This article is part of Rapid Growth's Voices of Youth series, which features content created by Kent County youth with support from Rapid Growth staff.
I am 100% Vietnamese, yet I have never felt a hundred percent connected to my roots. I’ve grown up with the experiences that my mother and father gave me – wearing ao dai on Tết, using the pinky method to measure how much water I put in the rice pot, apple slices after arguments – but I was born in Michigan, and I have never visited the homeland. The home that was once a paradise had turned into a tragedy, something that we never talk about, and yet something I longed to know more. This is not my story; it’s theirs.
In this project, I interviewed Xinh Van Pham, my paternal grandfather, or “Ong Ngoai,” Xinh Van Pham, and Thong Pham, my father.
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Courtesy of Jennifer PhamJennifer Pham’s grandfather, Xinh Van Pham, plays guitar alongside fellow Vietnamese friends in the 1980s, using music to celebrate culture and build community.
My grandpa was born in the city of Saigon, and like many others, the Vietnam War caused the end to everything he knew. As a former general and driver in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), the corruption of the south prompted the urgency for all its soldiers to flee.
As the Viet Cong initiated a total lockdown of the country, the future was clear for an enemy: escape or death. On April 30,1975, the day that the communists won, my grandpa was tuned into the radio, learning where traps lay ahead in the safe havens of hospitals and police stations. In the spur of the moment, he escaped in an ambulance heading towards the Tan Son Nhat Airport.
Without looking back, he traveled from location to location – days at an airport hangar in Thailand; weeks at a camp in Guam; then five to six months at a refugee camp in Fort Chaffee, Arkansas. It was dissociating, leaving behind his wife and four kids, but he knew he had to if he wanted everyone alive.
Arrival in Michigan
At that time, a Reformed church in Holland sponsored his move to that city. In the first couple of years, the church helped him settle into a house with clothes and utilities. Every week, someone came to pick him up from his cramped little house and get groceries. This was his new life. After a couple more years, he moved from Holland to Grand Rapids in search of new opportunities.
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Courtesy of Jennifer PhamJennifer Pham’s grandfather, Xinh Van Pham, poses proudly with his new car in the 980s.
It took nine years to sponsor his family over to the States. After arriving in the Midwest, he sent a letter to Vietnam to tell them he was alive and a plan was in motion – and yet, my grandma and father never got the letter because the government had blocked it.
For years, they didn’t even know he was alive. It was a devastating time: years of sorrow, darkness, and desolation as the home they once knew was shattered. As my father recalls the experience, he states that all you could do was “[sell] things at your house and survive.”
My father, his siblings, and my grandmother arrived in Grand Rapids, on Dec. 23, 1984. The second youngest of his siblings, he was only 8 years old. Acclimating to this new environment was a challenge. The language barrier was the most difficult, and when they spoke, people really had to listen before they could understand them.
They all grew up in the small house on Cable Street and attended a bilingual school, Sherwood Park, because their English was rudimentary at best. Eventually, they attended Grandville Junior High and, being the first Vietnamese students in the Grandville area, faced constant bullying and defaming insults.
Field day was a highlight of his childhood growing up: the running, the games, the laughter. It was memorable because it occurred every year, but it was the only time that other children truly recognized him as a human instead of an immigrant. While he grew up and attended Grandville High School, his race did not stop him from becoming a varsity soccer player, a varsity track runner, and a varsity wrestler.
He graduated from Ferris State University in 1997 with a degree in product engineering, finding jobs that had him create dies for cars until his entrepreneurship led him to establish his own business: a family-owned nail salon.
Building their lives
The world was slowly getting better, and my family adapted. My grandpa attended temple to try and make sense of what was lost, and he still goes to the Buddhist temple Chua Linh Son every week. Today, he plans to live out his retirement after 44 years of working as an outstanding employee at Herman Miller.
My father attended the local coffee shop built for the Vietnamese community, participated in bands and later created a soccer club called the Grand Rapids Vietnamese Soccer Team – a method of enduring. In due time, he conquered his fear of flying to visit Vietnam after years of learning to live without it.
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Courtesy of Jennifer PhamJennifer Pham’s father, Thong Pham, stands beside his Varsity Letter awards in soccer, wrestling, and track from Grandville High School (2025).
Even with the punishments the war had cast upon them, their dignity is what kept them alive, and it is what motivates me to establish my own safe community.
I was born and raised in Grand Rapids and attended Kentwood Public Schools since pre-school, and I’m proud to be a part of the most diverse school in the state, which is truly something to celebrate.
After my fourth year, I had the honor to run as the sixth-generation student president of the Asian Student Union organization at my school. For years, I struggled to embrace who I was – a small Vietnamese girl in a system that is constantly trying to fight against her – and sheltered myself by dissolving my character into a world that wasn’t mine.
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Courtesy of Jennifer PhamTwo-year-old Jennifer Pham with her mother, Van Le, in front of the food court at Rivertown Crossings Mall in 2010.
In the ASU bylaws, we clearly state this: The Asian Student Union’s mission is to educate, inspire, and positively impact our outlying communities through honoring and embodying the Asian heritage. Home is not the place you live in, but where you make it out to be. ASU has brought me comfort and solidarity, providing a place where we, as Asian-Americans, can come together and celebrate our rich identities. I am privileged by my experiences and opportunities to be able to cultivate the path for many others to call this their home.
My path
Now, I am a senior, less than two weeks away from walking the stage at graduation. I have an opportunity to drive my own discussions, and while I am not changing countries, I am moving far from home for my next step. Bringing my family honor, I will be attending the University of Michigan for the next four years to major in cellular and molecular biomedical sciences and minor in political science, fostering a career in emergency medicine. I follow my sister, who I will join in the medical field, reflecting on the amount of care my family provided me in order for me to provide it back.
I understand the risk that my grandpa took to rewrite his own story; and I know I will never be able to fully repay his efforts, my father’s efforts, and my mothers' efforts. But I recognize them. We are not native-born, American white; but we have the “American Dream,” and I will not disrespect all of their hard work to get to where we are now. Never should they be ashamed of their story, because I will tell it for everyone to hear.
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Courtesy of Jennifer PhamJennifer Pham’s grandfather, Xinh Van Pham, reunites with his wife, father, and siblings on Dec. 23, 1984, after nine years apart.
It has been 50 years since my Grandpa arrived from Vietnam, and 41 years for my father. I had the honor to tell their story, something that hasn’t been discussed for decades, and I am incredibly grateful. I understand now where I come from, and I cherish every action more. As I get older, I won’t remember them through their journey across the sea, or through the troubling years at the beginning of their immigration, but I will remember them for fighting so hard to ensure that I have the best life possible. Their story is not what defines their legacy. Their legacy is the homes they paid off; their legacy is the store my father worked so hard to build; their legacy is my sisters and cousins; and I.
I am their legacy.
Family photos courtesy of Jennifer Pham.
Jennifer Pham is a senior at East Kentwood High School. She took part in GR Stories, a partnership between Kentwood Public Schools and the Grand Rapids Public Museum. In their U.S. History class, students explore how Vietnamese Americans shaped West Michigan by interviewing family members who arrived after the fall of Saigon. Their stories offer personal insights into national history, highlight the impact of the 1980 Refugee Act, and serve as primary sources for future students.