A shining beacon

Sunday August 17, 2008

He left Vietnam in search of a better future and ended up as a lieutenant governor in South Australia. ONE of the first Vietnamese refugees to arrive in Australia, Hieu Van Le never imagined that he would, one day, be appointed the lieutenant (deputy) governor of South Australia. All he wanted when he left Vietnam was a better future.
That was in 1977, two years after the fall of Saigon (now known as Ho Chi Minh City) to the communists. Le was then 20 years old.Le believes it is important to learn about other cultures.
"In the aftermath of the war, I realised we didn't have much of a future (in Vietnam) as family members who had been part of the South Vietnamese government were placed in re-education camps while our property was confiscated."We had nothing except the clothes we were wearing," he shares, in an interview in Adelaide.So, Le and his wife Lan, made the decision to leave Vietnam. They arrived at a refugee camp in Pulau Tengah, Malaysia, in 1977, in a wooden fishing boat."We stayed at the camp for a few months. I befriended an ex officer from the South Vietnamese navy who taught me about navigation."Eventually, with permission from the Malaysian Government and the assistance of the Red Crescent Society, we managed to buy a good map," he says.Le and Lan, together with 39 other people, left for Australia in the same boat they had taken from Vietnam. It took them a month to arrive in Darwin, with Le as navigator. They were put in a quarantine complex for a week.
"We were sent to Adelaide where we have lived ever since," says Le.
Le now has two sons; the elder is in his final year of a pharmacy degree while the younger is in Year 12. Le says language was not a problem when he first arrived as English was one of the languages he had been taught in school in Vietnam.
"However, I had an American accent as our teachers were from the United States. It was a matter of adapting (the accent) so others could understand us," he says, adding that his teacher was from Texas."Language is so important when integrating into a new society," he says.
Unfortunately, his qualifications in economics and management from a university in Dalat, Vietnam, were not recognised in Australia.But this did not deter him and he eventually obtained both a bachelors degree in economics and accounting and a masters degree in business administration from Adelaide University.Le is now a senior manager with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, and also a member of the Australian Society of Certified Practising Accountants.Le is the first to admit that he has been lucky in life.
"Starting anew in a strange country is not easy but we received a lot of assistance. I was overwhelmed by the kindness shown, and wanted to repay this kindness," he shares.
When they first arrived in Australia, not many people knew the Vietnamese culture. But they did know about the Vietnam war, from television, Le adds.
This instilled in him a desire to promote the Vietnamese culture so that others would know more about it. He soon became committed to promoting multiculturalism in the state. South Australia alone has migrants from 200 countries.
One thing led to another and in 1995, Le became a member of the South Australian Multicultural and Ethnic Affairs Commission.
He even served as its deputy chairman before becoming the first Asian appointed commission chairman in January last year.
"The role of the commission is to advise the government on multicultural or ethnic affairs. We are the eyes and ears for the government on such issues," he explains.
The commission also aims to enhance understanding about ethnic diversity among the South Australian community.
According to Le, new migrants need a good support system. To help them, the commission provides services such as interpreting.
The government also funds the commission to teach migrant children their native language, be it Cambodian or Chinese, so they do not lose their ability to converse in their mother tongue.
"We hope that by doing so, the younger generation will grow up to be multi lingual and multi cultural," he adds.

By KAREN CHAPMAN