Profile by Alaina Schilling "They gutted the boat... We had nothing except two paddles and the shirt[s] on our back[s]."

Back to Table of Contents | Back to Main Index Previous Profiles | Send mail to The Voice Fleeing communists, Tran's family escapes Vietnam Left: Arriving in Thailand, Tran was a scared young boy. Right: Now as a part of the Multnomah community, Tran is the head of the ISD Department as well as a seminary student. -Thinh Tran, Alaina Schilling, photos The communists were coming to arrest his father. One night, 14 people huddled on a small 15-foot boat, bound in any direction but the shores of Vietnam. The boat seemed minuscule compared to the thrashing, violent waves that threatened to take it over. The passengers wanted to turn back, but they knew that if they returned to Vietnam, the communists would take two of the men straight to prison. So they prayed for safety and relied on God's grace to bring them ashore somewhere soon. "We turned back out [toward the sea] and just went, with the little faith that we had because we didn't know where we were going," Tran said. Thinh Tran, 28, and his family escaped from Vietnam when he was 7. His father had worked for the American CIA. But when the communists began to take over in 1980, they arrested people who had helped the Americans and weeded them out of the community. After praying about the situation, Tran's father had decided they needed to escape. Although Tran's father was also a fisherman, he had no experience with navigating and fixing engines on larger boats. God led Tran's parents to a few people who would help them escape by navigating the escape boat and operating its large engines. After three months of preparation, Tran, his parents and grandparents, his sisters and brother, his aunt and uncle, two of their pastor's friends, and a pilot sneaked into the boat and ventured into the seemingly never-ending sea. After three restless days trying to conserve what few supplies they had, the group encountered and were deceived by some Thai pirates. The pirates invited them aboard their boat and gave them noodles, somewhat like Ramen, to eat. But while Tran and his family were filling their stomachs, a larger boat came along, filled with more Thai pirates. "They were all shapes and sizes," Tran said. Tran's family was held hostage with a few guns. Peeking out from behind his shocked parents, Tran watched the pirates steal all the possessions from the tiny boat. "They gutted the boat; so we had nothing except two paddles and the shirt[s] on our back[s]," Tran said. After the bigger pirate ship left, the escapees were forced back onto their barren boat and abandoned. Fighting despair, Tran's family thanked God that the pirates had not abducted any of the women. "We just got out the paddles and started paddling away," Tran said. "All we saw was water." But late that same afternoon, they came upon an American oil tanker. Tran's father spoke in English with the American sailors, who rescued the group and brought them to Thailand. In Thailand, Tran's father found work as a translator for some missionaries. He came across a missionary couple who knew of a couple in Texas who wanted to sponsor a refugee family and bring them to the United States. Although the couple had planned to sponsor a one-generation family, the couple finally agreed to help Tran's family. Fourteen months after that first scary venture into the sea, all three generations of his family traveled together to Bastrop, Texas. Today Tran is director of informational technologies at Multnomah Bible College. He graduated from the University of California, Davis, with a double major in biological science and religious studies. Although he had planned to pursue dentistry, Tran realized that his faith in the Lord was extremely important. Tran said that in college, because of the challenge of a friend, he really started taking his faith seriously. After taking a year off to think things through, he decided to come to Multnomah Biblical Seminary in 1998 for his graduate certificate. Tran is also an elder at his church, The Crossing. He overlooks finances and daily operation for the church and plays sports with the young men. Tran hopes to one day marry and have children. Meanwhile, he is happy with his life and the twists and turns it has taken. Tran feels blessed by the events that have taken place in his life. "At every big turning point I could really see that God's hand was there," he said. Back to Table of Contents | Back to Main Index Previous Profiles | Top Of Page Send mail to The Voice| Journalism department website © 2002 The Voice. No part of this publication may be reproduced in written or electronic form without prior written consent from the journalism adviser of Multnomah Bible College. All rights reserved.