Sudanese government and its proxy Janjaweed militias have been committing mass murder, mass rape, and other kinds of systematic violence against Darfur's civilians. More than 400,000 have been killed. Millions are now either displaced within their own county or cling to life as refugees; the World Food Program estimates that well over 3.5 million need daily food aid in order to survive.

 

In July 2004, Congress unanimously declared that the situation in Darfur constituted genocide. The Bush administration followed with its own official genocide determination in September 2004. Numerous human rights groups (including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International); international NGOs; bipartisan Congressional coalitions; Christian, Jewish, and Muslim community leaders in our own country---all these have brought attention to the deliberate and widespread ethnic cleansing of Darfur's African tribes.

 

This May, the Sudanese government and a Darfuri rebel faction (part of the government campaign is an ongoing fight with Darfur-based rebel groups) agreed to a U.S.-brokered peace plan, but this agreement is now in tatters. The plan requires the Sudanese government to disarm its militias, but instead a marked escalation in attacks has occurred.

 

September 2006 sees the beginning of a new, massive military campaign brought on by the genocidaires. The government is bombing and razing entire villages, threatening to kill, root out, and displace hundreds of thousands more.

 

President Bush, the State Department, and a large majority of Republicans and Democrats in Congress support a multinational intervention force to stop the genocide in Darfur, Sudan. But in light of unrelated foreign policy priorities, Darfur risks completely falling off the U.S. agenda. It is up to citizens of conscience around this country to advocate on behalf of the people of Western Sudan.

 

The U.S. has helped to pass a United Nations Security Council resolution authorizing a large and robust United Nations peacekeeping force with a mandate to protect Darfur's civilians. But, because UN deployment to Sudan is still a very uncertain issue, and because any UN mission for Darfur will most probably take a long time to hit the ground, the U.S. must help deploy right now a NATO rapid-reaction force of at least 12,000 troops to the Darfur region. NATO troops are well-equipped, well-trained, and have already held training exercises in Western Sudan.

The people of Darfur cannot wait any longer. If no multinational protection force is deployed to the region soon, the death toll in Darfur may reach over a million persons by the end of this year.

Remember that line in Hotel Rwanda, when the reporter says how Americans always say “Oh my God, that's horrible“ and then turn to continue to have their dinner? When I watched Hotel Rwanda almost two years ago at the Amnesty International Film Festival in Seattle, director Terry George was saying that it's happening again right now in Darfur, and the world is not paying attention again.

It now has been almost two years since I've seen Hotel Rwanda, and Terry is right. Darfur is still taking place, and the world turns a blind eye to it, including myself. I finally get myself into researching and reading about it more, and am ashamed that I haven't done so before, since it doesn't take that much effort.

Almost 400,000 civilians have been killed in Sudan by now in an ethnic cleansing operation backed by the government in a scale we haven't seen since Rwanda. Compared to what happens there, Vietnamese people in Vietnam are having a 'good' life.

The Save Darfur Coaliation is organizing a nationwide rally this Sunday to ask the United Nations to send the much-needed peacekeeping troops to Sudan. I hope you can join me as I will attend the rally here in San Francisco this Sunday, September 17th, from 1-3pm at the Justin Herman Plaza. More importantly, I hope you can take the initiative in learning more about this conflict and sign the petition by Amnesty International to ask President Bush to make it also United States' top issue.

I don’t know if I will continue my Vietnamese Buzz. I have recently unsubscribed from about almost 10-15 different Vietnamese mailing lists in preparation for my grad school, so I’ll be a bit out of the loops with what’s shaking in this vibrant community, but we shall see. Anyways, we are about two months away from the November election, and with that the political wheels are turning, bringing all the good and bad of the typical campaigns.

 

The Arnold Schwarzenegger, Tran Thai Van, Lynn Daucher and Phu Nguyen Controversy

 

Last month, Little Saigon was visited by the California governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger. In an almost-surprise visit, Schwarzenegger showed up in Westminster at the Asian Garden Mall, along with the entire local Vietnamese Republican Party machine to sign a largely symbolic measure honoring the Vietnamese Freedom and Heritage Flag.

 

During the above-mentioned event, Assemblyman Tran Thai Van, R-Westminster, and Arnold Schwarzenegger promoted and endorsed Assemblywoman Lynn Daucher, R-Fullerton, in her bid for state senate.

 

Community activist, former UVSA president Phu Nguyen then spoke out in a recent VietWeekly issue that this political stunt was used to endorse a candidate who does not have any track-record of fighting for issues that pertain to the Vietnamese community, and the controversy started when Tran Thai Van and Nguyen Quoc Lan lashed out and labeled Phu Nguyen as a naive adolescent who is only jealous because the candidate he supports, Lou Correa (D-Santa Ana), didn’t get any credit, and that his comment in VietWeekly will only be beneficial to Vietnam’s Communist Party as it’s another dividing factor in Vietnamese community.

 

(Warning, personal opinion to follow)

 

Puh-lease, when does the Vietnamese community ever get away from using communism as an argument for everything? First and foremost, Lynn Daucher does not have track record in supporting the Vietnamese community before this event. I’ve been involved in the Vietnamese community for years, and she literally came out of nowhere to the Vietnamese community. Lou Correa, on the other hand, has been involved within our community as early as the Tran Van Truong incident in 1999. I have personally walked with Lou Correa to hang up our flag on the streets of Little Saigon and was sitting beside him during the 24-hour hunger strike for the Faith over Force campaign in 2003. I see his active participation in the Vietnamese community not only during each Tet Festival but throughout the year, regardless of whether it’s an election year or not.

 

John Quoc Duong running for Mayor of Irvine

 

John Quoc Duong, the former Executive Director of the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (appointed by the Bush administration in 2001), is running for mayor of the city of Irvine. John is not a newcomer to the Vietnamese arena; we got to see him at many Vietnamese event, including a few VPS and VPAC conferences and of course VANG. This marks John Quoc Duong’s first run for political office and is aiming at taking the seat of current mayor Beth Krom.

 

Cindy Chavez in San Jose

 

So, what’s cooking for the Vietnamese community here in San Jose, home to the largest Vietnamese population of any US city? Cindy Chavez. I got to meet Cindy Chavez a few times earlier this year at a few Vietnamese functions, including the Asian American Women's Alliance annual dinner here in San Jose. Two of my fellow Vietnamese community activists including Huy Tran and Lilly Nguyen even left his job and her home in Minnesota (respectively) to join her campaign.

 

So here’s my plug for them and for Cindy.  Why should the Vietnamese community vote for Cindy Chavez?  My friend says it best:

 

“Because she’s the real deal.  Cindy is one of those people who get into public office for the right reason and is good at it!  She has a record of achievements in all of the areas that affect the Vietnamese community the most, which is education, healthcare, and affordable housing.

 

In education, Cindy Chavez is a visionary.  She understands that it takes a village to raise a child, and takes that approach in looking at ways to better our schools.  Look at what she did for Horace Mann Elementary.  That school used to be all portables, but with some city funds and a partnership between the people who live in that neighborhood and the city, Horace Mann is now a state-of-the-art academy with higher test scores and more and better supplies.  You know how Vietnamese people are about education!

 

In healthcare, Cindy is a fighter!  In her very first year on the city council, she challenged Ron Gonzales and got the city council to approve subsidizing healthcare insurance for children using settlement money from the tobacco industry.  Rich or poor, we all have to take care of our families, and Cindy understands that.

 

In affordable housing, Cindy has led the charge.  Because of her efforts, San Jose has more affordable housing than any other city in California, including Los Angeles and San Diego.  Contrary to popular belief, not everyone in the Vietnamese community is wealthy or well-off.  Many families in our community are poor and they rely on low-income housing to have a roof over their heads.

 

I know that many of you know who Chuck Reed is.  The question should be what Chuck Reed has done.  It was Cindy who worked with Madison Nguyen to get the funding for the Vietnamese Community Center (and that’s why Madison endorsed her).  It was Cindy who put in funding and resources to support the Vietnamese Heritage Day Festival (and that’s why Dr. Ngai Nguyen has endorsed her).  She won’t put on an Ao Dai and do a song and dance, because she has more respect for our people than that.

 

What Cindy will do is get us results.”

 

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Past Vietnamese Buzz entries: July 2006 June 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006

Four days of school orientation at Carnegie Mellon West and –woohoooo– I am excited, motivated and enthusiastic as ever. The more I get to know the curriculum, the faculty and my highly-motivated and exceptional co-students, the more I am falling in love with this program and can’t think of anything better suited for my academic/professional career as well as holistic life than this.

 

The people

 

It all started Thursday night, when all the 57 students of the Class of 2008 first get to know each other through mingling/finger-food/beer in the courtyard followed by a nice, formal buffet dinner on campus (situated at the NASA Ames Research Center). The first thing I noticed, however, was the very impressive caliber of diverse students with remarkable backgrounds and well-rounded characters. You know how you go into computer science programs and always meet those nerdy nerds sitting in the computer labs that talk about technical stuff 24/7/365 while lack every possible communication and people skill and cringe when exposed to sunlight? Well, this class is everything but that demographics, so it’s so refreshing to meet motivated software leaders from various renowned companies who are passionate about what they do and possess great communication skills and have great characters that make them loveable people you just wanna hang out with. My team for the Fall 2006 semester, for instance, consists of employees of IBM, Google, Lockheed Martin and myself from Microsoft, and promises to be an exciting team as we embrace this diversity, as we want to learn from each other.

 

CMU West is a private school and boy does it feel like a private school (you know you are attending private school when they start serving you wine and flower you with Carnegie Mellon laptop bags, shirts, caps, mugs, stickers and even school chocolate). With a faculty to student ratio of 5:1, we are all on a first-name basis. Over the past four days, I ate breakfast, lunch and had dinner with all the faculty members, including the dean, and discussions were often not limited to just school and technology. I can’t wait to start this program, interact with the faculty and learn from them as much as they will learn from me. Just like the students that I have met, I am very impressed by the faculty (my teacher for the first semester used to work as software engineer for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on the Mars Pathfinder mission--how cool is that?!).

 

The program

 

CMU West prides itself with a story-based curriculum. We will learn Software Engineering not through boring lectures but through a learn-by-doing curriculum. Over the next two years, I will spend producing deliverables, collaborating with other students on projects, architecting, analyzing, gathering requirements, coding in a fictitious company (with faculty acting as stakeholders). We will actually go through a few full project life cycles that will span almost the entire two years, and at the very end, I even get to do a practicum where I will actually work on a real product for another Silicon Valley company.

 

 

The team

 

If there was one thing that we should have learned from the past four days, it would be the importance and significance of team building. I’ve attended so many leadership-workshops/camps in my life with the same old cheesy icebreakers, that there is little that can surprise me anymore, but I encountered something different this weekend.

 

We spent almost two hours on a project to build a castle made out of Lego bricks in a small team. Building the castle itself took only 15 minutes really, but we were asked to assign roles and carefully plan construction to minimize construction time as much as possible: one person was the warehouse manager (and provided the team with the Lego bricks), one person was the construction manager (the only person allowed to put bricks together), one person was the quality assurance manager (the only person allowed to walk to the prototype model situated on another table for comparison), while I acted as the project manager (trying to tell the other managers what to do next). We planned, constructed, reflected, analyzed, re-planned, improved the process, constructed again, reflected again and so on, and it was very interesting to see the team dynamics change and improve through open communication and careful planning at each iteration. It sure was a very fun approach to software engineering and team dynamics through Lego bricks.

 

The required reading prior orientation consisted of books, chapters and few scientific papers about team building, conflict resolution, and team dynamics and the orientation weekend provide amble opportunities to apply our readings into practice through a multitude of team-building exercises and educational games. I left today with a good sense of knowing my teammates very well, befriending them already to a stage that I’ve never even reached with past software teams. I wish I could have applied all the knowledge I heave learned this weekend to my previous companies and community projects!

 

In Conclusion

 

So, have I mentioned already how excited I am for this program? If everything goes right, my graduation date will be Saturday, August 9^th 2008 (start marking your calendars, hehe). From today until then, I will go through a rigorous two-year program, leaving me with very little time, given that I continue my full-time job. I expect the next two years to be very challenging, I expect it to be demanding, and I expect it to push me to my limits. However, I embrace it, because demanding challenges that push me to my limits will only bring the best out of me, and I absolutely can’t wait. See you in two years, and let the journey begin.

I've updated my stupid PhotoResizer program today to support EXIF meta-data tags, so that digital camera image properties are now retained while resizing the pictures. Thanks to Tuan Dinh from the UK for this suggestion and feature request. Happy batch-resizing, you smugmugs.

After a very long beta phase, I am finally moving my new Vietnamese Conversions utility out of its beta stage and releasing it without any modifications. I have received a few bug reports, but honestly I was not able to reproduce them and my rudimentary tests have not shown any conversion problems.

The new version supports rich-text editing, so you can copy and paste Vietnamese legacy text (VPS, VNI, Vietnet/VIQR) including formatting in here and do the conversion into Unicode while retaining the formatting. It’s pretty useful/helpful when dealing with pre-formatted text. In addition, you can now also print directly from this textbox (there you go, Mom, that feature you keep on asking me for). If you have any suggestions, comments or find any bugs, shoot me an email. However, given that grad school will start for me in two weeks, marking the end of my social life as I know it over the next two years, I don’t know if I will get to accommodate any of your requests. :)

Before the VNI->Unicode conversion

After the VNI->Unicode conversion

The PowerPoint slides from the Vietnamese Professionals Society - Unicode Workshop that I presented yesterday in Little Saigon are now posted here:
http://www.enderminh.com/minh/blogfiles/vps_unicode.zip

For those who missed the presentation, you can also watch the equivalent 30-minute episode when I presented this on SBTN's “Dien Dan Khoa Hoc” here:
http://208.69.42.150/vpssocal/ddkh_2_vpskeys.wmv

Here's the link to my Vietnamese Conversions web-utility:
http://www.enderminh.com/minh/vnconversions.aspx

Enjoy!

“Congratulations! It is my pleasure to inform you that you have been accepted for admission into the part time Master of Science Software Engineering Technical Track Program at Carnegie Mellon West for the Fall 2006 semester.”

Hello Carnegie Mellon West

This, ladies and gentlemen, is the decision letter that I have been waiting for for so long.  For the past several years, I have been contemplating about going back to school to obtain my master degree in software engineering, but my hands were tied due to community projects and the fact that mortgage payments are tying me down to my job (that I don’t want to leave anyways given that it’s such a dream job). In search for a part-time master’s program to good computer science schools in the bay area, I have been rejected by Stanford University, but accepted to the west campus of the prestigious Pittsburg-based Carnegie Mellon University.

And this couldn’t be any better program for me. As I was comparing this program to Stanford’s and other schools, I realize more and more that this program is just so perfect for me for a multitude of reasons:

-          The program is only two years long, I’ll be graduating August 2008

-          This is a part-time program allowing me to keep my full-time job

-          My diploma will say “Carnegie Mellon University”, a top-tier university known for its excellence in computer science

-          This is a very practical program emphasizing on completing software projects in small teams. There are no classes, nor exams, just deliverables—which is exactly what I am good at and what I have been doing for the past years at my work

-          The campus (located on the NASA complex) is one mile away from my work. I can literally (and probably should) jog or bike there

-          I was admitted to the Fall 2006 semester, which means school starts next month and I can use three years from my company’s tuition expense program for this two year program (see, it’s all planned out already! :) )

-          PT and I are starting our master’s degree at the same time, while she completes hers already in January 2008

Source: US News

Thank Yous

I want to thank my Berkeley professor Mike Clancy, my former Expedia.com manager Melissa Yang, and Microsoft managers Steve Falkenburg and Chris Yerga for writing me excellent letters of recommendation.  I need to thank DG and Sue Christensen as well as Nicole Nguyen, Dianne Le, Hai Ton and Derrill Dabkoski for reviewing and providing me with extensive feedback on many aspects of my lengthy applications. Thanks to Loc Nguyen to providing me answers to my many Java questions. A very, very special thanks goes to Orange County First District Supervisor (and future California State Senator) Lou Correa and her wonder-woman campaign manager (and my close friend) Tammy Tran for writing an excellent letter of recommendation, and lastly thank you to PhuongThao Le, who pushed me to look into other schools after my Stanford rejection, allowing me to stumble on this great program in the eleventh hour and for pushing me to do the application DURING the uNAVSA conference just in time to get it into the super-late admissions pool.

Good Bye Vietnamese Community

During my admissions interview and with discussions with other CMW students, I have been told to kiss my weekends good-bye. CMW is a very tough program. Given that I will be working full-time and getting my degree on a part-time basis, I will be extremely busy for the next two years, as I will be working on school work every evening and on weekends. As such, I have to take an extended leave of absence from the Vietnamese community… for real. It is time that I am concentrating and focusing on my education, and will therefore pull out of every Vietnamese community project and organization that I am currently involved in (with very few exceptions of course). I realize that this will be difficult for me to do, having been so involved in the community, but this is where I need your help and support. Over the next four weeks, I will transition out my responsibilities to other volunteers and will say ‘No’ to any future projects (go ahead, try and ask me). I am afraid I have to pull out of Lenduong’s Project Renaissance and with much sadness I realize that I can’t even attend DH5. I need your help in accepting my decision, not making me feel bad when I decline these things and, most importantly, I need your help to stop asking me to do this “one last final tiny thing”, because those many “one last final tiny things” do take up a lot of time. I am sure that I will come out for events here and there, but at least you won’t find me behind the scenes, so consider Minh T. Nguyen removed from the face of the Vietnamese community earth for the next two years. But don’t worry, in August 2008 I’ll be back… bigger and better.

T?p H?p Thanh Niên Dân Ch?

The talk of town is this new Vietnam-based youth organization called T?p H?p Thanh Niên Dân Ch? that is literally touring the world and being received by each respective Vietnamese communities like rock stars and future leaders. The two masterminds behind this new organization are Vietnamese exchange students Nguyen Tien Trung and Hoang Lan from France who created this new organization to work with Vietnamese youths around the world to demand for more political freedom in Vietnam. Not fearing personal repercussions, they have boldly written dissident letters to the Vietnam government even though their families remain in Vietnam. The idea is that this organization represents a new political party that they want to offer the Vietnamese people in Vietnam, giving the people of Vietnam the option to choose between them and the Vietnamese Communist Party. Whether this is practically possible in Vietnam is of course questionable, but their bold statements (especially as du sinh) is what is making headlines in and outside of Vietnam. Currently, they are travelling the world to debut their organization in all Vietnamese communities, and this marathon includes cities in Germany, Switzerland, Australia, France, Denmark, United States and will conclude in Saigon. I had the opportunity to meet these bright individuals at their San Jose stop as well as at a kick-ass clapping-after-every-statement workshop at this month’s uNAVSA conference, where they participated in a Du Sinh workshop that bridges the divide between Vietnamese youths here and in Vietnam. Tomorrow, they will have a forum from 2-5pm in Little Saigon at Viet Nam Tuong Te Hoi, so come out and meet them. To learn more, listen to this radio show or visit their website at http://www.thtndc.com. Hats off!

VuuDoo Soul

So, the talk of town in the Vietnamese grassroots music community is VuuDoo Soul. You might have not heard of him, since he doesn’t belong to the Asia or Paris By Night crowd, but the Vietnamese grassroots youth community is raving about him. After finishing his electrical engineering degree at MIT (!!!), VuuDoo Soul decided to shift gears to pursue his music talents in R’n’B. I heard a LOT about him and heard people raving about him left and right, so I finally get to see him perform at this month’s uNAVSA conference, and boy, this guy surely knows how to sing, perform and make girls melt like phó mát and guys envy him with jealousy. VuuDoo Soul immediately stands out in the Vietnamese music community with his vocal talents and his jaw-dropping must-be-there-to-see-for-yourself-performances. His self-composed and self-performed music is original, it’s amazing, it’s impressive and has earned him recognition from various critics including American Idol critic Randy Jackson with a thumbs-up comment. So, check out his website and be sure to buy his CDs and see him perform some day.

Vietnam @ Movies

Yup, yup, yup, the Vietnamese International Film Festival is taking place next year in April in Irvine again and they are currently collecting entries for their festival. In its third edition, we are expected to see a plethora of movies being produced and directed by Vietnamese artists again. For one, Spirits-director Victor Vu is producing a new direct-to-DVD horror movie with almost the same cast of Spirits. Now, if you haven’t seen Victor Vu’s Spirits yet, be prepared to see a very frightening Vietnamese ghost story, so needless to say, expectations are very high for this upcoming DVD. On the other hand, Pig Meat Tran’s Journey from the Fall will be shown on August 5th at the Asian Film Festival in Dallas and on October 7th this boat-people-movie will even open the San Diego Asian Film Festival at the Opening Night Gala where actress Kieu Chinh is to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award. Cool beans.

Other Headlines

Somewhere in San Jose a lone Vietnamese guy returning from his grad school interview this week is waiting and hoping for the acceptance letter to the top engineering school and program of his choice.

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Past Vietnamese Buzz entries: June 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006

Boy, this has got to be the busiest month for me this year. uNAVSA conference couldn’t come at a worse time as I was in the midst of completing my grad school application, professional work and freelance work. Beep. uNAVSA conference was pretty cool. While it was a repeat of VASCON with similar topics, speakers and entertainment, it still was a fun experience to meet up with old friends and network with new ones. The Du Sinh workshop totally kicked *ss. It was the most awesome, constructive, inspiring, clapping-after-every-statement-made workshop I had attended at the conference. I am glad to see uNAVSA in good hands with the new board. It is time for me to leave….. for real now. Beep. Unless something major happens today, we will be shipping Microsoft Foundation Edition 1.9 RTM tonight. I am so very excited to see 14 months of my work finally materializing into a product that Comcast will be deploying in multiple states in the near future. Hehe, I am still looking forward to the day my family will actually use my search functionality on the TV at home. “Look, ma… no hands!!” Beep. I just finished my grad school application for a prestigious computer science university, and I am ueber-eggcited. The program I am applying for, while extremely rigorous leaving me with no time to sort out my socks by color, is so perfect for me at this point in my career. However, I shall not blog about it more, until I hear a decision from them soon. Wish me luck. Beep. You guys know how much I love attending and organizing conferences and how much I love my work? Well, my next baby will be the best of both worlds, as I am putting my heart and soul into Microsoft’s First Annual Asian Pacific Leadership and Development Conference taking place this November in Redmond, WA. How cool is that? Beep. Hina, my Honda Civic, broke down. I had to replace the entire engine last week. I guess me driving to OC twice a month does take a toll on the engine. Beep. I have always loved New York City. I guess I’ll be loving it even more. Beep.

Funny, random chats I have with random friends and relatives...

my_sister: shut up already

me: no

me: Have I told you about my inner insight on reading the bible backwards?

me: let me start

my_sister: elbib?

me: hey you should try underwater welding, have I told you?

my_sister: waht's the matter with you today

me: what you don't like your little bruderherz?

my_sister: gaaawd NOT NOW

my_sister signed off at.

 

my_sister: nhan bought a new car
me: yeah, I heard
me: Toyota ,huH?
my_sister: it's a monster
me: what?
me: Hence your blog entry with the car?
me: can you send me a link/picture
my_sister: yeah
my_sister: that's the pic on my blog
me: haha
my_sister: i wrote the article out of frustration
my_sister: haha
me: that's hilarous
me: why did he buy it?
my_sister: but i'm too ashamed to admit i'm driving that piece
my_sister: aaarggh
me: He's a frenchman
my_sister: i know!
my_sister: he should know better!
me: is this a new car?
my_sister: yeah
my_sister: it cost as much as my graduate degree
me: hahaha
me: so, did you protest?
me: or did he just come home with it?
my_sister: i'm signed the contract
my_sister: i wasn't happy
my_sister: but i'm weak
my_sister: buhuuuu
my_sister: now i could kick myself
me: Hahaha.. hilarious
my_sister: :-[
my_sister: :'(
me: now we know who has the pants on....
my_sister: i'm so ashamed
my_sister: i do'nt want to be seen wiht the car
me: hey, he can drive you to Phu's wedding with that
my_sister: he can put three red stripes on it
me: yeah.. the ultimate thing
my_sister: i'll just say he needs it for his business
me: Riiiiiight...
my_sister: that's what he said

 

 

me: gruess gott
my_sister: gruezi
me: ja, ist dein ehegatte schon heim?
my_sister: ja doch
me: und die mama?
my_sister: die mama ist mit mir gell
me: geile Sache
my_sister: volle kanne geil eh
me: aber volle kanna aber auch!

 

 

Friend: hey
Friend: check this out
me: yeah?
Friend: http://minh.nguyen.youaremyfriend.com/
me: how funny
me: haha
Friend: =O im insulted
me: brb
Friend: fine.

Friend: ure this
Friend: http://minh.nguyen.youaremighty.com/
me: http://no.one.youaremyfriend.com/
Friend: such a pessimist

[….]

me: ROTFL
me: HAHAHAHAHAA
me: hahah
me: http://%24%24%24.youaremyfriend.com/
me: a little bit of hacking...
me: ROTFL
me: Omg, I am cracking myself up, HAHA

 

my_little_nephew: are you still working with computer

me: yeah

me: same old boring uncle, ey?

my_little_nephew: ya

me: gee.. thanks, kid.

my_little_nephew: BRb

me: are you still watching shows with speaking sponges?

my_little_nephew: ya

me: don't you think that speaking sponges are a bit unreal?

my_little_nephew: Be Right Back

 

me: my mental image of u is holding a camera
female_photographer: oh man
female_photographer: have u ever seen me w.out my camera?
female_photographer: rofl
me: no, you would be naked then
female_photographer: wat
me: you would feel naked, I mean
me: oops sorry, that came out wrong, haha
female_photographer: thats better
female_photographer: lolo
me: lol!
me: ROTFL

• How do I write Vietnamese in emails and word documents?
• What’s Unicode? Why should I use Unicode when I want to write Vietnamese?
• Why do all my i’s become capitalized once I use VPSKeys?
• Why do capital letters with Vietnamese signs show up as big boxes?
• Someone sent me this file and I can’t read anything in it. What should I do?

If you have asked yourself these questions before, then the Vietnamese Professionals Society - Southern California chapter has a FREE workshop for you.

Abstract: Geared towards the everyday computer user, this workshops covers software and concepts related to using Vietnamese signs on the computer. We will cover the software used to write Vietnamese in documents and emails as well as describe Vietnamese computer formats such as VNI, VPS and Unicode. After this workshop, you will be able to use actual Vietnamese signs in your documents and emails and convert between different Vietnamese legacy formats. Other than Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Word, no further technical skills are necessary. This 2-3 hour workshop will be conducted primarily in Vietnamese.

Time: Sunday, August 6th, 2006 at 1 PM
Location: Việt Nam Tương Tế Hội, 7621 Westminster, Garden Grove, CA 92683
Cost: Free to the public
Registration: send an email to nguyentriminh@yahoo.com

Speaker: Minh T. Nguyen has been a long-time, active member of the Vietnamese Professionals Society, where he regularly gives workshops in Unicode, Internet technologies and Microsoft .NET. As a past co-host of the VPS TV show "Diễn Đàn Khoa Học" on SBTN, he also brings technical and scientific topics to general Vietnamese community. He published his first book "Visual Studio .NET Tips and Tricks" in 2004 and currently resides in San Jose, where he works as a Software Design Engineer for Microsoft.

-----------------

Cách sử dụng chữ Việt trên máy điện toán

• Làm cách nào viết chữ Việt trong email và các văn bản?
• Unicode là gì? Tại sao phải dùng unicode khi viết chữ Việt trên máy điện toán?
• Những trở ngại gì thường gặp khi dùng nhu liệu VPSKeys?
• Phải làm những gì để có thể đọc được chữ Việt trên máy điện toán?

Hội Chuyên Gia Việt Nam - phân hội Nam California sẽ có lớp hướng dẫn về cách sử dụng chữ Việt trên máy điện toán.

Nội dung: Lớp sẽ hướng dẫn cách dùng nhu liệu đánh chữ Việt trên máy điện toán VPSKeys cũng như các kiểu chữ VNI, VPS, và unicode. Buổi học sẽ bao gồm cách viết, cách đọc chữ Việt trong email, văn bản hay các trang chữ Việt trên internet. Ngoài ra sẽ hướng dẫn các bạn có thể hoán chuyển từ bộ chữ Việt Nam này qua bộ chữ Việt Nam khác. Lớp hướng dẫn bằng tiếng Việt Nam, thời gian khoảng 2-3 tiếng. Chỉ cần biết cách dùng MS Windows và MS Word là có thể tham dự.

Thời gian: chủ nhật, ngày 6 tháng 8 năm 2006, lúc 1:00 PM
Địa điểm: Việt Nam Tương Tế Hội, 7621 Westminster, Garden Grove, CA 92683
Tham dự miễn phí
Ghi danh trước: gởi email ở địa chỉ nguyentriminh@yahoo.com

Diễn giả: Nguyễn Trí Minh, hội viên Hội Chuyên Gia Việt Nam, hiện đang làm kỹ sư điện toán cho hãng Microsoft tại San Jose. Anh xuất bản quyển sách đầu tiên "Visual Studio .NET Tips and Tricks" vào năm 2004 và thường xuyên tổ chức các lớp học về Unicode, Internet, và Microsoft.NET cho cộng đồng. Trước đây anh từng là một xướng ngôn viên chính cho chương trình "Diễn Đàn Khoa Học" trên hệ thống truyền hình SBTN để giới thiệu các kỹ thuật khoa học cho cộng đồng Việt Nam tại Hoa Kỳ.

Every once in a while you hear a jaw-dropping composition that you just find so darn amazing that you want the entire world to know about… and that’s when you go home and blog about it. :-)

This is what I call the acoustic equivalent of love at first sight, and Joe Hisaishi’s oh-so-romantic-I-gonna-melt “Rain” from the "Kikujiro no Natsu" album is a piece that I have first associated the term “Love On First Listen” with. Well, time to acknowledge a few other Love On First Listen pieces that I have been listening over and over again in the past months.

Bruno Coulais’ “To Be By Your Side” from “Winged Migration”

Whoa, Minh listens to songs with vocals besides symphonic film music? Yes, I indeed do, but frankly I stumbled on this when I was listening to the music of the famous bird-documentary “Winged Migration” (which I have yet to see). Bruno Coulais’ “To Be By Your Side” is a fascinating piece. While it’s partly because of the combination of a great choice of voice (provided by Nick Cave), the well-versed lyrics, and how well Coulais adds the sound of birds throughout this entire piece, I am mostly intrigued by the voice of the cello/violin in the background. It perfectly accompanies Nick Cave’s voice, but at the same time has as an element of its own as it dances with the rhythm. Ah… love on first listen.

Rene Dupere’s “Love Dance” from “Cirque Du Soleil: Ka“

Cirque Du Soleil has always benefited from great composers, and make no doubt about it, the music is such an important element to the success of Cirque Du Soleil. I stumbled on “Love Dance” when I listened to the Ka CD in the O-store at Bellagio. It’s quite a majestic piece using strings as main instruments. The piece starts out with a single violin playing the melody in classy and exquisite loneliness, and then all the other string instruments then take over the lead in playing the same melody majestically over and over again, and the piece ends with the lonely voice of a young boy and of course the single violin again. Ah… love on first listen.

Hans Zimmer’s “Chevaliers de Sangreal” from “The DaVinci Code”

From the most anticipated-movie this year comes an album that I personally wasn’t anticipating at all, for Hans Zimmer is to me quite… well, the same Hans Zimmer. That is not to say that he’s bad, for I do like his action-sequences, but Zimmer is just Zimmer most of the time, as you can recognize his style in a heartbeat, even if you’ve never heard the piece before, but this piece from the “The DaVinci Code” album is quite not the usual Hans Zimmer. The “Chevaliers de Sangreal” piece was used during the closing sequence of the movie that gave “The DaVinci Code” such an excitement as Langdon is about to reveal the mystery of all mankind. It’s one of the pieces that starts out quite and slow, and then gradually picks up with a Philip Glass-like violin zig-zag rhythm in the background, slowly increases in volume and ends in quite refreshing and majestic sequence. Within the last minute of the piece, you keep on thinking that the music is so climatic that it can’t possibly pick up any more momentum, and yet it simply does. Ah… love on first listen.

So, just last week I was reporting in the Vietnamese Buzz June 2006, about the Dr. Kim Oanh Nguyen Lam controversy in Westminster, CA. In short, the Westminster School District Board reversed their original decision to hire Dr. Kim Oanh Nguyen Lam as the new superintendent of the school district in a closed-door meeting without providing any explanations. Naturally, the Vietnamese and Latino community has reacted with much uproar, and I mentioned that grassroots efforts have already started last week.

Well, the grassroots efforts are reaching national headlines, and this issue is getting bigger by the day. This Thursday, June 15^th, at 6pm, a coalition to keep Dr. Kim Oanh Nguyen Lam as the new superintendent is calling for a peaceful, respectful gathering in front of the Westminster School District’s next board meeting (14121 Cedarwood Ave. Westminster, CA 92683) to voice our opinion that Dr. Kim Oanh Nguyen Lam is well qualified for the position as the new superintendent (otherwise the independent search firm would have not selected her to begin with), and that a public explanation for the unusual second vote needs to be provided. Needless to say, we also hope and respectfully request the board to reconsider the decision and reinstitute Dr. Kim Oanh Nguyen Lam.

This seems like it's going to be a very big gathering, especially with the Latino community being heavily involved in this as well, and I am more than delighted to see both Latino and Vietnamese community that make up Orange County work together hand in hand with this. Heck even civil rights pioneer Sylvia Méndez will come out for the rally. I wish I can attend this rally, but I can’t (one more reason for me to seriously reconsider moving back to my beloved Little Saigon).

So, for mes amis in Orange County, please come out for the rally, keep it peaceful, respectful and constructive (yes, this means, leaving your megaphones at home) and visit www.supportdrkimoanh.org for more information and sample fax letters on this national issue and also inform your co-workers/friends/neighbors/dentists/veterinarian about this as well. Another Little Saigon history in the making, and you don’t want to miss out on this.

So I am somewhere in my second year of formal piano lessons now. I wish that I could find more time to practice, but usually professional and community work take higher precedence, so most of the time I don’t get to do my daily one-hour practice as I would like to. However, at least there is a two-hour time frame every Tuesday evening where my cell phone is turned off, where I have no access to internet and just enjoy exploring music with my piano teacher, and I guess that this is what counter-balances my involvement in Vietnamese community and keeps me sane.

 

In the past several months, part of my weekly homework is to compose short melodies in different keys. I call those my piano experiments and here are a few of them:

 

Piano Experiments #6A-6C

 

Piano Experiments #6 is a series of short 8-bar melodies in the key of F Major. I first composed only Piano Experiment 6A, but my teacher then asked me to come up with a few other variations of the same melody, so I came up with version B and C. You’ll hear that it’s same root melody though.

Piano Experiment 6A

Right-click here to download

Piano Experiment 6B

Right-click here to download

Piano Experiment 6C

Right-click here to download

 

 

Memory Lane (aka Piano Experiment #9)

 

The task for Piano Experiment #9 was devised after I just learned how to play Joe Hisaishi’s “Going Out” from his “Kikujiro no Natsu” album. My piano teacher asked me to come up with a new melody while using the same harmonic chord progression, so you’ll hear the same left hand as “Going Out” but a new right-hand melody (in D Major). My teacher liked this piece a lot and insisted that I need to give it another real name instead of “Piano Experiment #9”, so after consulting some friends, I named it "Memory Lane".

Memory Lane

Right-click here to download

Starting today, a non-printable PDF version of my book “Visual Studio .NET Tips and Tricks” is available as a free download exclusively on InfoQ.com, a new enterprise software development community that covers Java, .NET, Ruby, SOA, and Agile. Launching today, InfoQ.com comes from the same people that started the much-read TheServerSide.net, and even before launch InfoQ.com has generated a lot of traffic, blogs and articles already, so keep an eye on this website.

In order to download the book, simply visit InfoQ.com, register and download the PDF and if you would like to support InfoQ.com and myself, feel free to purchase the print copy, so I can put bread on the table for my wife and 8 children (k, I am kidding of course).

I can’t believe that it’s almost two years already since I published this book. 70% of this book was written during my 1-hour lunch break when I was still working in San Diego. The rest was written in the Downtown Bellevue Library. A lot of people are asking me whether I will write a second book, and I am sorry to disappoint you all, but I am afraid that I won’t find the time to write a 2nd edition, even though I very much would like to.

About the Book: Visual Studio .NET is one of the most versatile and extensible programming tools released by Microsoft. The number of features and shortcuts available in VS.NET is truly immense, and it grows tremendously with each release. Developers who are unaware of these timesaving features surely miss out on opportunities to increase their programming productivity and effectiveness.

Visual Studio .NET Tips and Tricks explains how to use VS.NET efficiently. Organized into short and easy-to-grasp sections, and containing tips and tricks on everything from editing and compiling to debugging and navigating within the VS.NET IDE, this book is a must-read for all .NET developers, regardless of expertise and whether they program in C#, VB.NET, or any other .NET language. This book covers the Visual Studio .NET 2002, 2003, and 2005 Beta 1 releases.

In this book you'll find the following:

• More than 120 tips for editing and writing your code, navigating within the IDE, and compiling, debugging, and deploying your application
• Section dedicated to VS.NET 2005
• Keyboard shortcuts for the majority of tips
• More than 90 figures and screenshots

About the Author: Minh T. Nguyen is a website development engineer with Expedia.com. He has worked with Visual Studio .NET since its beta stages and regularly gives workshops and writes articles for the .NET community.

---

• ISBN: 1411613961
• Suggested Retail Price: $15.95
• Format: Paperback, 124 pages
• Publisher: Lulu Press, Inc.; 1 edition (September 2004)
• Preview: vsnet_tt_preview.pdf
• Complete: Free PDF Download

---

Buy it for $13.95 on lulu.com

Buy it for $15.95 on barnesandnoble.com

Buy it for $15.95 on amazon.com

 

N  g  u  y  e  n     N  g  o  c     P  h  u
U V S A   E x t e r n a l   V i c e   P r e s i d e n t
1 1 / 2 7 / 1 9 8 3   -   0 6 / 0 7 / 2 0 0 5

http://www.thsv.org/special/ngocphu/default.aspx

 

Lots of things happening in the Vietnamese community lately, so here's a two months catch up.

 

Bill Gates in Vietnam

 

The buzz was in Vietnam end of April, when Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates visited Vietnam for the very first time where he was met with cheering crowds and a welcome usually reserved for rock stars. Bill, speaking at the University of Hanoi, says that Vietnam has a huge potential to be ‘a miracle economy’, and especially after reading “The World is Flat”, I can’t agree with him more. A few months earlier, chip company Intel made a big announcement that they are going to build a $300 million chip plant just outside of Saigon. Exciting times for Vietnam’s economy!

 

Phu and Yen Khanh’s Wedding of the Century

 

What the? Since when do we include personal wedding in the Vietnamese Buzz? But boy, the buzz-o-meter was off the hook, because anyone and everyone who ever worked in the Vietnamese Southern California community knows Phu Nguyen as the innovator of UVSA and the yearly Tet Festival (not to mention the youngest president of the Vietnamese SoCal community) and Yen Khanh as the graceful master-mistress of ceremony of all the events down there. It’s the community couple that everyone’s talking about and with a wedding of 1000 guests at the beautiful Hyatt in Huntington Beach, you were living behind the moon if you haven’t heard about PYK’s wedding (or are not involved in the Vietnamese community, but that’s okay, don’t feel bad, grin). Check out the slideshow. Congrats to these Vietnamese community activists and leaders, both of whom I have great respect for.

 

Kim-Oanh Nguyen-Lam controversy in Westminster, CA

 

Everyone’s talking about, a lot of people are agitated, many are disappointed, lots of finger-pointing, so here’s the scoop: in February of this year, an independent execute search firm was hired by the Westminster School Board to search for a new superintendent for the school district. Dr. Nguyen-Lam Kim-Oanh whom I had the pleasure to invite to the VPS Conference 2004, is a long-time student advisor, professor, community leader and educator, was named Little Saigon’s Person of the Year. She was among the Top 7 people during the final “rounds” and was finally hired in a school board vote of 4-1 with much celebration. Many educators and community activists welcomed that decision, for she last worked as an associate director and senior professional development specialist for the Center for Language Minority Education and Research at Cal State Long Beach and was also a trustee for the Garden Grove Unified School District.

 

Well, the controversy started, when a week later, Board members Judy Ahrens and Jim Reed reversed their decision in a closed-door meeting and the new vote of 3-2 rescinded the hiring of Dr. Nguyen-Lam as the new superintendent without publicly citing any reasons. Naturally, the Vietnamese and Hispanic community are outraged, as the 10,000-student Westminster district consists of 39% Latino and 35% Asian students. The Vietnamese and Hispanic community cry out “racism”, board members cry out being “disgusted for being accused of racism”. Petition letters, faxes to the school board, yahoogroups are already going off the hook this past week, but I recommend everyone to go to the press conference on Friday, June 9^th at 9am at Westminster School District Headquarters, 14121 Cedarwood Avenue, Westminster, CA 92683 to inform yourself and find out what we all can constructively do about this issue.

 

VietACT in the TIP Report

 

Each year, the US State Department releases the much-read “Trafficking in Persons” Report, documenting the state of human trafficking in the almost 150 countries. Well, Condi and her gang just released the 2006 report yesterday. Vietnam remained this year as a tier 2 country, which means that it “does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so.” The TIP report cites the Vietnamese brides and migrant workers that are often trafficked to Taiwan (which also is on tier 2). Now, the cool thing for us, is that VietACT’s pictures from our “Not for Sale” poster campaign were used in this report (see pages 264, 267, 270 and 275). In addition, Father Nguyen Van Hung, one of the founding members of VietACT was also mentioned as a hero in the anti-human trafficking campaign; check out pictures from the Southern California Walk Against Trafficking. Who says grassgroots efforts don't make a difference?

 

uNAVSA-3 in San Jose, CA

 

It started in 2004 in Boston, went over to Chicago in 2005 and next month, the annual Union of North American Vietnamese Student Associations Conference is going to take place here in San Jose, CA. Yes, time sure flies, as I still recall Phu Nguyen's “hey, how cool would it be if we were to unify all VSAs together into one organization and put on a yearly national conference” intial talks as it was yesterday. Well, fellas, it’s round 3, and you don’t want to miss this opportunity to meet the shakers of the young Vietnamese youth population. Rumor has it that two energetic Brokeback Mountain fishing buddies are pioneering this conference. Look what they got for you already: housing at the nice Crown Plaza for only $75 for three nights, almost up to 15% discounts on selected airlines, free bus ride from Southern California, early bird registration of ONLY $80 until this Saturday and get this: people from outside of California are getting a $50 off rebate (and no, no rebate forms necessary!). uNAVSA-3 is going to be a four day event of workshops, talks, networking, taking actions and loads of fun. So, go register now, and I’ll personally welcome you to my home town.

 

That's all from me at the Vietnamese Buzz.

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Past Vietnamese Buzz entries: April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006

This month marks my one-year anniversary of moving to San Jose and, yes, I still think it’s a hella boring place, and I guess there’s a reason why I never spend any weekends in this town. With this Memorial Day Weekend, I am breaking my own record as this is the fourth consecutive weekend flying out of town.

This weekend was of course Phu and Yen Khanh’s wedding, often dubbed as the wedding of the century being at the beautiful Hyatt Regency at Huntington Beach overlooking the ocean and having a total guest count of 1000 people. I joke around and say that this wedding is the epitome of all events that we have worked on in the past many years. Everyone and their mothers (literally) were invited and it was such a blast to see and recognize so many faces in this community at the event.

 

The wedding was just splendid, we all had so much fun, there are many funny stories to tell (keywords are men's restroom, wheelchair, cake face) and I am so very happy for Phu and Yen Khanh, as I can’t imagine anyone more suitable for each other for themselves. Wishing the couple all the best.

 

Here’s the Phu and Yen Khanh Wedding Trailer slideshow that I created for them, and yes, believe it or not, but the voice-over is my voice, I just digitally lowered it:

 

To download, right-click here and choose "Save Target As/Save Link As".

Since I just wrapped up a project at work, I finally found some time to decorate my office a little bit further. Wanna see?

The door entrance (and parts of my interior office) is decorated with all kinds of conference and trade show badges that I have accumulated over the years. I love attending conferences and trade shows and don’t want to throw those personal ID cards away, so I started collecting them all and hang them in my office.

My office. Nothing spectacular. Unfortunately I don’t have a window in my office. Instead, I have a mysterious-looking fire emergency door, but no one knows where it leads to, because ironically it’s locked (go figure). That’s my old keyboard there in the back. However, I pretty much never play that thing except for Tuesday evenings, when I desperately try to “cram piano performance” just before my weekly piano lesson. Unfortunately that never works out. Apparently, you can’t cram performance the way you do linear algebra.

So, this is my workspace. I have a bit of an obsessive compulsive disorder trait in me and like to keep my desk clean. Yes, I have a TV in my office, but no, I don’t watch TV during my work time. I happen to work on products for the TV space, and that’s why there’s a TV in my office (though of course, it doesn’t hurt to watch breaking news right from my office).

This is my architecture wall. If I wouldn't be a software engineer, a college professor or a film composer, I would have been an architect, as I have an appreciation for modern architecture. One of my favorite architect is Pritzker-prize winning architect Norman Foster who has designed a plethora of very majestic, modern and often sci-fi-looking buildings around the world. Recognize any buildings in here?

Here's a video of putting everything together. Yeah, there's always film music playing in my office, pretty much all day. What’s missing from my office? Some kind of plant or greenery, but that won’t work since I don’t get any sunlight. The other funny thing is that there is a basket ball hoop right in front of my office (see it in the picture above?). So, as I code happily, basketballs often come fly into my office and hit my equipment, haha. Ah well, at least we’re not playing baseball indoors.

The past several weeks have been absolutely great. So many projects that were on my plate have been completed in the past weeks, and my “to do” list in Outlook is getting shorter and shorter, and I love the feeling of checkmarking things off that list. It all started with the completion of the two-year freelance project a few weeks ago. Then, I finally created the new VMWBO/VietACT slideshow that father Hung has requested almost seven months ago (unfortunately the slideshow was not shown at the human trafficking conference in Washington, DC this weekend because they didn’t have a projector/screen--what’s up with that?!). The VietACT Relay Against Trafficking campaign ended this past weekend with successful events along the California coast, so that’s off my chest now too. To top it off, this past week I even hit zero-bugs at my current project at work, so I am very excited to move on to the next project.

 

This is sooo cool. Contrary to popular belief, I actually have a lot of time for myself lately. I started jogging with my co-workers every Tuesday and Thursday for an hour along beautiful Shoreline Park and playing volleyball every Friday at work. I’ve been reading a lot of books lately and love spending time at Barnes and Nobles by myself. This past weekend, I even flew down to Little Saigon for a spontaneous surprise visit with my family and friends, and I am looking forward to fly up to Seattle this weekend to visit old friends and attend an Advanced ASP.NET 2.0 training at the Microsoft headquarters.

 

So, overall, life’s swell coz Minh’s well. :)

 

What’s next? Well, it’s time to shift my attention. When I joined the VietACT band wagon after DH4, I already told Tammy and the gang that I’ll be on this only temporarily, until VietACT has a new website, and the support to grow by itself, and at this point, VietACT has received a lot of press/media and is growing faster than we can actually handle.

 

At the beginning of the year, I’ve set out two goals for 2006. Now, with my part for VietACT considered completed, it’s time to shift my attention to the Lenduong innovation project. The Fifth International Vietnamese Youth Conference is literally around the corner, and we have very high ambition to completely revamp Lenduong’s image from the ground up until then and break grounds on a lot of things with DH5. So, until then, let’s have fun at Phu and Yen Khanh’s wedding and the uNAVSA-3 conference (do I hear poker chips at my place?), while starting the work on DH5.

Let the games begin.

 My fellow VietACTion-takers,

Verbatim copy of an email from my friend Duc Nguyen, whose documentary Bolinao 52 and his work in the Philippines along with Hoi Trinh I highly support. Read, watch the video and pass it on.

Minh T. Nguyen

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Dear Friends,

While the headlines at the end of 2005 mentioned that the last remaining Vietnamese boat people who are stateless in the Philippines have finally resettled, the fact remains that more than 100 families are still left behind. The reason: they have Filipino spouses. Their cases were flatly denied without a chance for interview nor appeal. Their due processes were devoid.

When we were in the Philippines last summer, the interview process for those approved cases had just begun. Now many of those cases have already resettled in the U.S. But at that time, I saw the anxiety of those who were waiting for their fate to be determined. I saw the happiness of those who were approved. I saw the sadness of those who were rejected. And I saw the wonderment of those who stepped foot onto this country after being lost for so long. Friends, there is no word to describe what I felt and what these people felt. So I encourage you to watch this video clip:

www.bolinao52.com/images/vnmese.mov

Perhaps, it will help explain the struggle of finding home experienced by our brothers and sisters who are still stranded in far away land.

With that saying, what can we do about it?

Hoi Trinh, a lawyer from Australia was instrumental in getting apprx. 1500 people to resettled. He began lobbying for the stateless Vietnamese since late 1990s' are still in the Philippines fighting for the denied cases. Hoi has been frustrated by the bureaucrats in Washington DC. And he's exhausted his energy. But he's committed to find a solution.

Here is his immediate need:

The Vietnamese Community in Australia is looking for a Vietnamese American with a law background to volunteer in their legal centre in the Philippines. Although many of the stateless Vietnamese have already been resettled in the US, there are still 150 people who need help.

The ideal person will:
- be available for 6 months
- be willing to help with legal and non-legal tasks
- be happy to live and work in basic conditions in Manila

For more information, please email Hoi Trinh at hoi@hoitrinh.com and Linda Phillips at linda_nsw@hotmail.com

While the success of his campaign brought many Stateless Vietnamese to resettled in the U.S., the workforce in his legal aid center also diminished. Please contact Hoi if you have other ideas that you can contribute or forward this email to your friends.

Read www.vietphi.com for more info.

Duc Nguyen
Director/Producer
BOLINAO 52: A Vietnamese Boat People Documentary
www.bolinao52.com
duc@rhimp.com

So, the biggest news today came from a Sci-Fi Wire interview with Orson Scott Card: Wolfgang Peterson, the German director who brought you “Air Force One”, “Troy” and the upcoming “Poseidon“, says that with the adaptation of my all-time-favorite novel “Ender's Game” as a movie script reaching completion soon, “Ender's Game” might indeed be his next movie. Now yes, we heard Orson Scott Card talking about an “Ender's Game” movie for almost a decade, and the official movie website is as stale as a rock on the moon, but I have a gut feeling that this time, it's for real. Last time I went to an Orson Scott Card book signing, he was pretty serious about finding the right director, production team and company to produce this, and I commend OSC on the fact that he hard-headedly doesn't bow the Hollywood folks who want to cast grown-ups for this movie and introduce a love story to this (puh-lease).

No doubt about it, the Ender's Game movie will have a very hard time to live up to the hype and satisfy my opinionated expectations, having read “Ender's Game” almost nine times in two languages by now, but I can't help being very excited about this! Hey, I have even secured the domain http://www.enemysgateisdown.com just last week, wuhaha. :)

I’ve been pretty busy to say the least. Community work is manageable, but professional work has been very demanding. I stay in the office almost every day until the wee hours, and even this sunny weekend is spent mostly indoors again. Bummer, isn’t it? Beep. On Phu and Yen Khanh’s wedding page, it says that if I were to be thrown into the pool, so many websites would go down, haha. I should some day compile a list of all the websites I either created or maintain--I can’t even keep track of them myself. Recent additions include www.journeyfromthefall.com (noticed the new award animation or the background music?) and the uNAVSA conference website that was just launched yesterday (like the doves?). Did you already register for this conference? Beep. In my quest to fundraise $3000 for VietACT in the upcoming Human Race of Silicon Valley, I have already received almost $3700! I am deeply touched by how generous and supportive people have been. I’ve received $100 checks from complete strangers. Do you want to join them in supporting me? Beep. I seriously think I spend more weekends out of town than actually in town. Last month I’ve been down to Little Saigon for two (almost three) weekends, and for the month of May I am scheduled to fly out-of-town three weekends. Do I hear airline mileage? Beep. I know when and where the Fifth International Vietnamese Youth Conference is going to take place, but I can't tell you where, or I have to kill you right afterwards. Unfair, isn't it? Beep.

This week I hit code complete on a two-year freelance project that originally should have lasted only for a few months. In the beginning of 2004, a close friend of mine asked me and my technical partner-in-crime to work on an e-commerce website for his business, and we gladly agreed, because we work together very well, are pretty efficient about it and have the technical know-how. Unfortunately, what we lacked was the correct motivation. You see, we both were not motivated by money and as community activists at heart any work for any Vietnamese event we deem worth supporting was just more important to us than pure-business.

Over the past two years, we have constantly put this project on hold over and over again, because I got busy organizing the first uNAVSA conference in Boston, co-chaired the VPS Conference 2004 in Santa Ana, took time off to write my book, was busy with creating slideshows and coordination of the Vietnam Freedom March in DC, dealt with personal problems in my life, helped a bit with the second uNAVSA conference in Chicago, and then went head-on into the Fourth International Vietnamese Youth Conference. Throughout all these events, I felt awfully bad for continuously letting down my close friend by not meeting that project deadline.

After returning from Sydney, we both finally managed to put community work completely aside for a few weeks to work on finishing and delivering the project this week, and I am sooooo relieved that we finally shipped this thing, so that I can clear my mind and focus on VietACT and Lenduong, and for heaven’s sake just enjoy a weekend playing racquetball, watching independent movies and read interesting books again. In hindsight, I would have chosen not to take on that project, as I realize that I am not motivated by money, and herein lies the problem.

I am constantly being approached left and right by friends to start my own business. Whether it’s my technical expertise in programming, my project management skills or my love for cats, I dunno, but pretty much ever since college people always seek me out for entrepreneurial ideas or wonder why I haven’t started my own business yet. I have always declined those business proposals, because I seriously think that people don’t think thoroughly enough about what they are getting themselves into. Having your own business means working 24/7, having it constantly on your mind, being stressed out about it and worry about it while having no time for family. Sure, it’s neat to be your own boss and take off days whenever you want to do community work, but frankly, how often have you seen business owners say “cool, now that I worked enough, I am going to quit and transfer all the work and business to my partner, so that I can go on vacation for a year and/or commit to this community project.”

During the days of the Third International Vietnamese Youth Conference, I have worked around the clock for an entire year, creating slideshows, directing people, coordinating translations, designed websites/brochures, took care of logistics and so on, and never became tired, because it was a project that was so dear to my heart. However, if it’s business work, even though it’s a lot of money involved, I am lazy, come up with excuses to do other stuff and never get around to it.

So be it, I don’t want to have my own business, unless it’s well thought through and is really just passive income (there you go, that's the keyword here). Other than that, I’ll stick to my master plan of just investing, so I can continue to do community work part-time and then retire somewhat early to do community work full-time.

First of, before you read this post, please note that I am not a food connoisseur. On the very contrary, people always complain that with the exception of Japanese food (to which I always have a craving), I consider food as chemical substances required for the functioning of my metabolism and survival of my self.

So anyways, the talk of the town is this new fancy-dancy Vietnamese restaurant in Mountain View downtown called Xanh, so I dragged a bunch of co-workers to check it out this week. I really wasn't expecting anything spectacular given that it seems like Asian fusion, but actually the food was much better/more authentic that I thought (at least compared to other nice Vietnamese restaurants). Sure it might not beat real authentic Vietnamese food, but it's definitely more authentic than expected.

However, what impressed me the most (and why I think you guys should try it out at least once) is definitely the setting, decoration and impressive presentation. My non-Vietnamese co-workers that I invited to lunch were quite impressed (little do they know how dirty real Vietnamese restaurants can really be, hehe). There is so much detail put into a lot of things at Xanh, from the blue/green decoration, the blue lights behind the picture frames, the artwork of three women in ao dai (representing the mother and her two daughters who run Xanh), the blue M&Ms on the table, the green walls and flowers, etc. Heck, even their menu and their website is impressive-looking. It's so refreshing to walk into a Vietnamese restaurant and not see a fish tank for a change, or where you trip because of the greasy floor. Food was served on very nice dishes and presentation of the food is quite impressive, very cute. It looks like it comes straight out of the Food Network Channel or something. The waiters (who are funny to listen to with their pronunciation of Vietnamese foods without accents) even mix the food in front of you, since the rice/meat/sauce/canh come nicely separated on your dish.

Food is a bit pricier than usual, but the "Power Lunch" for $12 includes quite a lot. Overall, I compare it to the Tamarine at Stanford (which is one of the nicer/fancier Vietnamese restaurants down here in the South Bay). While Tamarine has more of a romantic/date setting, Xanh seems more of a professional/take-your-workers-to-lunch setting, which is what exactly I did (and we got lucky as the owner gave us some nice complimentary desserts as well, yay)

Enjoy!

Journey from the Fall wins Best Cinematography

 

Ham Tran’s boat-people masterpiece Journey from the Fall just won the Best Cinematography award at the Milan International Film Festival. Since it also recently won Audience Award at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, I really hope that distributors start to realize that this is not only a moving human story, but also movie of artistic excellence and possibly earning quite a lot of other awards for the distributor. And yeah, since sooooo many people in SoCal keep on asking me, you might wanna know that the movie is FINALLY showing in Orange County at the Newport Beach Film Festival (end of April) and the Visual Communications Festival in LA early May. Better get your tickets early before they go *poof*. On another note, Le Van Kiet’s Vietnamese gang movie Dust of Life will show in San Jose soon. I am looking forward to see that.

 

Vietnamese American National Gala in San Francisco

 

It’s happening in about three weeks: the Vietnamese American National Gala is going to take place in San Francisco early May. This event is usually hosted at the White House in DC, but this year it’s over here in California, so I recommend you guys to go. It’s a great opportunity to meet some of the Vietnamese people that make headlines in this tight-nit community. It’s a very fancy and professionally-organized event. I had a lot of fun going there last time in DC and met many of the people I used to work with throughout my years of involvement. Among they many speakers this year is again CNN anchorwoman Betty Nguyen.

 

uNAVSA in San Jose in July

 

We just got back from DH4, VIA-1 and VASCON2, and now Vietnamese students and youths are preparing for the next conference around the corner: uNAVSA-3. Following the first conference in Boston 2004 and Chicago 2005, this year this national VSA conference will take place mid-July... in my own backyard. We expect the usual crowd of some 250 people to attend this conference and are working hard on coming up with the program, and are looking for individual and corporate sponsors.

 

VietACT simultaneous walkathons in California 

 

VietACT has been very involved in the past months bringing uNAVSA’s Relay Against Trafficking around the country to promote awareness about human trafficking. We are also narrowing down our internship application, and from what I hear, we have had some great and competitive potential interns asking to follow us to Taiwan this fall. Things are doing great, albeit that we are still seeking active leaders who can head other projects with little supervision as we are really only volunteers with full-time jobs (and gesh, there is so much to do). The two biggest things going to happen soon are two simultaneous walkathons in support for VietACT in California. On May 13^th, the SoCal team is organizing a huge Walk Against Trafficking in the streets of Little Saigon, while the NorCal team is partnering with the Human Race of Silicon Valley to raise funds and awareness for VietACT. Join me on the NorCal walk or help me fundraise $3000!

 

Labor strikes and US delegation visit to Vietnam

 

Other big headliners in the Vietnamese community these days are: Last month some 60,000 workers went on strike in Vietnam and walked out on the streets to demand fair labor practices, a right to a decent pay and improved working conditions, but most importantly a right to strike and form their own union. The reason why this event is so significant and much talked about is that it’s the first time workers across the nation has gotten together in such huge numbers to demand change and challenge the business. US House Speaker Dennis Hastert arrived in Vietnam today for a 3-day visit. Just weeks earlier, US Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez, a very vocal human rights activist from Orange County was denied a visa to visit Vietnam on her own for the fourth time by Vietnam’s Foreign Affairs Committee. As she was invited to join Dennis Hastert on the current trip instead, she turned down that invitation as that approved visa came with so many restrictions (not allowing her to meet with anyone else outside of the official government visits) that she might as well just stay in the hotel throughout her entire stay.

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Past Vietnamese Buzz entries: March 2006 February 2006 January 2006

I got involved in the fight against human trafficking after seeing Dateline NBC’s deeply disturbing documentary “Children for Sale” showing how Vietnamese children as young as eight were trafficked to Cambodia for sexual exploitation. On one of my visits to Vietnam, an English high school teacher told me about her intention to sell herself as a Vietnamese bride to Taiwan, not knowing that under the covers of these “bridal” services are often systematic human trafficking rings, with many of these “brides” being raped, beaten and denied of health services, until they end up contacting the Vietnamese NGOs operating in the host country.

 

On May 13^th 2006, I’ll be joining hundreds of other Vietnamese youths to walk in the Human Race of Silicon Valley to raise funds for the Vietnamese Alliance to Combat Human Trafficking (VietACT). My goal is to fundraise $3000 through personal donations alone. This is a rather high goal, but I believe that with this urgent issue at hand and your generous donation, I can reach this goal so that we can continue to support the Vietnamese NGOs operating in Southeast Asia as well as put an end to the root cause of this human catastrophe. To learn more about VietACT and this Relay Against Trafficking campaign, please see our press release.

 

I sincerely ask you to support me on this 5K walk by making a tax-deductible donation. Checks must be made payable to “Human Race” (the race organizers will then later dedicate the marked donations to VietACT) and be sent to me preferably before April 25^th, but definitely before May 13^th. Email me for my home address and let me know if you do not want to be listed in the donors list below. For those who are not from the United States or if you simply prefer the ease of online transactions, you can also donate by using the PayPal button above and I will write a personal check for you instead. Any donation, regardless of whether it’s $10, $25, $50 or $100 (or even more) is highly appreciated. Please also help by forwarding this website to other people.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you for your donation and support.

April 7^th 2006,

San Jose, CA

Minh T. Nguyen

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Thank you for the following sponsors who have already pledged their support
$100 and above Hai Ton, New York, NY Dong Xuyen and Michael Matsuda, Yorba Linda, CA Anonymous #2 Chau Le and Thanh Hoang, Encino, CA Hoang Tran, Richardson, TX Phu Thanh Bui, Irving, TX Elisa Yao, Sacramento, CA Dien and Phuong Le, Thousand Oaks, CA Lovely Mom and Lovely Dad, Santa Ana, CA Xuan Khuong, London, UK Anonymous #3 Anonymous #5 Phu Nguyen, Fountain Valley, CA ($200) Amy Pham, Richardson, TX Tiffany Quach, San Jose, CA Loc Nguyen, Santa Ana, CA Anonymous #9 T. Nguyen, St. Paul, MN Thao Mai and Robert Clark, Sacramento, CA Amanda Phan, Plano, TX Uyen Vu, Seattle, WA Ky Vo, Hayward, CA Jennifer Le, San Jose, CA Carl Kenner, Adelaide, Australia	$50 and above Minh Chau, Anaheim, CA Diep Doan, Houston, TX Tanya Hoang, Orange, CA Quyen Dang, Fountain Valley, CA Kim Anh Tran, Los Angeles, CA Huy Tran, Garden Grove, CA Salima Abdul, San Jose, CA Trung Quach and Nicole Nguyen, Garden Grove, CA Tuy Tam, Allen, TX Tony Ngo, Chicago, IL Nido Nguyen, Seattle, WA Anonymous #4 Albert Ngo, Irvine, CA Bich-Tuyen Tran, San Diego, CA Nguyen Hoang Thanh Tam, Sydney, Australia Ham Tran, Los Angeles, CA Anonymous #6 Hang Cam Pham, Garden Grove, CA Quynh-Dao, Seattle, WA Mai Phuong and Duc Nguyen, Napa, CA Thu Pham and Le Thiep Pham, Santa Clara, CA Paul Huynh, Arlington Heights, IL Mai Dong Thanh, Huntington Beach, CA Amy Logan, San Jose, CA Anonymous #10 Arleen Fernando, Redwood City, CA Dianne Le, Cambridge, MA Anonymous #11	Below $50 Derrill Dabkoski, Seattle, WA Quoc Phan, Elk Grove, CA Anonymous #1 Linh Nguyen, Milpitas, CA Thomas Tran, Los Angeles, CA Victoria Ha, Berkeley, CA Angela Ngo, Berkeley, CA Duy Hoang, Washington, DC Alex Ngo, Cupertino, CA Loan Le, San Jose, CA Thuc Nguyen, Chicago, IL Thanh Nguyen, San Francisco, CA Anh Thu Ho Tra, Santa Clara, CA Anne Anh Thu Kim Hoang, Santa Ana, CA Chris Lam, San Jose, CA Anonymous #8 Cuong Nguyen and Van Tran, Huntington Beach, CA Natalie Mitchell, San Jose, CA Hang Tri Tran, Lake Forest, CA Carina Ma, Berkeley, CA Anonymous #7 Vimal Ramesan and Sandhya Pillai, San Jose, CA My Tien and Hao, Oakland, CA Tin Tran, Anaheim, CA Mugdha Kulkarni, Oakland, CA Canh Nguyen, Orange Park, FL Linda Chan, San Jose, CA KimDung Nguyen, Chicago, IL

San Jose, CA – On May 13th, 2006, Vietnamese youths from many groups all over Northern California are walking at the Human Race of Silicon Valley as part of a national campaign to raise awareness and funds about the issue of human trafficking. Funds raised through the events held across the nation will be donated to the Vietnamese Alliance to Combat Trafficking (VietACT) to help the cause of eradicating human trafficking through public awareness, collaboration and advocacy.

“We hope to bring out all the VSAs (Vietnamese Student Associations) and youth organizations in Northern California to participate in this event”, says Bao T. Ngo, an active member of the United Vietnamese Student Associations of Northern California who is helping out with organizing this campaign.

“Human trafficking hurts women and children; it not only happens in Southeast Asia, but also here at home,” says Quynh Ha, a student of San Jose State University.

VietACT (Vietnamese Alliance to Combat Trafficking) was selected as this year’s beneficiary organization as part of the Collective Philanthropy Project of the Union of North American Vietnamese Student Associations (uNAVSA), an umbrella of Vietnamese Student Associations across the continent. The campaign kicked off in Minnesota in late March, continued with several fundraising events across the nation, and ends on May 13th, with two fundraising walkathons in both Northern and Southern California.

The Human Race of Silicon Valley is organized by the Volunteer Center of Silicon Valley. Started 27 years ago, the Human Race events are held throughout California, where walk/race participants fundraise money through individual pledges and then choose a registered non-profit organization they want to dedicate their funds to.

Interested participants should register with the Human Race of Silicon Valley at their website http://vcsv.us/humanrace/. Participants are encouraged to choose VietACT as the beneficiary of the race by indicating "VietACT, PO Box 218, Westminster, CA 92684" under the "Community Based Organization Receiving Pledges" heading on the registration form.

Prior to the actual race day, participants should ask for donations/pledges from family, friends, companies and other sponsors to support this cause. Checks should be made payable to "Human Race - Volunteer Center" and all donations are tax-deductible.

On the day of the event, participants should arrive by 7AM to allow for heavy traffic and parking at the event location at Charleston/Shoreline Parks/Stevens Creek Trail in Mountain View (adjacent to the Google Campus). Plenty of parking will be available at 1450 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA. Participants should first visit the registration tables to provide last-minute checks, pledge forms, pick up official Human Race t-shirts and race tags, and then should go to the VietACT booth, where all VietACT supporters will receive an additional VietACT t-shirt and will walk together as team on the 5K course.

For more registration/logistics information on VietACT’s participation in the Human Race, please visit http://www.vietact.org.

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Giới trẻ Việt Nam Silicon Valley Đoàn Kết Chống Tệ Nạn Buôn Người

San Jose, CA. Vào ngày 13 tháng 5 năm 2006, nhiều bạn trẻ người Việt tại miền Bắc California sẽ tham dự cuộc đi bộ được tổ chức tại Silicon Valley để gây sự nhận thức và gây quỹ cho việc chống lại tệ nạn buôn người. Nguồn quỹ từ những cuộc đi bộ trên toàn nước Hoa Kỳ sẽ được trao tặng lại cho tổ chức Liên Minh Người Việt Chống Tệ Nạn Buôn Người (VietACT) để dùng vào việc xoá vấn nạn buôn người qua sự giáo dục, hợp tác, và vận động lập pháp.

“Chúng tôi hy vọng các tổ chức sinh viên Việt Nam và các đoàn thể của người trẻ tại miền Bắc California sẽ tham dự vào cuộc đi bộ này.” Ngô T. Bảo, thành viên của Tổng Hội Sinh Viên miền Bắc California phát biểu.

Quỳnh Hạ, một sinh viên tại Đại Học San Jose State University phát biểu: “Nạn buôn người gây ra đau khổ cho trẻ em và phụ nữ. Vấn nạn buôn người này không chỉ xảy ra tại Đông Nam Á mà thôi nhưng thật sự đang xảy ra ngay trên đất nước Hoa Kỳ”.

Liên Minh Người Việt Chống Tệ Nạn Buôn Người (VietACT) là tổ chức phi chính phủ được chọn để nhận nguồn quỹ thu được từ dự án Collective Philanthropy Project của Liên Đoàn Sinh Viên Việt Nam Bắc Mỹ (uNAVSA). Chiến dịch gây qũy bắt đầu từ Minnesota vào cuối tháng 3, sau đó được tiếp nối qua những cuộc gây quỹ tại nhiều nơi khác. Chiến dịch gây quỹ sẽ chấm dứt vào ngày 13 tháng 5 với hai cuộc đi bộ tại miền Bắc và Nam California.

Cuộc đi bộ tại Silicon Valley được tổ chức bởi Volunteer Center of Silicon Valley. Được bắt đầu 27 năm về trước, những cuộc đi bộ được tổ chức tại nhiều nơi tại California với mục đích gây quỹ qua sự hiến tặng của nhiều cá nhân, sau đó một tổ chức vô vị lợi được trọn để nhận nguồn quỹ đã được hiến tặng.

Để tham dự vào cuộc đi bộ, xin quí vị đồng hương vui lòng ghi danh với Human Race of Silicon Valley tại trang nhà http://vcsv.us/humanrace. Xin vui lòng chọn VietACT là tổ chức được nhận quỹ từ cuộc đi bộ bằng cách điền VietACT là “beneficiary” ở phần Community base organization receiving pledges với địa chỉ: VietACT, Po Box 218 Westminster, CA 92684.

Truớc ngày tham dự cuộc đi bộ, người tham dự đi bộ hãy xin sự hiến tặng tiền từ gia đình, bạn bè, công ty, và những nhà bảo trợ muốn bảo trợ công tác từ thiện này. Trên chi phiếu xin đề: Human Race Volunteer Center. Mọi sự hiến tặng có thể trừ thuế được.

Trong ngày đi bộ, xin quí vị nên đến lúc 7 giờ sáng để tránh bị kẹt xe trên xa lộ vì giao thông và để có chỗ đậu xe. Cuộc đi bộ được tổ chức tại Charleston/Shoreline Park/Stevens Creek Trail. Sẽ có nhiều chỗ đậu xe tại 1450 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA. Người tham dự đi bộ cần nghi danh trước để nhận các hướng dẫn và áo T-shirt và sau đó xin đến quầy của VietACT. Những người đi bộ để ủng hộ VietACT sẽ nhận được thêm một áo T-shirt, và mọi người sẽ đi cùng đi bộ chung.

Để biết thêm chi tiết, xin vui lòng thăm trang nhà của VietACT: http://www.vietact.org.

Join us this year for our Third Annual uNAVSA Conference hosted by the Union of North American Vietnamese Student Associations (uNAVSA, you know!) and the United Vietnamese Student Associations of Northern California (UVSA representin!) reaching out to U and your youth organization anywhere all over the continent! Following this year’s theme,{In Common Unity building local power} we’ll focus on helping local leaders network effectively, share resources, and collaborate on common philanthropy projects to inspire progressive change within the community.

• Building Leadership
• Recruiting & Retaining Membership
• Running Effective Meetings and Retaining Membership
• Marketing, Advertising, Fundraising, and Budgeting
• Working with Nonprofit Organizations
• Pan-Asian Coalitions: Why & How Should Vietnamese American Groups Broaden Out? What Lessons Can We Learn From History?
• Enjoy (off the hook!) Live Performances
• Issues affecting our community and how we can overcome them together.

date	july 13–16, 2006
location	san josé state university
registration	www.uNAVSA.org
contact	Huy.Tran@uNAVSA.org
blogring	@xanga
myspace	myspace.com/uNAVSA

I finished reading Thomas Friedman’s “The World is Flat” on my flight back from VASCON2 last weekend. It’s a very interesting read for the first half and made me go “whoa, this is soo cool.” Though the second half of the book is rather random and boring. Anyways, starting your own IT business? Read that book, so you can ask yourself as well “how cool is that?” Beep. Father Hung from VMWBO in Taiwan called me two times already and is asking for my next long-promised VietACT/VMBWO slideshow. When someone as important as Father Hung calls you personally from another country TWICE, and you still have to admit to him that you haven’t started on the work, you are really a slacker. How embarrassing is that? Beep. My parents spent several days in Vegas last week to celebrate my Dad’s 60^th birthday. They lost money left and right and went to see Cirque Du Soleil. My parents spending time together in Vegas? I guess whatever happens there, stays there. How cute is that? Beep. At my piano teacher’s request I started to transcribe some of my random piano compositions. Last week marked the very first time in my life I notated my composition on sheet music with dotted notes, time signature, measures, bars, dynamics, chords, crecendos, etc. How neat is that? Beep. My The Economist subscription has expired for several months now, but they continue to send me the magazine (even though I barely find time to read it). Anyways, I’ve fallen through the cracks, haha. How sweet is that? Beep.

Date Posted: 3/31/2006

Over 300 Students From Across the Country Gathered in Austin, TX to Discuss Human Trafficking, Human Rights, Film & Education

Austin, Texas – Last weekend, March 24 thru 26, 2006, over 300 undergraduate and graduate students from across the country attended the 2nd Vietnamese-American Student Conference known as VASCON 2 in Austin, Texas.

Students came from all over the country including California, Colorado, Connecticut, Virginia, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Texas.

The purpose of the conference was to inspire and empower its participants to get involved and make a contribution to build a stronger Vietnamese-American community. The conference program included a variety of speakers from diverse backgrounds and professions ranging from entertainment to human rights activism. Speakers included Journey from the Fall director Hàm Tr?n, Garden Grove School Board Member Nguy?n-Lâm Kim Oanh, Texas Representative Hubert Võ, two of the highest ranking Vietnamese Americans in elected office, and Reverend Nguy?n Van Cu?ng from Vietnamese Migrant Workers and Brides Office in Taiwan.

Specifically, this year human trafficking of Vietnamese women and children was a key focus of the conference. A keynote address, a panel discussion, and table display were dedicated to this important topic. Reverend Nguy?n Van Cu?ng addressed human trafficking in Taiwan as the keynote speaker during the Saturday morning session. He currently serves as the Associate Executive Director of Vietnamese Migrant Workers & Brides Office (VMWBO) and currently works full time with Reverend Peter Nguy?n Van Hùng to deliver much needed services to Vietnamese migrant workers and Vietnamese brides in Taiwan.

The Vietnamese Alliance to Combat Trafficking (VietACT) participated in a panel discussion entitled “Human Trafficking: Awareness to Action.” Kim Chi Nguyen, VietACT San Diego Representative and Coordinator of the uNAVSA National Relay Against Trafficking presented specific actions that can be taken by individuals and groups in the efforts to fight human trafficking. Also participating in the panel were Reverend Nguy?n Van Cu?ng, Nhà Magazine staff writer and women’s rights activist Lê Anh Ðào and Phoebe Lin, chair of the UT Anti-Human Trafficking Campaign. Ð? Lê Anh Ðào has recently written articles in Nhà Magazine on human trafficking of Vietnamese victims.

Conference participates were also able to stop by a VietACT table with brochures, slideshows, photo collages and sign-up sheets. Minh T. Nguyen, VietACT San Jose Representative, was also on-site to promote awareness and action and the ongoing National Relay Against Trafficking campaign. He says, “I think it’s amazing that so many students want to get involved with the fight against human trafficking. During Father Cuong’s presentation on the current situation in Taiwan, so many attendees were asking what they can do, and how VietACT comes into play, and we had to point out that we have an entire panel dedicated to this in the afternoon.”

Hai Ton, one of the coordinators of the upcoming uNAVSA conference in July, adds to that "I thought it was a great opportunity to raise awareness and advocacy towards combating human trafficking amongst the next generation of Vietnamese American leaders." Hai expects to see high attendance at the upcoming conference in July, as human trafficking will continued to be addressed there as well.
 
The first Relay Against Trafficking event took place in Minnesota in early March. The next Relay Against Trafficking event will be held in Austin, Texas. Local student leaders and community groups will be organizing a Human Trafficking Awareness Week from April 24 to 26, 2006.  Other events will continue through June in Washington DC, Southern California, North California, Atlanta, Boston, and Vancouver, Canada.

For more information on VietACT’s Relay Against Trafficking campaign, please visit www.vietact.org or www.unavsa.org.

####

XIN PHỔ BIẾN

Ngày 30 tháng 3 năm 2006
Liên Lạc:

Nguyen Kim Chi (714) 797-1923



Trên 300 Sinh Viên Việt Nam Khắp Hoa Kỳ Tụ Họp tại Austin, Texas để Thảo Luận về Vấn Nạn Buôn Người, Nhân Quyền, Giáo Dục và Phim Ảnh

Austin, Texas – Vào cuối tuần vừa qua, ngày 24 đến 26 tháng 3 năm 2006, trên 300 sinh viên từ toàn quốc Hoa Kỳ đã về tham dự Đại Hội Sinh Viên Người Mỹ Gốc Việt kỳ II (VASCON 2) tại Austin, Texas. Các sinh viên này đến từ California, Colorado, Connecticut, Virginia, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Texas.

Mục đích của Đại Hội là để khuyến khích các tham dự viên tích cực tham gia đóng góp xây dựng một cộng đồng người Mỹ gốc Việt vững mạnh. Chương trình Đại Hội gồm có phần trình bày của nhiều diễn giả từ nhiều ngành nghề và lãnh vực khác nhau, từ văn nghệ giải trí đến đấu tranh nhân quyền. Thành phần diễn giả gồm có đạo diễn phim Vượt Sóng Hàm Trần, Thành Viên Hội Đồng Học Khu Garden Grove Nguyễn-Lâm Kim-Oanh, Dân Biểu Tiểu Bang Texas Hubert Võ - một trong hai người Mỹ gốc Việt với chức vụ dân cử cao nhất tại Hoa Kỳ, và Linh Mục Nguyễn Hùng Cường, từ văn phòng Công Nhân Lao Động và Cô Dâu Việt Nam tại Đài Loan (VMWBO).

Năm nay, nội dung then chốt của Đại Hội là vấn nạn buôn bán phụ nữ và trẻ em Việt Nam. Bài diễn văn chính cùng với một cuộc hội thảo và những trưng bày triển lãm đã được dành riêng cho vấn đề này. Linh Mục Nguyễn Hùng Cường, trong bài diễn văn chính vào sáng thứ Bảy, đã trình bày về vấn nạn buôn người tại Đài Loan. LM Cường hiện nay là Phó Giám Đốc Điều Hành văn phòng VMWBO and đang cộng tác toàn thời với Linh Mục Nguyễn Văn Hùng để mang dịch vụ cần thiết đến cho các công nhân lao động và cô dâu Việt Nam tại Đài Loan.

Liên Minh Người Việt Chống Tệ Nạn Buôn Người, tức tổ chức VietACT, đã góp phần tham dự trong buổi hội thảo với chủ đề “Buôn Người: Từ Ý Thức Đến Hành Động.” Cô Nguyễn Kim Chi, đại diện của VietACT San Diego kiêm Điều Hợp Viên của chiến dịch Relay Against Trafficking do Liên Hội Sinh Viên Việt Nam Bắc Mỹ Châu (uNAVSA) chủ động, đã trình bày về những hành động cụ thể mà mỗi các nhân hay đoàn thể có thể làm được để góp phần trong nỗ lực chấm dứt tệ nạn buôn người. Chủ tọa đoàn trong buổi hội thảo còn có Linh Mục Nguyễn Văn Cường, phóng viên Nhà Magazine và nhà đấu tranh cho quyền phụ nữ Đỗ Lê Anh Đào, và trưởng ban tổ chức Chiến Dịch Chống Tệ Nạn Buôn Người Đại Học Texas, cô Phoebe Lin. Riêng phóng viên Đỗ Lê Anh Đào đã có những bài viết về tệ nạn buôn người và các nạn nhân người Việt Nam được đăng trên Nhà Magazine trong thời gian vừa qua.

Tham dự viên Đại Hội cũng đã có cơ hội để ghé qua bàn triển lãm của tổ chức VietACT và xem qua các tài liệu, slideshow, và hình ảnh liên hệ cũng như điền phiếu ghi danh. Anh Nguyễn Trí Minh, đại diện của VietACT San Jose, cũng có mặt để kêu gọi sự ý thức và hành động cũng như quảng bá chiến dịch Relay Against Trafficking. Theo lời anh, “Thật là một điều đáng quý khi thấy rất nhiều người trẻ muốn đóng góp và cuộc chiến chống lại tệ nạn buôn người. Trong phần trình bày của cha Cường về hiện trạng Đài Loan, đã có rất nhiều bạn trẻ đưa câu hỏi họ có thể giúp bằng cách nào, vai trò của VietACT ra sao, và chúng tôi đã phải nhắc các bạn rằng sẽ có một chủ tọa đoàn thảo luận riêng về vấn đề này vào buổi trưa hôm đó.”

Sinh hoạt đầu tiên trong chiến dịch Relay Against Trafficking vừa diễn ra và đầu tháng ba tại Minnesota. Sinh hoạt kế tiếp sẽ diễn ra tại Austin, Texas. Các lãnh đạo của giới sinh viên địa phương cũng như các đoàn thể trong cộng đồng sẽ tổ chức Tuần Lễ Ý Thức về Tệ Nạn Buôn Người từ ngày 24 đến 26 tháng 4 năm 2006. Các sinh hoạt khác sẽ tiếp tục từ nay đến tháng 6 tại các địa điểm Washington DC, Nam Cali, Bắc Cali, Atlanta, Boston, và Vancouver, Canada.

Theo anh Hải Tôn, đồng trưởng ban tổ chức Đại Hội Liên Hội Sinh Viên Việt Nam Bắc Mỹ, “VASCON vừa rồi là cơ hội tốt để giới trẻ Việt Nam tìm hiểu và tham gia chống tệ nạn buôn người.” Anh Hải cho biết, Đại Hội Liên Hội Sinh Viện Việt Nam sẽ được tổ chức vào tháng 7 và sẽ tiếp tục khuyên khích giới trẻ Việt Nam tham gia chống nạn buôn bán trẻ em và phụ nữ Việt Nam.

Để biết thêm chi tiết về chiến dịch Relay Against Trafficking, xin ghé thăm trang nhà www.vietact.org hoặc www.unavsa.org.

Le Van Kiet's Dust of Life will show tomorrow, March 30th, 2006 at the AMC at The Block in Orange. Tickets are available online.

Ham Tran's Journey from the Fall (which recently won Audience Award at the San Francisco International Asian Film Festival) is showing at the following festivals. Be sure to attend, bring a box of tissue paper and vote for Audience Award there, too. :)

Florida Film Festival
Maitland, FL
March 25th, 6pm at Enzian
March 31st, 3:45pm at Regal

Newport Beach Film Festival
Newport Beach, CA
April 21st, 8pm
April 23rd, 4pm
Edwards Fashion Island Cinema

Visual Communications Film Festival
Los Angeles, CA
May 4th (Opening Night)
Director's Guild of America

Journey from the Fall will also show in Italy next month at another film festival. More info to be posted soon.

DEADLINE FOR THE 2006 VietACT SUMMER INTERNSHIP PROGRAM IN TAIWAN IS QUICKLY APPROACHING
Date Posted: 3/28/2006

For Immediate Release Contact: Tram Tran
March 28, 2006 ngoctramtran@gmail.com

Westminster, CA – The deadline for VietACT’s 2006 Summer Internship Program in Taiwan is THIS Friday, March 31, 2006. This is an exciting opportunity for students and professionals of various disciplines to gain hands-on experience and learn more about the issue of human trafficking.

Interns will work at the Vietnamese Brides & Migrant Workers Office (VBMWO) in Taiwan for ten (10) weeks during the summer months (May-August or June-September) of 2006. Selected VietACT Interns placed in Taiwan will participate in research, case studies, case work, writing projects, and advocacy.

The Vietnamese Alliance to Combat Human Trafficking (VietACT) is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to eradicating human trafficking of Vietnamese victims through collaboration, advocacy, and education, for the purpose of supporting, protecting and empowering victims. Current VietACT activities include raising public awareness through community presentations, media outreach, and networking with established NGOs in the U.S. and throughout Asia. VietACT’s current 2005-06 focus is on the plight of over 100,000 Vietnamese brides and 90,000 Vietnamese migrant workers in Taiwan, many of whom have been trafficked and/or enslaved. VietACT is currently supporting the Vietnamese Brides and Migrant Worker’s Office (VBMWO), headed by Reverend Peter Hung Van Nguyen, which runs an emergency shelter. Reverend Hung, also a founder member of the VietACT Board of Directors, has been working in Taiwan for over a decade, assisting impoverished and underserved locals as well as new immigrants and migrants.

The application process is a simple but extremely competitive process. VietACT will only select a limited number of qualified and dedicated students or recent graduates to participate in this exciting and educational opportunity. The deadline for applications is THIS Friday, March 31, 2006. To apply, please send an application (available at www.vietact.org), resume and cover letter to:

VietACT Internship Program
P.O. Box 218
Westminster, CA 92684

Please direct any questions to Tram Tran at ngoctramtran@gmail.com.

I spent the weekend in Austin, Texas to attend VASCON2, the annual Vietnamese youth conference in the south. Originally, I was actually not intending to attend the conference, but I’ve been asked to go there to represent and promote Lenduong as well as VietACT, since I am so heavily involved in both of them. VASCON2 was a blast for me, because this is the very first time for me to attend a Vietnamese conference, where I truly did not have to work behind-the-scenes or give any presentation that I need to prepare for. As a result, I actually got to attend all workshops to my likings, learned a few new things here and there, and got to network with more Vietnamese-people-that-you-should-know-if-you-work-in-the-community. Outside of the workshops, I had pure joy meeting so many of my old friends again. It was a reunion with UVSA staff, VPS Dallas members, SoCal friends, DH4 veterans, uNAVSA attendees and Vietnam Freedom March participants, and getting drunk and clubbing with them until the wee hours was just hella fun.

 

Other things that emerged this weekend to note

-         Ham Tran’s Journey from the Fall won the Audience Award at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival. How cool is that? I offered Ham my help to maintaining the Journey from the Fall website, which has been frustratingly dead for the longest time. Certain things I can’t say No too. This is one of them.

-         uNAVSA came out of DH3 because we started talking about establishing a national VSA during that conference in San Diego, but I didn’t know that VASCON came out of DH3 as well! VASCON brainchild Kym Pham attended DH3, was inspired by it and when she returned to Texas she wanted to organize something similar like that in the south as well and so VASCON was born.

-         Kim Chi’s “touching” exercise on Sunday (where people were able to express their appreciation for someone in an anonymous manner) was probably the most touching and moving bonding exercise I’ve ever encountered at these kinda workshops. I thought that that combined with Mike Vu and Vu Dinh’s great work during the closing ceremony was one of the highlights of the conference!

-         Since the power went out in a large segment of the city during my spiel about Lenduong, I would like to repeat the info here: the Fifth International Vietnamese Youth Conference will take place in June 2007 in South East Asia. We’ve narrowed down the location to Malaysia, Indonesia or Thailand, and yes, it’s not a typo, the conference is indeed in June 2007, so better start saving vacation days and money now. Click here to see the slideshow that I meant to show and be sure to visit www.lenduong.net or www.sydney2005.net to learn more about Lenduong and its past conferences.

-         VASCON was one of the most professionally organized student-run conferences I’ve ever attended. From the logistics, the email updates, to the venues, and hospitality of the local group, I am very impressed at how professionally everything was organized. It really puts the logistics of Lenduong’s biannual conference to shame, hahaha. Kudos to Nam Nguyen, Kym Pham, Frank Le, Judy Feng… and everyone else involved in the planning and execution of this great conference. I am looking forward to welcome you all to San Jose at uNAVSA-3.

Oh my god, a second blog entry from Minh in the wee early hours. It's 2:51am, I was about to go to sleep, but was still browsing though my daily websites, and bam, there it is: the second DaVinci Code Trailer just went online:

http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/thedavincicode/

Audrey Tautou is cute! Guess what I will be doing May 19th 2006. :)

So I returned today to the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival to see “Journey from the Fall” at the Palace of Fine Arts. This is my fourth time watching the movie (and I finally managed not to cry, haha). As noted so many times before, I think it’s one of the most touching and moving films about Vietnam I’ve ever seen. “Journey from the Fall” is such a groundbreaking movie that touches upon father-son, mother-son, mother-grandmother relationships, while telling the story of a family being separated after the Fall of Saigon, the boat people and reeducation-camp experience and the life of Vietnamese immigrants growing up in America.

This is a story that needs to be told to the American mainstream, as no other movie has ever touched upon these topics before. The movie is so well done: from cinematography, to the heartbreaking script, to the touching performances by Diem Liem and add to that Cristopher Wong’s tragic, but beautiful score, and you end up with an independent masterpiece that easily compares to Schindler’s List or Hotel Rwanda.

I still get tons of emails from random people asking about the release of this movie, so I'll repeat it again here: I am sorry, I don't have any information when the movie will be released to the theaters. Last that I heard, director Ham Tran is still looking for a distributor, and we would want this movie to be released on an national and international level, not only into the niche inside the Vietnamese community. No, I don't know about the DVD release yet, because frankly, the movie needs to come out into the theaters first! Read/listen to this interview I did a while back with Ham Tran to find out more about this. I should have more info to blog about, when I get to see him again this weekend at VASCON2 in Texas.

So, I went to the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival again today to see a series of shorts about familial, romantic and/or communal bounds in a segment called “Lost and Bound”. Nine independent shorts produced/acted by Asian Americans were in this segment: Keun-Pyo Park’s “Wake”, Hung P. Nguyen’s “Her Love/Life”, Ted Chung’s “Passages”, Samuel Kiehoon Lee’s “5 x 90: The Wake”, David Estrada’s “Tears in the Rain”, Daniel Mulloy’s “Sister”, Taika Waititi’s “Sons of Tu” and Tak Hoon Kim’s “Public Bath”.

 

I liked the following shorts the most:

 

“Sons of Tu” presenting six soldiers entertaining themselves through silent jokes, faces, all while waiting in complete silence in a war-ruined home for their turn in the war. Comedy is contrasted to the eminent death of war.

 

In “Tears in the Rain” a pair of conjoined twins is separated after an operation, and we witness how one of them is exploring life for the very first time. Like an alien to this world, she wanders in and around the hospital alone, witnessing life, people, and tears in the rain as she comes back to the hospital to look into her twin’s face for the very first time.

 

In “Sister”, we encounter a Chinese teenager adopted by a UK-family being outcast on a school bus and bullied by Caucasian kids, and the only person who stands up for him is his younger (Caucasian) sister, who he in return protects.

 

Ah… I love independent shorts. Albeit that it takes me a while to understand some of them, it’s always a fun watch. Next up: “Journey from the Fall” this Thursday at the festival’s closing gala! Let's see if it wins the Juried Competition or Audience Award!

So my family returned to the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival yesterday to see Vu Thu Ha’s world premiere of “Kieu” starring Kathy Uyen Nguyen and Cristopher Dinh. It’s an independent, artsy adaptation of Vietnam’s famous epic nineteenth-century poem The Tale of Kieu, placing Kieu as an oriental masseuse repaying her parents’ debt in modern-day San Francisco. The movie overall was pretty interesting. It’s an art movie, so if slow scenes, poetic voice-overs and repeating flashbacks that at first don’t make sense to you are things you usually don’t like in films, then “Kieu” is not the movie for you. However, while I think that some of the conversations don’t always seem very natural to me, I think that the movie shines on two points: cinematography and music.

 

As for cinematography, the film doesn’t stand out for any stunning, panoramic and moving shots (for that kinda cinematography, look at Minh Nguyen-Vo’s jaw-dropping Buffalo Boy), but rather for its numerous extreme close-up shots by cinematographer Carla Roley and director Vu Thu Ha. Even the movie’s very first shot shows Kieu’s face as an extreme close-up from a rather unusual angle, focusing our eyes on Kieu’s left face. Throughout the movie, we have this close “macro-vision” on things like a single match burning up incense, Kieu placing layers of salad into the pot or watering the plants and many other close-up shots. I happen to love those close-up shots, and after the Q&A with the cast and crew I got to chat with Carla a bit, who told me that while these close-ups reflects her style and sensibility, she has worked closely with the director on the visual approaches that ultimately end up on the screen). I also really liked the way things on the screen go in and out of focus, not so because the camera lenses readjust their focal point, but more so simply by the way the characters walk closer or further away from the camera. This combined with the music often gives the movie dreamlike sequences.

 

As for the music, well, I think it’s the music used in the trailer that gave this movie this intriguing feel to it, prompting me to pre-purchase tickets to this sold-out show weeks in advance. As I was driving home from work the other day, I happened to listen into a NPR-interview with Kieu’s numerous writers promoting the movie, and they played the Kieu soundtrack again there. I generally don’t like classical music as much as film music (yes, there’s a huge difference), but Kieu’s original soundtrack composed and performed by Q String Quartet is classical in nature but gives the movie the intriguing and dream-like undertone similar to the same effect we see so well perfected with Wong Kar Wai’s “In the mood for Love”.

 

While Kieu might not blow your socks off, it’s definitely a movie worth watching. Cristopher Dinh plays the role of the shy, introverted Vietnamese male counterpart to Kathy Nguyen so well, that I was very surprised to see the actor being so young and “Vietnamese Americanized” in real life in contrast. Director Vu Thu Ha explains that her work for the movie really has just began with the world premiere, as she is now starting an outreach program to show the movie to the many women in the massage parlor business (who the crew have interviewed and consulted in preparation for the movie).

My family went to the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival today to see Duki Dror's film "The Journey of Vaan Nguyen" which documents a Vietnamese Israeli's family as it returns to Vietnam after living in the refugee community in Israel for the longest time. We follow Vaan Nguyen as she accompanies her father back to Vietnam to reclaim land that their ancestors once owned, meet old friends, relatives and even government officials. The documentary itself starts out a bit disordered – one isn’t really sure what this documentary is about or what the main themes are, and even after the (rather abrupt) ending, I wasn’t quite sure what the documentary actually wants to say.

Nevertheless, it’s an interesting documentary that reminded me a bit of my childhood in Germany, where meeting Asians alone in the streets is already an intriguing incident by itself (let alone meeting Vietnamese people). However, it’s interesting to know that you can always find Vietnamese people anywhere on this globe, even in the most remote areas.

I couldn’t help but draw comparisons with Andrew Pham’s “Catfish and Mandala” that I finally finished today. Both stories juxtaposition scenes of the exodus of a Vietnamese family during the fall of our country and their return to the modern-day homeland as foreigners in a strange land. I call the alienating experience of Vietnamese diasporas returning to Vietnam as the Viet Kieu Experience, and I think everyone growing up in the Western world have to go through that dreadful experience once. Vaan Nguyen’s family is attempting to rebuild a new life in Vietnam, and it will be interesting to see a sequel/follow-up on this family in a few years.

The more I watch these movies and read novels from Vietnam, the more and more am I dreaming and thinking of returning to Vietnam again. Nha Magazine recently had an article on young Viet Kieu like me returning to Vietnam to start small businesses there. Wouldn’t that be cool?

Tomorrow, the 24^th San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival will kick off with a range of some very intriguing films. I already purchased a series of tickets to their showings, and yesterday even received an email from the organizers that I also won an additional pair of tickets to the closing gala featuring Ham Tran’s Journey from the Fall due to my support of the festival trough my blogging (never mind that I already bought six tickets to the closing gala, and that I’ve seen Journey three times already, but oh well).

 

My close friends know that I never watch TV, but instead watch independent movies in the theaters and on DVD instead. Hollywood just gets boring after a while, and Indies are simply much more thought-provoking, intriguing and have a sense of art you seldom see in mainstream Hollywood. Deliberately avoiding mainstream movies, here’s the list of my favorite underdogs in no particular order that I recommend everyone to watch (or at least click through below to see the trailer)

 

·        Elephant

o       Gus Van Sant’s capturing life in American High School

·        Russian Ark

o       Russian history in one, continuous, single camera shot

·        Maria Full of Grace

o       Very disturbing story about drug-trafficking moles in Mexico

·        Hotel Rwanda

o       True story of an ordinary man saving thousands of lives during the Rwanda massacre (I’ve seen this movie at the Amnesty International Film Festival in Seattle and got to meet Paul Rusesabagina himself there, pretty inspiring)

·        Sky Blue

o       Korean love-story in an action-filled science fiction animation

·        Saving Face

o       Comedy about two Asian lesbians and their pregnant mother

·        Run Lola Run

o       Fast-paced MTV-style cinematographic movie about Lola running (and much more of course)

·        Better Luck Tomorrow

o       Smart Asian Americans in suburbia Los Angeles seek thrills through violence and other means

·        Journey from the Fall

o       Ham Tran’s groundbreaking movie about the exodus of Vietnamese boat people after the war and the reeducation camp experience

·        Three Seasons

o       Tony Bui’s artful masterpiece of a series of Vietnamese individuals living in modern-day Vietnam and being stuck between the two seasons/classes

·        Nobody Knows

o       Coming-of-age story of a Japanese boy learning to take care of his family when her mother is not

·        Fahrenheit 9/11

o       Michael Moore’s controversial, shocking, funny documentary about George W. Idiot

·        Bowling for Columbine

o       Michael Moore’s provocative documentary on gun control

·        City of God

o       Very well-done, fast-paced and extremely disturbing movie/documentary of the violent neighborhoods of Rio de Janeiro

I’ll be joining a few other Microsoft Berkeley alumni to present some of our work at the UC Berkeley Computer Science & Business Association 4^th Annual Technology Expo 2006. The event will take place Thursday, March 16^th, 2006 from 11am – 4pm at the Pauley Ballroom at UC Berkeley, where my co-worker and I will demo some of our recent work on Microsoft TV (Foundation Edition and IPTV). I’ve primarily worked on Foundation Edition 1.9 which we will be releasing this year and recently started work on some UI-prototyping for IPTV 2.0. Several other Cal alumni will show their work on PocketPC, SmartPhones and Windows Live Mail, so be sure to swing by and check out our very cool products.

GO BEARS!

A featurette of Le Van Kiet’s upcoming coming-of-age movie Dust of Life has been posted on the official movie website. The movie will have its first pre-screening at end of this month in Orange County. Wanna see the USC documentary this movie is loosely based on? See http://asianamericanmedia.org/buidoi/index.html. Speaking of movies, Ham Tran’s Journey from the Fall will be shown during the closing gala of next week’s San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival. Be there to meet the crew, the cast or simply see the most ground-breaking movie the world of Vietnamese cinema has produced in recent years.

VietACT is gearing up full steam. The human-trafficking awareness campaign Relay Against Trafficking will kick off in Minnesota March 17^th at the Vietnamese Interacting as One conference, stop by in Austin TX, where we’ll present at VASCON2, and then go all over the nation (with a stop here in San Jose on June 10^th and a big walkathon in Little Saigon on May 13^th 2006). Check the VietACT website for the full national campaign dates. In addition, VietACT’s internship program deadline is in three weeks on March 31^st. This is a great opportunity to volunteer in Taiwan with the Vietnamese Migrant Workers & Brides Office. Hey, check out UCSD student Kevin Le’s work on a human trafficking newsletter for his Asian American Studies class. Impressive, ey? Fellas, VietACT is growing at a faster rate than we can actually handle it, and we really need more help with active leaders who can take more ownership of projects. We are running very thin on volunteer staff. If you can actively help out, please join our efforts.

After several years of great campaigning Young Australian of the Year Hoi Trinh managed to get the vast majority of the 2000 stateless Vietnamese Filipino out of there. Listen to the NPR Morning Edition story Vietnamese Refugees Finish Long Journey to U.S.

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Past Vietnamese Buzz entries: February 2006 January 2006

You know how parents always send pictures of their newly born babies around or brag about how cute their children are and post pictures of them all over their blogs and e-cards, etc? Something tells me that I don't think I will be much different. Darn.

	Charlie with his “so, what? You have a problem that I sleep on here?“ look
	Charlie prevents me from brushing my teeth in the morning
	Charlie and Annie hide under the bed when strangers come to my place
	Annie takes a nap. Cats always sleep ... pretty much all day. Only Koala bears are lazier.
	Charlie sleeping stress-free on the couch.
	“Hm... what's this?“
	“Can I touch it?“
	“Oops.. did I do that?“
	My cats go crazy for thịt chà bông. Ahh.... that's the Vietnamese spirit!
	Charlie attempts to play Canon in D on my piano.
	Ah... Minh's coming home.
	Cats always love to sit on laptops because it's warm... so if you ever chat with me on AIM and sometimes get weird messages like “aiiiiiiiikkkkkkkkkkk2222u“ you know who's typing.
	Annie rests her head on my arm, while I work on the computer
	Charlie plays dead.
	Charlie and Annie are guarding my couch.
	“I am the king of the world“
	Annie (when she was young) hides in a plastic bag.
	Annie sleeps tight.
	So, did I mention that I am cat lover?

This is long overdue, but I've finally updated my stupid PhotoResizer program with the two requests that most people have asked for the most. The 1.2 update has the following two new features:

A) You can now drag a folder over the area, and it will resize all files within that folder. No folder-recursion.
B) You can now specify the JPEG compression ratio, which defaults to 90.

Thanks for Martjan den Hoed from the Netherlands for some of his suggestions and his Dutch version (which I assume he will update for 1.2 version soon).

Enjoy,
Minh T. Nguyen.

PS: For those who are awaiting the new Vietnamese Conversions to go out of its rich-text-editor beta stage, hang in there. Besides a bug that I still have to fix, I've received an additional request to add Unicode->Vietnet/VIQR conversion. I already know how to do it, I just need to find the time to implement it some time this month.

---

Name	:	PhotoResizer
Version	:	1.2
Requirement	:	.NET Framework 1.1
Size	:	6kb
Download	:	Binary executable - Source code - Dutch Version
License	:	Freeware/OpenSource

This is a very simple utility to allow you to batch-resize digital photos. You simply indicate your maximum width or height in pixels and drag and drop your picture files onto the window. The program will then batch-resize all pictures into a subfolder.

“Thank you for applying to the Computer Science Master's Program at Stanford University.  The MS Admissions Committee has reviewed your application and I am sorry to inform you that the committee did not recommend you for admission.”

Hm… I received an extremely high score on my GRE exam, had very good letters of recommendation from a diverse set of respectable people, and my application is very solid in nearly all aspects and exemplifies a lot of qualities that I deem Stanford to be interested in. So, yes, I am perplexed at my rejection.

However, since I am determined to start my master’s degree this year, I will continue to pursue this goal, and will meet with Stanford to find out why my application is rejected and appeal the rejection.

When Japanese film composer Kitaro delivered his score for Oliver Stone’s 1993 Vietnam drama "Heaven and Earth", I was immediately mesmerized when I saw the movie on the big screen. The opening sequence alone with the cinematographic shots of the rice fields as it moves against the wind combined with the incredibly majestic music is just breathtaking, earning Kitaro his first Golden Globe for Best Original Score.

I’ve been listening to this moving album a lot lately, and after several weeks of experimentation, I’ve come up with a piano-adaptation of the theme that appears in the end title of the album. Listen to the original theme here:

Right-click here to download

And the following is what I arranged out of that. Please note that my arrangement is a loose adaptation with a few notes being purposely different than what you find on the album. Sure, a bit repetitive, but this is just an experiment for now. I’ll deliver my own full-length award-winning score in nine years. ;-)  (okay, Minh, keep on dreaming).

Right-click here to download

This weekend I received in the mail my sixth copy of the August 1977 issue of the Science Fiction/Science Fact magazine Analog which holds the first true appearance of Orson Scott Card’s story Ender’s Game that earned him the many literature awards when he expanded the short story into the 1985 novel.

The short story (which is by the way fully accessible over at the official homepage at hatrack.com) is by far not good as the entire Ender quartet novel, so for those who haven’t read the full novel series, please don’t judge the Enderverse by these 33 pages.

Why do I collect these? Well, for one, I am huge Ender’s Game for many reasons, partly for I identified with Ender as the child outcast who was bullied for being smart, but more so because I idolize Ender, for he is the brainchild, community leader, friend, the family father and husband, the person I always strive to be, especially when I go through hardships in my life.

Of course, I also collect these as I intend to resell these hard-to-find collectible items at ridiculous prices when the Ender’s Game enthusiasm peaks when the movie comes out in 3-4 years, cough, cough, cough. However, if anyone is willing to shell me big $$$ now, I’ll be happy to negotiate (insert evil grin here).

Score Corner: John Williams Munich and his 6^th Oscar potential

 

So, I saw Steven Spielberg’s Munich this weekend, and without having read the book and history that this movie is based upon, I couldn’t fully understand all that transpired in this rather long movie with all the politics. Regardless, one part of me wanting to see this movie was more due to the good reviews that I have read about John William’s fourth score this year. John Williams’ dark score to Munich resembles that of his Schindler’s List with a slight flair of James Horner’s Troy (given the Middle-eastern vocals that remind me of Troy’s Greek vocals). Some pieces of this album could easily be put on the Schindler’s List album without raising an eye-brow for those unfamiliar with his previous work, for the score also uses a lot of tragic string segments in addition to cello and piano solos. However, what really got me into buying the CD after coming out of the movie, is that addictive, pulsating, low-tone, electric drum-beat that John Williams has added throughout the album (and throughout the movie). You’ll hear the beat already with the opening sequence of the movie, and it’ll follow you as you find protagonist Avner go down his hitlist. Very tense, very exciting.

 

With Williams completing the Star Wars saga, delivering a rather disappointing score to War of the Worlds, a good soundtrack to Munich and an amazing score to Memoirs of a Geisha all within this year-where does this lead us? Well, John Williams earned his 44^th and 45^th Oscar nomination with Geisha and Munich, but this time he might actually win an Oscar for a change. Williams has been nominated for the Oscar pretty much every year since he received his last Oscar in 1994 for Schindler's List and this is not the first time that he is being nominated twice in the same year, but with already five Oscars in his hands, no one really expects him to win anything (heck, last year he wasn't even in the audience, but was conducting the Academy Awards orchestra himselfs during his own nomination). However, this year might be different, for I truly think that Geisha is nothing short of a masterpiece, and the other three nominated scores didn't make a splash this year in the filmmusic industry. We shall see the results in two weeks.

 

Gay Indies: Brokeback Mountain, Saving Face

 

Gay indies? No, not what you think of. I am talking about independent movies about homosexuality. I saw Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain a few weeks ago, and I think it’s groundbreaking, it’s beautiful, it's a great script, and it's a remarkable job done by director Ang Lee. I can’t believe this comes from the same guy who did Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. I highly recommend this movie to everyone.

 

So after seeing Ang Lee’s story about two gay cowboys, I figure to balance things out, I picked as the next movie from my indy-list Alice Wu’s comedy Saving Face about two Asian lesbians, a 40-something year old pregnant mother and … well.... I shall save you guys from the intricacies of this movie's story. While I think the dialogue in this movie is not very well scripted, it’s a very funny comedy that makes fun of everything we love so much about Chinese parents (and probably Vietnamese ones as well) and their foolish match-making attempts and obsession about saving face within a given community. It's a fun watch, go see it.

VietACT Website

 

It’s alliiiivee. After promising the folks at VietACT a new website for almost an entire year, I’ve finally gotten my ACT together (no pun intended) and worked on a complete revamp of the website. Well, after working on this for the past 12 consecutive days, I am proud to announce that the new website finally went up today. Sure, it is still lacking a lot of content, but we hope to fill it up soon. Stay tuned for VietACT's Relay Against Trafficking Campaign information.

 

Journey from the Fall at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival

 

I went to the press conference of the 24^th San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival today to see the final version of Ham Tran’s “Journey from the Fall”. While this is the third time I am watching this movie, it’s the first time I am seeing it in its final cut, and boy, I can’t believe I am still crying over and over again whenever I see the tragic scenes about a Vietnamese family’s journey to the United States after the fall of Saigon and the reeducation camp experience. For those who haven’t seen it yet, it’ll play during the film festival’s closing night gala on March 23^rd at 7pm at the Palace of Fine Arts in SF.

 

As a fan of independent, Asian films, I absolutely can’t wait for this festival. Check out the amazing line-up. There are two other Vietnamese-related films that will have their world premieres at this festival. Duki Dror’s “The Journey of Vaan Nguyen” tells the unheard story of Israel’s Vietnamese refugee community with a family that fled Vietnam and adapts to the land of Jews (sure sounds intriguing, doesn’t it?). At the same time, San Francisco resident Vu T. Thu Ha’s “Kieu” is a loose adaptation of Vietnam’s epic poem “The Tale of Kieu” (Truy?n Ki?u) and is setting Kieu into the neighborhoods of 21^st century San Francisco. Kieu is played by Spirits actress (and Vietnamese hottie) Kathy Nguyen.

 

VANG 2006 – Student of the Year Award

 

Speaking of San Francisco, the Vietnamese American National Gala is heading westbound. It’s gonna happen this year right here in San Francisco, departing from its traditional location at the White House complex in Washington, DC. VANG 2006 is currently seeking nomination for its Student of the Year Award. It’s an award presented to an outstanding college student (senior) whose services to the community, academic excellence, personal achievements, and/or future represent the best and brightest of the next generation of leaders. See the submission guidelines.

 

America Online Instant Messenger goes Unicode

 

America Online's newest version of its popular instant messenger program AIM is finally, finally, finally supporting unicode. What this means for you with the Triton version, is that you can finally type in Vietnamese in a chat. Simply download VPSKeys, switch to the Unicode mode and start chatting in Vietnamese, or shall we say... b?t d?u nói ti?ng Vi?t di?

 

Bonjour Vietnam

 

If you haven’t heard of the “Bonjour Vietnam” song yet, then you seriously live behind the moon, because this song has been blogged about, forwarded, posted so many times on the internet. The pace of its circulation is really off the hook, as I get more emails on this song than the usual Hi-I-am-from-Africa-and-have-$20,0000-locked-in-an-account-email. It’s a simple flash animation created by Donny Truong consisting of a lot of nice Vietnamese sceneries (by unaccredited photographers) combined with a very nice melody and lyrics by Marc Lavoine and performed by Pham Quynh Anh. Sure, maybe the flash is a bit corny, but the melody and her voice sure is a beautiful combination. German/French/English translations are here. Vietnamese translation and interview can be found here.

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Past Vietnamese Buzz entries: January 2006

VietACT Website Weekend

 

So I moved to San Jose in May 2005, but I think I spent more weekends out of town than actually in town. Well, last weekend was the first weekend in seven weeks that I actually spent time here in the second largest Vietnamese community in California. However, I locked myself up in my apartment with my two cats to work on the new VietACT website. This was a total VietACT weekend (no, not Viet Weekend, that’s the Vietnamese erotic magazine, haha). With the exception of swinging by the Tet Festival in San Jose, going to the gym and having dinner with Boat People documentary Bolinao 52 director Duc Nguyen (who, btw, is finishing up his promising 1-hour documentary this month and producing a feature-length version of this for next year’s Sundance Film Festival at the same time), I was just working non-stop on this much-delayed and long-overdue website revamp that I promised my good friends at VietACT almost a year ago.

 

While I have made some significant progress this weekend, I think that I need to continue to dedicate all this week and weekend on this before we can go live with this hopefully around Valentine’s Day. Stay tuned…

 

 

Journey from the Fall at the Berlin Film Market

 

Hallo meine Deutschen Freunde: Journey from the Fall/Vượt Sóng ist ein neuer Film über die Vietnamesischen Flüchtlinge die nach dem Vietnamkrieg nach Amerika gezogen sind, um ein neues Leben aufzubauen sowie über das Leben in den Kommunistischen Konzentrationslagern. Der Film ist wirklich sehr rührend, sehr emotionell und sehr traurig, und ich empfehle diesen Film sehr, den viele Leute als einen “Schindler's List“ für die vietnamesische Gemeinde betrachten. Der Film wird am 11. Februar in Berlin gezeigt:

JOURNEY FROM THE FALL
Trailer and more info at: www.journeyfromthefall.com

“At points heartbreaking, at others uplifting, “Journey from the Fall” doesn’t pull any punches”
– FILM THREAT

“It is by turns powerful and effecting and features some wonderful cinematography, along with standout performances…”
– IOFILM

Written and Directed by Ham Tran

Starring
Kieu Chinh (“The Joy Luck Club”, “Green Dragon”),
Long Nguyen (“Heaven and Earth”, “Green Dragon”)

Date Time Location
Sat, Feb. 11 13:30 CinemaxX, Studio 14
Potsdamer Straße 5,
10785 Berlin
Germany
Entrance: Voxstraße

Berlin Contact Info
Nguyen “Wyn” Tran
The Institution
(972) 849.3502 (mobile)
ntran@theinstitution.biz

 

Dust of Life Update

Le Van Kiet's Vietnamese gang-movie Dust of Life is based upon a documentary of the same name (some of you might know this documentary as it is often shown at Southern California VSA/VSUs and mentorship programs). The first screening of this feature-length movie will be in mid-March in Orange County and there might be a screening in San Jose a few weeks afterwards, too. Stay tuned for further details.

I've been taking formal piano lessons now for more than a year and while I still consider myself a very beginner, I believe that with the completion of Canon in D I have reached the first milestone in my quest of being a film composer some day (if that's what I choose to be in the future, that is).

I've finally got around to do a mediocre recording of this, so here it is:

Canon in D
Composed by Johann Pachelbel
Arranged by Robert Van Horne
Performed by Minh T. Nguyen on a Yamaha PS120

Right-click here to download

Due to the length of this piece and my numerous failed attempts in recording this entire piece in one single take, I decided to split up the recording into two segments and merge them later on my laptop. As a result, there is a point in this piece that doesn’t sound too natural and feels as if it’s missing one or two beats. I won’t tell you where it is—maybe I am lucky and nobody notices. ;)

Chúc m?ng nam m?i, everyone! Lots of things are happening in the Vietnamese community all the time, so I decided to start summarizing 'em up in newsletter-like posts that from now on I decided to call Vietnamese Buzz! Enjoy.

Tet Festival 2006

Tet Festival 2006 just took place in Little Saigon. This year, UVSA did not videotape the event, so please don't wait for the videos to be posted as every year, because they simply won't. :) The OC register features a short article, and of course the Tet issue of Non Song is now available online as well.

Upcoming Vietnamese conferences

VASCON2, March 24th - March 26th, Austin, TX
VIA-1, March 17th-March 19th, Minneapolis, MN
uNAVSA, July 13-July 16th, San Jose, CA
VIFF, Spring 2007, Southern California (I assume)
DH5, some time in 2007, somewhere in South East Asia
          (new article on DH4 was published this week on Nguoi Viet)

Honoring cyber dissident Do Nam Hai with courage award

Cyber dissident Do Nam Hai in Vietnam was fined 1,300 US dollars for writing an unauthorized dissident manuscript. There's a project from the Vietnamese Diaspora to collect from 1,500 people to honor his courage with a $1,500 cash prize instead. Lots of emails circling around on this one on the many Vietnamese mailing lists, but see this website for more info.

Vietnamese Movies

Ham Tran's Journey from the Fall was a hit at the Sundance Film Festival with a long standing ovation (which typically doesn't happen at Sundance). Unfortunately, the distributors and press weren't at that screening. For those who still haven't seen it yet, it'll play at the end of March at the Asian Film Festival here in San Francisco. A very promising Vietnamese movie named Dust of Life is coming out soon. Le Van-Kiet's first feature length movie is a coming-of-age story of a displaced Vietnamese juvenile growing up in Orange County after his parents died during the boat people exodus. The first screenings will be held in Orange County end of this month. Looks very promising! Of course, there is still Duc Nguyen's boat people documentary Bolinao 52 (which wrapped up filming in the Philippines last year, but is currently on re-edit to include Hoi Trinh's fabulous campaign for the 2000 displaced Vietnamese) and Mike Nguyen's cute animation My Little World to look forward to as well. In the meantime, Victor Vu's dysfunctional-Vietnamese-family movie First Morning came out on DVD this week and Minh Nguyen's (no, not me) very aesthetic coming-of-age story Buffalo Boy can now be pre-ordered, but won't come out until March 21st.

VietACT

In preparation for the new year, anti human trafficking non-profit VietACT is in the process of stopping at various cities in a nationwide tour to promote and educate the Vietnamese community on human trafficking issues. This Relay for Trafficking campaign will start at VIA-1 in mid-March. More info to be posted soon.

I am currently reading Andrew Pham’s “Catfish and Mandala” and his vivid descriptions of Vietnam evoke many memories of the four times I visited Vietnam so far.

 

Winter 1999. My sister and I traveled to Vietnam for the first time to meet my grandma and my two aunts. It’s my first Viet Kieu experience when my emotions of poverty, hopeless children with no future and human cruelty are not desensitized yet, when the sight of poor children selling chewing gums alone already tear your heart apart. My sister and I stopped at one of the food vendors in a market, sitting down on tiny plastic chairs in the streets of Saigon to eat rice and meat like the locals. As we ate the tiny meals, we can’t help but notice the two children standing near us, looking at us, waiting for us to finish and hoping that we would have leftovers. My sister looked at me, knowing that we both can’t continue eating and asks whether we should leave now. Not knowing what to do, I nod and as we left, we look back and sure enough the two children scrambled over whatever we left behind. I realize that if my family did not make it on our second attempt leaving Vietnam on a boat in 1979, that my sister and I could have been there eating some other tourists' leftovers.

 

Summer 2001. My friend and I travel to the countryside of Vietnam to teach English, but the government shut us off after a month because we forgot to bribe the county with gifts, while I already donated two laptops to the school. When I was supposed to inform our 50+ students scrambling inside a tiny, hot classroom that had nothing but benches, chairs and a board, that our program has been shut off, I look into our children’s eyes as they are filled with tears. News have already spread that we are leaving, but to protect the school from further difficulties with the county officials, I was pressured into lying to them with an excuse of 'important business back in the States.' My voice cracks as I try to say that we can’t teach anymore, but I mutter only a few words, until someone else had to take over. I left my Vietnamese teaching experience, asking what kinda impact have we really done, even if we gave these children an entire year of ESL? What help would it be to know perfect English in a town with only two major intersections and the only future is to be stuck in poverty with little chance of moving into a bigger city? As our school children are slowly starting to discover the internet, I get emails every three weeks from children whose names and faces I have almost forgotten, but they always ask “thay oi, thay, chung nao thay moi tro ve Viet Nam lai?” I don’t know what to answer. 'Some day', I reply, not really knowing when I will see them again. I miss them.

 

Summer 2002. My family and a group of friends organize a cross-country trip from south to north Vietnam to see the history and sights of Vietnam, but also to make contact with Vietnamese youths at universities and through other youth-related gatherings. Just before our trip, my friend and I took the moped (or Honda as you call it in Vietnam) and we drove alone for two hours out of Saigon to the place where we taught the previous year. We met up with Mai again, a young, bright, but very poor high school English teacher whose smile was enormous when we showed up unannounced in front of her place that is literally in the woods. She tells us about her father’s illness and that she intends to sell herself as a bride to Taiwan after hearing so many “good” stories for an easy way out for a poor woman like her to save her parents from poverty. My friend and I looked at each other, knowing what it really meant to sell yourself as a bride, and tried our best to talk her out of it, but somehow I don’t know if were convincing enough. As we return to the States, my family tried to match-make her with one of our acquaintances, but unfortunately it didn’t work out. We exchange a few letters here and then, but I haven’t heard from her since them. As I do my volunteer work for VietACT, I am often afraid of suddenly seeing her face in one of the pictures that we get from Taiwan. I sit in my comfortable apartment in heart of Silicon Valley with a stable job, and I ask myself, what ever happened to Mai? Will her house with the roof made out of hay still be there next time I drop by or will I see her face next time in a VietACT file?

 

Fall 2004. I return to Vietnam on a medical volunteer mission with Project Vietnam. I arrived in Hanoi several days before the meet-up, but didn’t really know anyone in Hanoi yet. Already knowing Hanoi’s sights from previous trips, but not knowing how to spend my time alone in Hanoi, I rented a moped again and drove around with my digital video camera to make my A Day in Hanoi video. Along the way, I encounter two children playing chess, a sign stapled to the street corner announcing the death of a person in the neighborhood, an old senior who sits on his wheelchair enjoying the tranquility of Ho Hoan Kim, a group of art students drawing images of the romantic scenery of Ha Noi. Exhausted in the evening, I stop over at one of those pho street vendors again and chat with a Japanese businessman about the differences between Japan and Vietnam, when the vendor owner comes over and joins us for the next hour as she lamented about how the people at the bottom of the ladder will always continue to be stuck in this status quo, and that she doesn’t see how the majority of the Vietnamese people will prosper anytime soon with the current state of phenomenal economical growth but that only benefits the few. I wonder whether her opinions will have changed next time I return to Ha Noi and stop by the same food vendor place.

 

January 2006. It’s the Tet Festival in Little Saigon and I find myself for the third consecutive weekend in the place that I call home. My entire family is on the Tet Festival site, taking care of community projects, preparing Phu Heo’s booth, and helping here and there. Although I never really lived in Little Saigon, I always consider it my home, not only because my family is there, but more so because the community and the people I work with are there. However, more and more, my thoughts are bringing me back to my home country. It has been two years since I’ve been back, and reading Andrew Pham’s novel makes me a bit nostalgic. I miss Vietnam. I really miss Vietnam, and I play more and more with the idea of living there some day. Last weekend, I chatted with my family about my plans to work in Vietnam for a couple of years. Mom supports the idea very much, and turns out that my sister had some ideas of her own to go back soon, and as for my Dad. I don’t know. It will be hard for him to see his beloved son go to Vietnam, but ultimately I know he will support it too, shall the opportunity arise, and shall I follow up on my dreams.

 

It’s Tet here in Little Saigon, but I wish that I can spend Tet in Vietnam some day soon.

I started this blog in March 2004 originally as technical blog, where I shared my experience and discoveries in computer science. However, in May 2005, I decided to go personal with my blog, simply because my passion for computer science is of secondary nature compared to the work I do within the Vietnamese community.

However, I do want to blog every once in a while on some technical aspects and have therefore decided to spin off a professional blog that will be hosted over at the MSDN. So, if you are a software engineer and wanna read geek-talk, come over there.

Professional:
http://blogs.msdn.com/minguyen/ (RSS)

Personal:
http://www.enderminh.com/blog/ (RSS)

Xanga cross-reference:
http://www.xanga.com/enderminh (RSS)

Don't know what RSS is? Read this.

This past weekend, I drove home to Orange County and witness an event that identifies the heart of Little Saigon: hard-core, extreme protests based on sheer ignorance and lack of communication. What started out as a community forum to vote on a meaningful day to commemorate the Vietnamese refugee experience, ended up in a rather verbally violent protest—and we were the center of the attention. As the forum went on inside, many protesters gathered outside yelling in, disrupting our meeting, calling us communist for reasons that I find logically unsound. They were holding signs and banners and calling us rather unfavorable names. We were “chu.p mu?” and verbally abused.

 

It would have been easy to simply ignore the protest and move on with our meeting, but there were some of us who said that we need to go out there and attempt to communicate with these protesters and so we did. A small group of maybe 5-7 young people went out there and approached the elders and tried to understand their reasoning. Being accused of not having the experience living under communist rule, or being accused of being naive is one thing, but what bothers me more is that the group we tried to talk to simply refused to communicate with us. "We don't want to talk to you communist-followers" is what we hear.

 

It's so easy to go home and quit it all, to say that we have enough. People are constantly encouraging me to stay away from the Vietnamese community for that reason. Why do we even attempt to change the community we live in? People who are not involved in the community continuously criticize and challenge me and ridicule my efforts as futile and hopeless, but I beg to differ.

 

After my tonight’s piano lesson, my piano teacher and I discussed a little bit about my goals and aspirations, and he encouraged me to join ASCAP (The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) even though I am very much a novice, but I replied "Oh no, I don't think I'll do music as a full profession", thinking that my passion to be a computer science teacher or a reformist for Vietnam has more broader significance than my personal passion for film music, but he interrupted me right there and requested that I should never ever utter that sentence again, for I will never know what the future will bring and how powerful my mind can be. He reminded me of a motto that I have lived by since childhood. Ever since I grew up in the computer revolution, I have always wanted to work for Microsoft, and after many years of hard work (and one prior rejection), I am finally here, currently working on some very cool stuff on Microsoft IPTV and Vista's WPF. During my college years, I made it a goal to go to Berkeley and/or Stanford, and I've finished the first part of that goal and aiming at finishing the second part later this year. Several years ago, I decided to write a book for personal development, and during one particular lunch break, I took out my laptop under the San Diego sun and simply started writing the introduction, and now you can buy the book on amazon.com.

 

Where do I go with this? Well, as I drove home from my piano lesson, listening to Kitaro's inspirational music to "Heaven and Earth", I asked myself if I have successfully applied this code to my career life, then I can apply it to my emotional world as well. I've gone through a rather difficult year in my life in 2005, but I realize that the power of the mind can control so much. It’s not only your physical limits that your mind can control but also your emotions, and this has been put to test very much this past year. In the end, you choose to be happy, and you choose to live your life with the emotions that you can control. After DH4, I've taken a small chill pill and am in the process of reorienting myself for 2006, and I am happy to see that the optimist and Minh-goes-around-to-change-the-world-mentality slowly returns in me.

 

Then I thought that, if I can apply this to my emotions, my life, why can’t I apply this to the community as well? If there is a small group of enough people applying the same principle on a community-scale, why can't we change the community we live in? There is absolutely no reason why we can't change the Vietnamese community (or the world for that matter). "Be the change you want to see in the world", Gandhi says, and that's the reason why we went out there last weekend, even though we know that it might be futile.

 

The bottom line is that people will always continue to stand outside, pointing their fingers at us, laughing at us for trying to make a change, but what matters is that we believe in what we do. There are so many bad things within the Vietnamese community that I am not particularly proud of, but I see this as an opportunity for change and to make it better. I believe in the work I do, and I strongly believe that we have already ignited some change within the Vietnamese community here in the States as well as inside Vietnam. There will always be opposition regardless of what you do, but what matters is that you stand up and pick the battle you want to fight, because you believe that it's the right thing to do.

The following is my personal list of the 15 greatest compositions of all time. Granted, not all of them are scores, but ah well, besides film music, I do listen to a variety of music across different genres. Needless to say, this is a personal list, but I hope I will awaken or sparkle some of your musical interest in these remarkable songs, albums and composers.

Without further ado, here comes my list, bottom up:

15. Part of Your World from "Little Mermaid" by Alan Menken
 
Yes, it’s a kid flic, but Alan Menken’s musical-like composition to Disney’s “Little Mermaid” gives a wonderful opportunity for the singer to express Ariel’s wishes. If you ever want to fall in love with a female voice, listen to Ute Lemper’s German version. Her crystal-clear, strong, but very feminine voice is what really got me into this piece.

14. Colors of the Wind from "Pocahontas" by Alan Menken
 
Yes, another kid flic, but Alan Menken topped himself again with the very rich and extraordinary composition to Disney’s Pocahontas that left me in awe the very first time I heard it.

13. Bai Ca Dai Viet by Phan Van Hung
 
I still don’t know the original composer to this piece, but Phan Van Hung re-arranged this piece for the Viet Tan opening ceremony in Berlin, and boy, I immediately fell in love with this music the first time I heard it. The lyrics of this song tell Vietnam’s long history (I wish I understood it better, though), but besides the lyrics, I am speechless at how well Phan Van Hung combines the male and female voices and let the chorus accompany them in distinct, refreshing and uplifting segments that always reenergizes my passion for Vietnam.

12. The Chairman's Waltz from "Memoirs of a Geisha" by John Williams

Nostalgia and sadness fills my soul when I listen to this short piece from one of Williams’ most recent albums. It’s a very emotional and touching musical outcry of melancholy. Representing Sayuri’s deepest wish to be with the Chairman, this recurring theme reflects a person’s wish and longing for the ‘one love.’

11. Summer from "Kikujirô No Natsu" by Joe Hisaishi

A simple, uplifting, warm, life-is-good, yet slightly nostalgic piece of music that somehow embodies to me the past and innocence of childhood. I really loved the harp section at 0:55, and wished that Joe Hisaishi has used the harps at the end of this piece as a nice ending climax. It feels a bit out of touch and unexpected where it’s currently at.

10. Throne Room and End Title from "Star Wars - A New Hope" by John Williams

I can’t possibly compile this list without leaving out probably the most famous and most successful score of all time that appears on every best-soundtrack list: John Williams’ “Star Wars” that catapulted him into stardom in the film music genre in 1977. Throne Room masters in repeating the Binary Sunset theme accompanied by strong strokes of string instruments and ends with the strong and majestic Star Wars main theme. Can’t ask for more here!

9. It's Only Gold and End Credits from "CutThroat Island" by John Debney

CutThroat Island is an extremely rich composition that simultaneously uses a huge variety of instruments. When Debney recorded this score, he probably had to hire every single person that belonged to the London Symphony Orchestra, and boy, you can tell and feel the vibration of the room as he ends this piece with the biggest finale you’ll ever hear in the history of film music. I often listen to this piece on headphones with full volume with my eyes closed imaging standing in front of a full orchestra and conducting this piece.

8. O from "Cirque Du Soleil - O" by Benoit Jutras

Benoit Jutras, very much like Joe Hisaishi, is another master of nostalgic themes, and O is probably the epitome of nostalgia, especially when it was written for and used in Cirque Du Soleil’s amazing dream-like musical O. It’s another one of those gradually-increasing pieces that makes you think and ponder about the past, your youth and become sad while doing so.

7. Picard Flute Solo from "Star Trek - Generations" by Jerry Goldsmith

Ah, the piece of music that I will request in my will to be played at my funeral. This semi-solo piece of a flute accompanied with string instruments starts out with a melody that brings closure to a period of sadness and then slowly the violins pick up the melody where the flute leaves off. The reason why I want this to be played at my funeral is that it embodies the passing of one melody from one sad form into another and then, as the violin starts its waltz-like dance, the flute returns and they both dance in unison representing hope and inspiration to do other good things in life despite death.

6. I'm Forrest… Forrest Gump from "Forrest Gump" by Alan Silvestri

Alan Silvestri’s most famous piece that clearly stands out in the film music genre as an innocent and sheer peaceful piece that starts with the piano and then carries on with violins.

5. Too Late from "Gaudi - Das Musical" by Eric Woolfson

First off, please note that I am not referring to the 1987 “Alan Parsons Project“ version of Eric Woolfson's Too Late, but rather his version for the 1996 musical that apparently is only playing in Germany. Too Late is a rather interesting and unorthodox musical piece, yet it still astonishingly harmonic. The piece immediately grabs your attention in the first second with the violin’s repeating pattern of strokes creating a suspense that through the different segments in this piece takes up different tones and volume. The duet of the lead male and female voices as they argue in complete harmony gives this song the strong variety—I especially love the female voice as it dances along with the music as if her voice is describing the curves of the female body (especially the part “It has always me who ended up the loser”/”Well, I’ve been waiting for so long without good reason”). Then, Woolfson adds the tenor of “Standing on Higher Ground” (another melody of the same musical) as background music and, to my astonishment, despite its complete different melody they all fit together so perfectly. After a very suspenseful segment of purely string instruments, Woolfson lets all these voices express their strongest feelings together in the climax and you’ll be amazed by how well all these complex melodies flow together. Then, when you think it can’t get any better, Woolfson adds the simple, low, long horns in the background that like an umbrella covers all voices under its reach. The icing on the cake – WOW! How does one person can come up with such an amazing composition?

4. Canon in D by Johann Pachelbel

One of the most overused pieces for romantic scenes in movies and at weddings, but for a very good reason. What starts out as a peaceful, harmonic melody of love grows gradually stronger and ends with a canon of a string quartet that sound so harmonious in unison. As I play this piece on a piano, I am still amazed and wonder to this day how Pachelbel could had ever come up with the many variations of these sheer-random notes that blend together so well. Never before has complexity sounded so harmonious.

3. Theme from Schindler's List from "Schindler's List" by John Williams

Schindler’s List is the epitome of sad violin music. It’s sad, sad, sad, sad, and sad. The sound of the low violin performed by Itzhak Perlman is going to tear your heart apart. The vibration by which Perlman draws the violin bow against the string is what gives this piece the almost literal notation of “tearing someone’s heart apart” and as he moves along the entire scale and goes from one octave to another within seconds…. whew, that's heart-wrenching! If you ever listen to this music alone in the dark, don’t be surprised if you start having suicidal thoughts, even if you have no reason to be.

2. The Rain from "Kikujirô No Natsu" by Joe Hisaishi

As noted before, this is probably the most romantic piece of music your ears will ever hear, yet this piece is so unknown. Joe Hisaishi actually delivers a very simple melody, and I guess I have to agree that in the simplicity lies the beauty. His choice of instruments and arrangement makes this nostalgic and romantic composition a masterpiece. Words cannot describe how romantic this piece is, so you have to trust me and listen for yourself. I literally fell in love with it the first time I heard it. The simple melody is simple repeated on different octaves (or is it the cello in segment B?) and the piece ends with a string version of “Summer” from the same album.

1. Journey to the Island from "Jurassic Park" by John Williams

When John Williams was hired by Steven Spielberg to compose the music for the dinosaur movie “Jurassic Park”, Williams could have easily chose strong brass instruments and hard drums to deliver a dark score representing the dinosaurs, yet to everyone’s big surprise, he delivers two very unexpected themes: an extremely powerful and bold theme of horns and an extremely warm and moving main theme. Journey to the Island is the combination of both themes. What makes this piece so perfect is that there is not a single second of this 9-minute composition that is wasted. The listeners' attention is grabbed in the first second with a short, strong string ascension. Then, over the next minute you are being prepared for the bold trumpet/horn theme that comes in so beautifully when you see the helicopter arrive at the island for the first time. As the helicopter lands on the island in the movie, the music transforms into an adventure-like expedition and then, after some short suspense, the main theme of Jurassic Park is introduced for the first time in the movie. The music is just breathtaking at that moment. It’s so warm, kindhearted, and majestic—something you really don’t expect at the sight of dinosaurs. As the party returns to the headquarters, the music gradually slows down (with less majestic repetitions of the main theme), yet introduces another small melody: a small dance of low string instruments foreshadowing the potential danger that is ahead and the music ends with an undertone of suspension as the violin dies on a very low and slow stroke. Ah… what an amazing composition. It’s a perfect piece from the first to last second with memorable themes and remarkable orchestral performances.

That's my current list. Some of these albums are very hard to find, so you have to look on eBay or something. Enjoy!

by Minh T. Nguyen

 

Author's note: I did this interview on January 12th, 2005 for UVSA's Non Song magazine. Due to page-limitations, the transcript below covers only a small part of the full 25-minute interview, but I posted the complete audio interview here. For the Vietnamese translation of this article, pick up the Tet 2005 Non Song issue at the Tet Festival in Little Saigon or visit the Non Song page when the issue is available in a few weeks online.

 

Ham Tran is UCLA graduate in Fine Arts and became best known with his thesis film The Anniversary that won him the prestigious USA Film Festival Award, which also qualified the film for the 2004 Academy Awards for Best Live Action Short. Ham Tran recently finished the much-anticipated boat people-movie Journey from the Fall which is often referred to as the Schindler’s List for the Vietnamese Diaspora. Ham Tran recently presented excerpts from the movie at the Fourth International Vietnamese Youth Conference in Sydney, Australia, after which Non Song had a chance to interview him about his first feature-length movie.

 

Q: Can you summarize the movie and tell us what “Journey from the Fall” is about?

A: It’s the untold story about the post-Vietnam war experience of re-education camps, boat people and the immigration process to America. It’s about a family that separated after the war and struggling against all odds to be reunited in the hope of freedom.

 

Q: Why did you decided to do this movie?

A: I was writing my short The Anniversary which was about the Vietnam War, but taking it from a Vietnamese perspective and telling the story of the Vietnam War as a civil war, rather than a war between America vs. Vietnam. As I was researching about the history of the Vietnam war, I came to realize that no film has ever been made that talked about the Vietnamese boat people experience, and as I was researching, I was finding a lot of stories about re-education camps and realized that in the last thirty years no film whatsoever—American, Vietnamese, Chinese or whatever—has been made about it. As I finished The Anniversary in 2003, I realized that we are coming up towards the 30-year anniversary [of the fall of Saigon] and that something needs to be said about that and that it needs to be told in a Vietnamese voice.

 

Q: What kind of research did you do for the movie or did you have any personal experience to draw upon?

A: My aunt who sponsored us to America was a boat person. She left on this boat and then had chicken pox, so they were about to throw her over because they were afraid that chicken pox might spread and get everybody on board sick, so they were going to throw her over the next morning. Then, in the middle of the night, they were hit by pirates and because she had chicken pox, the pirates didn’t want to go near her, and so the next morning they were rescued. These unbelievable stories about human endurance and suffering are all within our community. I started finding out, for instance, that my father’s friend, who was a very high-ranking officer, was in prison for twenty years, and he is the person who sort of kept my dad away from the frontlines, because he knew my dad had a family. So, he did my dad a favor, but after the war, he was arrested and got in prison.

 

When I started working on The Anniversary my producer Lam told me that his father was killed in an education camp. He was killed without trial, his body was buried and to this day his family doesn’t know where the father’s body is. Lam’s mom knew a lot of Vietnamese veterans who were in prison, so we started interviewing them and finding out more stories.

 

Q: How long did the entire production take?

A: The production itself took about just a year, but the writing part took three years. I started writing it around 2001, and then refined it and we then had it ready in 2004 and were looking for funding to make the film. At that time, The Anniversary was shortlisted for the Academy Awards, and so we got a lot of attention from the studios and I met with them.

 

Q: What was the hardest part in the entire production?

A: Strangely enough, the biggest hurdle right now is selling the film—it’s getting the film out there. I am learning now that so many films get made a year, but only about less than 10% of it ever go to the theaters. When we shot the film, we went through floods, storms and all kinds of crazy things, but all that had an ultimate goal, which is to finish the film. It was very immediate, and we knew what we had to do the next day, and we knew what to do to get it accomplished. The resources were within our control at least. Selling the film and getting the film out there—I have no control over that.

 

Q: That leads us to the question that so many people have been asking you. You have kind of finished the movie last year and had screenings in selected cities. What does it take for the movie to finally get out to national screens now?

A: When we screened it last April, it wasn’t 100% completed yet. We had a lot of sound and edit problems. If you saw it then and see it now—it’s  a completely different film as well. We officially finished it in September/beginning October. Now the hurdle is to convince the buyers that there is a market for the film.

 

For us the goal right now is to see what happens at the Sundance Film Festival. Currently, buyers are interested, but they are waiting to see the outcome of Sundance. Our plan is that if no one is buying the film at Sundance, we are going to try and self-distribute the film for April 30^th. It’s not like it has never been done before. Other films have been able to be successfully self-distributed. We will try and do it as well and hopefully Vietnamese people will come out and support it.

 

Q: I’ve been to the sold-out screening, and people loved it, and the community is asking for more. What can they do to help you to get the movie out?

A: That’s a question I am sort of examining myself. How the community can help is actually not necessarily towards this film, but making their consumer identity known. What do I mean by that? It means going out and supporting Vietnamese films whenever they get released. It’s almost as if it’s a social responsibility. If there is a Vietnamese film out there, we need to go to the movie theater, we buy the movie tickets and don’t wait for the DVDs to come out in order to go see the film. We generate the box office dollars for the film.

It happened that way for the black community with Spike Lee’s film, when he did Do the Right Thing. Because before then, there wasn’t that big of a black community that went up to pay dollars to see a black film, and I think what we need to do right now is to pay dollars to see a Vietnamese film. That’s the only way that we can get the industry and the studios to realize that ‘hey, you know what? There is a market out there!’

 

Q: With Journey from the Fall wrapping up and hopefully coming to the theaters some time this year, what do you hope the movie will accomplish? How do you measure success besides the number of ticket sales?

A: I think the ultimate goal is this. Of course, at least to make enough money to pay back the people that financed the film. Far from that, what’s more gratifying for me is the feeling that it opens up dialogue. Recently, I went up to Oakland to visit my grandfather and showed the film for him and my aunt, and they were all boat people. While the film was playing, they started talking. Most people would get annoyed, but then for me it was this incredible feeling of gratification, because they started talking about their boat escape. She is like ‘oh my God, this is what happened to us, and I had to do this and then I had to come back to get your grandfather and this and that.’ So, here I am, supposedly screening my film, but getting a lesson in my family history instead. I think the most important thing is to open up a dialogue, so that people begin to understand their own family histories.

 

One of our investors’ dad was in prison for ten years. So we sit down with him for two hours and interviewed him. He told us a lot of his stories about his education camp. My producer must have cried 400 times during the audition process, and at the end we asked how his family reacted to this, and he said that he has never told anyone these stories. So even my executive producers—he doesn’t even know his father’s story about what happened in re-education camp. It’s because of the need to silence up and protect the kids form the ugliness from the war. It’s a personal kind of shame having gone through that kind of experience. I think, if anything, we need to talk about them. We need to acknowledge what happened within our own families. In that way, we can move on.

 

I know that my father is still traumatized by the war. I know it in a way they fear the communist or are very suspicious of the communist, and they have a reason to be because they went through that first-hand. But we don’t know that, so we interpret their experience and their point of view as being paranoid and whatever, and we shut ourselves off to that. So I think as the 1.5 and 2.0 generation, we need to know these stories and know ourselves so that we can start the healing process for our parents.

 

Q: With Journey from the Fall wrapping up, what’s next for you? Any plans for your next movie?

A: I had a couple of thoughts, but because of Dai Hoi [the Fourth International Vietnamese Youth Conference], I got inspired and have another idea for another film. I am really inspired to tell the story of human trafficking. I think it’s a very important story. I don’t know if it’s going to be the next film, but I know it’s going to be one of the films that I want to do in my career. Before I went to Dai Hoi, I wanted to tell the story of the birth and the growth of Little Saigon based on my childhood experiences, like a Vietnamese gangster film set against the birth of Little Saigon.

 

Q: Okay, Ham. Thank you so much for the interview and good luck at Sundance.

A: Thank you.

I flew in from Sydney Sunday night, and on Monday I played with the idea of starting grad school early, and in a spontaneous decision left for lunch and drove over to Stanford University to discuss my academic plans, take care of my paperwork and register for class. Before I even realize, I am now taking a class on cryptography and was excited yesterday as I took my first online lecture about an aspect of computer science that has always been a passion for me (yaddi, yaddi, spare your nerdy side comments). So that there is no misunderstanding, let me make it clear that I am not accepted to grad school yet. My admission is still pending and I won't hear from them until May, but I am taking a risk and hope that I'll get in so that I can simply transfer the units over and have a good head start for my master's degree that is going to take me four years (yikes!).

Life is going to be busy, working full-time, going to grad school part-time, and trying to stay involved in the Vietnamese community, while continuing my private piano lessons. On top of this, I am playing with the idea of taking guitar lessons or joining the Vietnamese book club my friend has invited me to. What am I doing? Life's busy enough, but why do I continue to seek out new thrills and things to do? I am playing with the idea of snapping out of this stressful life and do something drastically new, like leaving everything I have here behind and move to Vietnam and work full-time there. How cool would that be to work for Microsoft in Hanoi and really get to know Vietnam and its people?

Other random things and thoughts in my life:
- I went to go donate blood today, and they freaking denied me, just because I spent childhood in Europe. Damn that mad cow.
- VASCON and VIA-1 as well as NAVSA retreat are around the corner, but I've opted to stay sane and not spread myself even thinner. I even pulled out of VANG earlier this week, even though that's going to happen right here in San Francisco.
- Playing with the idea of flying to Indonesia to attend one of my best friend's wedding, but after Sydney I am only going to have a few days of vacation. Hm.. is it worth it to fly there, attend the wedding and fly back immediately?
- Discussed world politics with a couple of friends lately, and I am starting a list of what's wrong with the Vietnamese community and what needs to be seriously changed. Oh, that is going to be an interesting post. Stay tuned and start collecting stones you can throw at me.
- I interviewed Ham Tran yesterday for my yearly article in Non Song. That was a looooong interview with great insights and behind-the-scenes stories, but I am afraid that I have to cut 70% to meet my 2-page limit.
- Anyone know of a free Vietnamese-language class in San Jose that I can attend? I seriously need to improve my Vietnamese.

Many thoughts wonder through my mind as I try to summarize the last three weeks at the Fourth International Vietnamese Youth Conference in Sydney, Australia.

Journey from the Fall

Director Ham Tran talks about Journey from the Fall

As noted before many times, I am a huge fan and supporter of the movie Journey from the Fall that tells the story and journey of a family to the United States after the Fall of Saigon. Director Ham Tram traveled to Sydney to present clips of the movie and talk about the hurdles he is currently facing. The movie still has not found a distributor yet, but is part of the official selection of the Sundance Film Festival 2006 that will take place in two weeks in Park City, Utah. There have been several distributors interested in buying this movie, but they want to see the audience’s reaction at Sundance first. If everything goes well there, the movie might be finally out in the theaters nationwide as early as April 2006 (hopefully this will answer the question many of you guys have been asking me all the time). I was lucky enough to see an earlier version of this heart-wrenchingly sad and extremely moving film at a screening in San Jose earlier this year, and am I delighted that Ham Tram has invited me to go to Sundance and see the final version of this amazing movie that has been so long overdue. Being an enthusiast for independent movies, I can’t be more excited to go to Utah in two weeks for this film festival! Don't worry, if you can't get into Sundance this year, you can see the movie again as it will be showing at the International Asian Film Festival in San Francisco in March.

Live Interview with Cyber-dissident Do Nam Hai

Conference attendees listen to cyberdissident Do Nam Hai from Vietnam

Do Nam Hai is a Vietnamese exchange student who studied in Australia for a long while and then returned to Vietnam, where he began publishing dissident papers on the internet criticizing the Vietnamese government and asking for political change, naturally with the constant danger of being harassed and  “troubled” by the current regime in Vietnam. I had the opportunity to meet Do Nam Hai in Vietnam during one of my many trips there, and during the conference, the International Vietnamese Youth Network set up a live audio-only conference call with Do Nam Hai in Vietnam to create long phone interview between Vietnamese youths overseas with a young dissident in Vietnam. As a dissident in Vietnam, one always endangers oneself by writing dissident articles, so speaking on the phone live with hundreds of Vietnamese youths overseas is an intimidating task, and I was very moved by my brother’s courage and determinism. I challenged my fellow Vietnamese diasporas at the conference (and was probably preaching the choir by doing so), by asking if these dissidents in Vietnam risk their lives and the lives of their immediate family members by voicing their opinion, and we Vietnamese diasporas living in free country choose not to speak up, what kind of role models would we be and what kind of message would we send to them? As I explain the need for overseas demonstrations and political engagement to my fellow Vietnamese who often challenge my involvement within the Vietnamese community, I ask of them to see the bigger picture. I don’t believe in “Da Dao Cong Sang Viet Nam” slogans. I hate them with the pest and was utterly disappointed seeing this sentence being overused at the opening ceremony of DH4 by local non-Vietnamese politicians, but I believe that it is our work overseas that gives the people in Vietnam the hope, determination and fuel to do the work that actually will lead to changes in Vietnam.

In Memoriam of Nguyen Ngoc Phu

Conference attendees learn about DH3 enthusiast Phu Heo

My friend Nguyen Ngoc Phu—aka Phu Heo—was supposed to be on this trip, and we missed him greatly. He was known as the DH3 enthusiast and camp leader and in the two years of his community involvement he has done more than many of us in our lifetime. After DH3, we became very close friends. He passed away in June of this year due to heart complications at the age of 21. We ran the Phu Heo slideshow on a table in the lobby and gave DH4 attendees the opportunity to learn about his life and to sign a guestbook that I am taking with me to his grave when I visit him for the Tet Festival later this month. I missed him greatly at the conference.

Sydney Opera House

During our Australia trip, we’ve traveled to Melbourne as well as Brisbane, got to see Koala bears, Kangaroos, swam at Sunshine coast and Gold Coast, climbed over the Sydney Harbor Bridge, toured Darling Harbor, ate Kangaroo meat, visited Manly Beach and drank wine at Bondi Beach, but the highlight of my entire trip was the end, when a close friend of mine and I went to see Madame Butterfly at the Sydney Opera House. It was the most amazing experience seeing one of the most famous operas at one of the most famous Opera venues in the world. Sung in complete Italian, but with English subtitles, we got to follow the love-tragedy of Madame Butterfly at the Sydney Opera House, followed by stroll along the Sydney Harbor with the Harbor Bridge in the background and a nice dinner at the waterfront. Ah… what a beautiful way to end our trip to Australia.

In conclusion

I took this picture when walking over Sydney Harbor Bridge

The Fourth International Vietnamese Youth Conference in Sydney has been a great experience, but somehow I find the Third International Vietnamese Youth Conference in San Diego more inspiring. Naturally, I am biased being a DH3 core organizing member, while this year I’ve only been a DH4 attendee. DH3 had more spirit and more enthusiasm, but DH4 was somehow more fun with all the parties that I got to attend at night (and getting drunk). The Aussies have been extremely hospitable and I am grateful for everyone’s great and amazing work. I’ve opted not to work behind-the-scenes much to finally experience an event from the attendee’s point of view. For this conference, I created only three slideshows: Opening Ceremony, Conference Intro and Closing Ceremony (even though I must add that the Closing Ceremony slideshow was put together last-minute and I am not particularly proud of it given that it's just a carbon-copy of the Opening Ceremony).

A new year, new hope

My two and a half weeks in Australia is coming to an end and with it the worst year of my entire life. I have been told that I inspire other people through my optimism and be-happy enthusiasm for community work, but I am afraid that this year the world has turned upside down for me. An unfortunate series of personal depressions not related to the Vietnamese community have taken a big toll on me, forcing me to take a step back and reorient myself before I start the next year. I intend to retreat myself from Vietnamese community for a while and disappear from the scene for a bit to reserve some idle and downtime for myself, before I will head on and dedicate myself to VietACT and to what I envision will be my next big task: to innovate Mang Luoi Tuoi Tre Viet Nam Len Duong.

International Vietnamese Youth Network Renaissance

Closing Ceremony at the Fourth International Vietnamese Youth Conference

The International Vietnamese Youth Network has been in existence since DH1, and many people believe that this organization has not reached the mainstream youth enough through a lack of promotion, community education and collaboration with other notable organizations such as Amnesty International or branches of the US government. Well, many of us-even within the organization-can’t agree with you more, and DH4 has given us the fuel to start working for a real, big change. During DH4, I sat down with some attendees and we decided that it’s time to give MLTTVNLD its much-needed facelift and reorganize and innovate ourselves.

If we truly believe that the future of Vietnam lies in the hands of the current Vietnamese youth in and outside of Vietnam, we better need to speak their language, and reach out and work with the youths more than we have. With that said, boys and girls, I ask of you to help me in this journey. We are ready to change and listen to your opinion, and we need your help in reshaping this organization that has so much potential, but has failed to live up to its mission statement. It’s going to be a long and daunting task, but if uNAVSA was born out of DH3 (see our article in the the January issue of Nha Magazine) and is now heading a nationwide campaign for VietACT within two years of its existence, then there is no reason for the International Vietnamese Youth Network to take this involvement to the international scale and change the world again. Ladies and gens, I want to see a MLTTVNLD renaissance. Let us change the world we live in, by changing ourselves first. Who is with me?

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."

       - Margaret Mead