Mr. Hoa rubbed his eyes throughout the conversation. Over the years, his eyesight had been getting worse, and now, day or night, he was surrounded by a mist. The third son of four children dragged his feet toward the table, mumbling and signaling that he wanted a drink of water. The eldest grandson, 12 years old, lay curled up on the bed like a 5-year-old, his head tilted to look at the strange guests visiting the house. Behind the door locked with several chains, Mr. Hoa said, locked his two daughters in there. “They are mentally ill,” Mr. Hoa said.
Sometimes what is left behind after the war is more terrifying than what it took away during the battle. Like tens of thousands of other “Agent Orange families”, Mr. Hoa’s family is a poor household in the commune. The regular meal is vegetables with soup, boiled water with lemon juice, and a bowl of peanuts with fish sauce. What can we do? Nine mouths depend on the Agent Orange victim regime, and the wife who works hard at the market does not earn much. “But only the father and son benefit, not the grandchildren” – Mr. Hoa “said specifically for the journalist to know”. He believes that Agent Orange has left consequences for the third generation and maybe even the fourth and fifth generations. However, that is only a personal belief, and in terms of policy, the grandchildren of resistance fighters infected with toxic chemicals are not eligible for preferential treatment.
Across the country, there are millions of Agent Orange victims like Mr. Hoa’s family. In Nghe An, more than 30,000 people who participated in the war and served in the war on the battlefields were exposed to toxic chemicals; 14,486 victims, of which more than 9,500 were direct victims and more than 4,900 were indirect victims. Finding “Agent Orange status” for the grandchildren and great-grandchildren is still a long story. Mr. Hoa – after going to the commune several times to ask about the policy for his grandchildren and receiving the answer “no” – has not thought about it for a long time. He thinks about something else. He blames himself.
During countless moments sitting quietly at the rickety table, amidst the meaningless screams of his two daughters, in the middle of a house that always reeked of filth because of his children and grandchildren who could not control their actions, Mr. Hoa thought about many “if onlys”: If only I had not gotten married, she would have suffered less! If only I had not given birth to them, their lives would not have been so miserable! If only I had not asked for a wife for the eldest son, who would have thought that it would have been passed down to his grandchildren!
However, not once did that man make a different assumption, that if he had not participated in the battle, if he had not gone through those bare forests, if he had not bent down more than once to scoop up water to drink from those murky and chemical-smelling rivers… He knew that if time could be turned back, he would still make the same choice. In the midst of the Fatherland’s danger, between the thin line between life and death, he and his comrades would only move forward.
The small radio was broadcasting the news. In August, amid many important events of the country, the press also devoted time to promoting the Day for Victims of Agent Orange in Vietnam on August 10. Mr. Hoa turned up the volume. He focused on listening carefully to the story of Mrs. Tran To Nga - a French woman of Vietnamese origin, born in 1942, who was a reporter for the Liberation News Agency. She lived and worked during the war years in many areas heavily affected by Agent Orange such as Cu Chi, Binh Long... One of her children died as a child due to congenital heart disease Tetralogy of Fallot and the other suffered from alpha thalassemia. She herself suffered from many serious illnesses but never wavered in more than 10 years of persistently filing lawsuits against 14 chemical companies that supplied Agent Orange to the US military for use in the Vietnam War. She said: I am suing because I am Vietnamese. I sue not for myself but for all the Agent Orange victims of Vietnam. I believe in justice and truth.
Mr. Hoa was moved when he heard that. A belief that seemed to have been vague seemed to revive in him…
Illustration: Document
