a personal story

I recently received an email from an old college friend alerting me to a really unfortunate situation involving someone I care about. Her name is Hoa Nguyen and she is originally from Vietnam. I met her in the fall of 2000 when we were both students at Luther College and I still remember vividly her teaching me how to pronounce her last name with a huge grin on her face ("It's just like the wind, Josh. That's how you say it!"). She married a really great guy, Dan Hanson, a few years later and, frankly, he can say it better than I can:

“My wife, Hoa Nguyen, was detained by four U.S. Immigration officers on August 14th, 2009. Since returning from our wedding in Viet Nam in February, there have been some difficulties making sure we have been complying with U.S. Immigration law. Hoa missed a court date on the 13th of August, as she mistook he date to be the 23rd, and was subsequently ordered to be immediately deported. It came as a shock to us that such serious action should be taken for that mistake. Currently, she is being held at Sherburne County Jail and we are doing everything in our power to secure her release.

Hoa and I have known each other for 7 years. I met her at Luther College and we began dating a year and a half after graduation. Since that time, we have fallen in love, married and we are now anxious to live the early years of our marriage in continued happiness and calm.

Hoa has a wonderful disposition and shares her laughter, smile and wit with all that are around her. She is infectious, kind, an amazing cook and can connect with kids in an instant. Additionally, she has a master’s degree in French from the University of Minnesota. A family as well as a restaurant, a day care, or teaching are her ambitions. She deserves to be in the U.S. on her own merits. She is however, my wife and as a U.S. citizen she and I have the right to be together. I am disappointed that we have experienced this part of our system and regret that we did not seek professional help earlier. Be that as it may, we are in this position and have every intention of making it through this with our heads held high and our relationship stronger."

Those paragraphs from Dan (and the 2 pictures I included here) were taken from a website that Hoa's friends set up to alert people to the situation (http://www.hoadefense.org/). He gets all the details just right but you can sense a tremendous amount of reservation regarding his emotions about the situation...and I certainly can't say that I blame him. For my part, all I can tell you is that Hoa is truly an amazing person; a positive force for positive change with everyone she meets. You might say she's "one in a million" or some cliche like that which cannot even come close to summing up what she's given you with her gracious personality and gentle spirit. Another friend of ours likened her to the human incarnation of a butterfly. This is not far off.

The latest update on http://www.hoadefense.org/ is a letter from Hoa herself. In it she talks about the rigors of living in the jail--no windows, lock downs sometimes for 10 hours a day--but that, "I have started to have dreams again and have very deep sleep."

We've all met people like Hoa and Dan and it would be a shame not to speak up on their behalf in any way possible. I've contacted our three representatives in the Congress (as I would imagine they already have) and am looking to see if there is anything else I can do. These are tremendously good people with a deep sense of compassion, social justice and an obvious devotion to each other. If there's anything that anyone out there can do please do it.