Kathryn Burns (18:08)

That was Faye Lane. Faye lives in the Chelsea Hotel in New York City. To find out what she's up to now, go to themoth.org in a moment we'll have a story about a young man risking his life to get his family out of South Vietnam.

PRX Announcer (18:41)

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts and and presented by the Public Radio.

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Kathryn Burns (22:30)

The Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Kathryn Burns. Next we have a story from emergency room physician Pha Le. The theme of the night was stories of safe passage. We met Pha when he called the Moth's pitch line and I'll tell you more about that after the story. Here's FA Live at the Ma.

Apple Representative (22:57)

So I was seven years old. I was living in Vietnam at the time. In the countryside. I lived with my mom, my brother, my grandmother and my aunt and uncle. On this particular day I just come home from school and I was playing in the front yard with my brother and my aunt. Suddenly a man appeared in the front yard. He walked straight up to me, bent down to my level and said, are you Keh KE means parrot in Vietnamese. Apparently when I was growing up I learned to speak very early and I echoed what everyone else said around me. So they called me Keh. And I said to him, yes, I'm Keh. And looking at him, I thought he looked a lot like my seventh uncle, my dad's brother that I visited recently in Saigon. I said, you must be my seventh uncle. And he just smiled, kissed me on the cheek and said, yes, I am your seventh uncle. He then hugged me for a really long time. After that, he asked me to take him to where my mom worked. So we took a short walk and arrived at a tailoring shop where she held a job at the time. I said, mom, seventh uncle is here. She looked up, immediately threw down what she was holding, ran out and jumped on him, and proceeded to kiss him and hug him passionately. I was so confused. So what's going on? When she was able to calm herself down, she walked over to me, got down to my level, and said, gep, this is not your seventh uncle. This is your father. My first childhood memories were of me living with my mom and my brother. But every time I asked about my father, I was told that he died in the war against the communists in Vietnam. My father attended the the Naval Academy of the Republic of South Vietnam. He served many years and achieved the rank of Lieutenant Commander. At the end of the war, because he was on the losing side, they put him in a concentration camp in North Vietnam. The family did not hear from him for months, so they all just assumed that he died. But my father did not die. He survived the concentration camps and he had come home to me. Shortly after coming home, my father took me out of school and moved the entire family to Saigon to live with his mom and his brothers there. He taught me math and English. The little that he knew tried to live a normal life, but it proved to be difficult. Randomly, the police would come by to interrogate him. I did not know this at the time because I was always away every time they showed up. But apparently they would ask him how he spends his days. And when he couldn't come up with all the answers, they would threaten him with imprisonment. This kind of mental torture worked very well because my father began to have severe nightmares about prison that only got worse with time. And it got so bad that after only a few months of being home, he decided that we must leave Vietnam. But how? This is a communist country. You can't just leave. If you want to get out, you have to escape. The only way we knew was to get on a boat and run for the Ocean. But in 1982, one seat on such a boat could cost as much as US$10,000. This is money that we just didn't have. Especially when you think about a family of five. But I knew my dad would find a way. One day I was visiting with my grandmother in the country. My parents showed up unexpectedly late one day. I knew something was going on, so I asked them. And they took me aside and said the next day they would take me back to Saigon and we would be escaping the day after that. I asked them, is the whole family coming? And that's when my mom started to cry. She said that in exchange for my dad's skills as a captain of the boat, he was allowed to bring two people with him, but only two, regardless of the size, age or weight of the passenger. And my two brothers would have to be left behind to be cared for by my grandmother who would send for them at a later time. She also said that I couldn't discuss this with my middle brother at all. He was seven and a half at the time and he could not be trusted with the information. If information got out and my dad was captured, he would be imprisoned. And this time, likelihood is that they would execute him. So we couldn't tell them. So the next day, the whole family was waiting at the roadside. Waiting for a bus to take us back to Saigon. There we were when the bus pulled up. Not a bus that you would recognize here in America. It's actually a broken down transport truck from the 60s that someone had fixed up and put passenger benches in the back. My dad told me to get on first and I did. Sat down on the bench and watched as my parents said goodbye to my brothers. My mom was holding on to my baby brother, already crying, not wanting to let go. But with a little coaxing from my dad, she was able to hand over my baby brother to my aunt who would be taking care of him. As she did so, she began to wail in agony. She slowly got on the bus and continued to cry and cry as if someone had died. Tears are streaming down her eyes, wetting her shirt. And as the bus pulled away, my brother realized at that point that he was being left behind. And he began to cry, which made my mom's cries get even louder. I continued to wave to my family as the bus pulled away and they disappeared from view. We got into Saigon late that night, stayed up most of the night talking with my uncles about the trip. We then woke up before dawn and headed toward the bus station. My dad had pre warned me that we were going to make a lot of exchanges in transportation in Order to avoid detection. It was a long day, so we first took a bus out to a town called Vinh Long. Vinh Long is on the Mekong river delta. This is where I was born because that was where my dad was stationed when he was in the navy. Once we got there, we took a taxi that took us down to the river. And at the river, we took a riverboat taxi that took us out to a transport boat. I remember this transport boat looks like this big brown blob with not many windows, but a huge passenger compartment. Kind of reminded me of a semi on water. Once we were inside, I saw all the other passengers, and my dad spoke up. He said, that night, we're going to transfer over to the escape boat, and all the people on this boat were going to be escaping with us as well. So I looked around, Mostly adults. There were only a few children, all waiting patiently for instructions. We waited for what seemed to be a very long time before a man came up to my dad and said it was time to go. He kissed me. He said he'll see me over at the escape boat because he needed to help transfer people and supplies over. And with that, he was gone. My mom and I waited for our turn, and when it was time, we walked over to the window. My mom handed me to a man standing on a ladder. He carried me down the ladder, and at the bottom of the ladder, he gave me back to my dad. I looked outside, and I could barely make out my dad because it was pitch black except for the light on the moon and the shimmering light off the water. My mom took me into the belly of the boat, where we were to stay for the remainder of the night. We waited for the rest of the passengers to show up, and when everyone found their seats in the belly of the boat, the hatch closed. And there we were in complete darkness, waiting to go. With a sudden roar, the engine started up, and we started moving through the water. We move faster and faster, and all of a sudden, I hear gunfire. I'd never heard gunfire before, but from movies. I knew what that sound was like, and I got so scared. All day long, my dad had been protecting me from the dangers of the trip by building up this sense of excitement. But now he's not there. I'm in the dark. There's gunfire. I began to cry. People. People were crying around me. But my mom stayed strong. She just held me tighter and said, don't worry. Your dad will get us through this. And with those words, the gunfire stopped. I soon fell asleep to the sounds of the engines moving through the water. I woke a few hours later to the sound of people vomiting around me. The smell and the sounds made me sick as well. A few minutes after that, the hatch opened and it was daylight already. It was raining outside. It was my father. He opened up the hatch and walked down the ladder and he stood there and made an announcement to the whole boat. He said, you are all sick because we've made it out to the ocean. And with that, the whole boat erupted in cheers and laughter and applause. We've escaped from Vietnam. We've made it out. But as we found out over the next couple of days, once we got above deck, we realized that our dangers were not over yet. Black and blue ocean as far as the eyes could see. The weather was tossing our boat around. We were still concerned about being recaptured. We were concerned about the Thai pirates that frequented the South China Sea. But on the third day, our deliverance came. It's a gorgeous day. I can almost feel the warmth of the Indonesian sun on my skin. There was not a cloud in the sky and the oceans were so calm you felt like you were going through a swimming pool. My dad deliberately headed towards a cluster of islands that separated into two island chains. He went right in between. And when he turned the corner of this one island, a refugee camp came into view. Our freedom had been won. Our lives were saved. And my life was saved by my father. We waited in Indonesia for a year before we were accepted to America as political asylum refugees. Initially, life in America was tough. At one point we had to live out of a fixed up garage and go on welfare. But even then we felt like we had a life plenty when compared to the family we left behind. It took us 10 years before we were able to unite with my brothers. But we're all together now. My parents live in a home of their own. My middle brother is an accountant. My baby brother graduated from UC Berkeley and is now in sales. I graduated from UCLA for undergrad. I attended medical school in Missouri and did residency in Chicago. I'm now a practicing emergency medicine physician in Southern California. I'm married to a beautiful woman who gave me two wonderful boys and life is good. So deliverance comes to all of us in many different ways. For some is through divine intervention. For myself, my family, it was through the perseverance of my father. He didn't give up in the war. He didn't surrender when he was in the concentration camps. He never gave up in bringing me to freedom. As I was growing up, he always told me the greatest gift you can ever give me is to be greater than me. And even now, as an adult, as a doctor, as a son who's doing everything I can to help out my parents, I don't think I can ever repay the gift that my father has given me. That was hard, but the future is bright for my family and myself now. But no matter what the future brings, I know through the lessons of my father and the legacy of my family to never, ever give up. Thank you.

Kathryn Burns (35:42)

That was fa. Larry Pha is an emergency room physician from South California. He called our pitch line to tell us his story. Now, the pitch line lets you leave a two minute version of a story you want us to hear on our website or phone line. Quite a few people have asked me, are we really listening to all the pitches that come in? And the answer is yes. And it's not just anyone listening. It's the Moth's curatorial producer, Meg Bowles. Meg is a director on the Moth's main stage and also helps cast all of our shows across the country. She knows a great story when she hears one. I recently sat down with Meg to talk about what makes a great pitch.

TurboTax Representative (36:19)

I think a great pitch is one that's a perfectly condensed version of a larger story. It has a real clear beginning, middle and end. And all the elements that make a really good story are in there. The pitches kind of fall into two categories. We have one kind that's like an experience type story, like surviving an avalanche or being initiated into a cult, playing with. Playing with Charles Mingus in a jazz club, helping to evacuate people during Katrina. Things that most people will never get to experience firsthand. And then there are the stories that we can all relate to. The stories of loss and of love and surviving our parents or surviving parenthood and the moment someone made a connection or breakthrough about themselves. I'm always really amazed by the stories that people call and share. And a lot of times it's the biggest moments in their lives. It's the stories that change them forever. And they're incredibly powerful and really humbling to listen to.

Kathryn Burns (37:17)

You directed Fah Le and the story that he called into the hotline. So tell me about how you first heard that pitch.

TurboTax Representative (37:24)

Well, I was really excited when I first heard Pha's story because I had heard about people fleeing Vietnam on boats and I had never. But I had never heard a story from the perspective of a child who was on one of those boats and how that affected him.

Kathryn Burns (37:44)

Here's a part of Pha's original pitch.

Apple Representative (37:46)

My story is about my life. I am an emergency physician practicing emergency in Southern California. But my story begins in Vietnam, where I was born during the Vietnam War. My father was a lieutenant commander in the Navy. And after the war, he was incarcerated in a work camp thousands of miles from his home because he was on the losing side of the war. After almost dying in prison, he was released and we escaped on a boat from Vietnam to Indonesia. From there, we were sent to America to settle.

Kathryn Burns (38:25)

So tell us how you went from taking a story that was a two minute pitch and turning it into a 12 minute moth story.

TurboTax Representative (38:32)

Well, with PHA, it was easy. In the first 10 minutes, he told me about how he grew up. His first memories in childhood were of him asking his mother where was his father. And she would tell him that he died in the war. And so he had no idea that his mom, his father, was even alive. And neither of them did.

Kathryn Burns (38:54)

Right?

TurboTax Representative (38:54)

Yeah. No, nobody knew. They all thought that he had died. But I think when you hear all of these details unfold and you hear that all these different things happen to him in the course of the story, you know that there's more there. There's a main stage story there, no doubt.

Kathryn Burns (39:12)

Okay, so now, on the opposite end of the spectrum, what makes a bad pitch? What should people calling never, ever do?

TurboTax Representative (39:22)

Okay, well, I think my biggest piece of advice is don't tell me about the time your sister went to Mozambique if you weren't with her. This has to be your story. You have to know all the details and you have to feel all the emotions that went along with that experience. So, and my pet peeve, the cliffhanger. I've had Minnie a cliffhanger, and I have called Minnie a cliffhanger back, only to be very disappointed that there's no payoff. You know, somebody will tell. Tell you the story on the pitch line where I went into a store and everybody seemed really nervous and I wasn't quite sure what was going on. And I'm standing in line and then somebody sticks something in my back. And that was the moment my life changed. And if you want to know more, call me back. And then I call them back and they're like, oh, yeah, no, somebody just tapped me on the shoulder. So when I hear a cliffhanger, it is to me a sign that it most likely isn't a good story and that you're using the cliffhanger as a way to get noticed. And I promise, if it's a compelling story, you will be noticed and we will call you so just tell us the story.

Kathryn Burns (40:30)

To hear more of my interview with Meg, you can go to our website, themoth.org you can also pitch us your own story or listen to pictures other people have left. When we come back, the Reverend Wayne Reese tells us about an Easter morning culture clash in Texas in the 1960s 60s.

PRX Announcer (41:09)

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media and in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and presented by prx.

Kathryn Burns (41:17)

This is the Moth Radio Hour from prx. I'm Kathryn Burns, artistic director of the Moth. Our last story is from the Reverend Wayne Reese. He told it on a night we called OMG Stories of the Sacred. Here's Reverend Reese live at the Moth.

Wayne Reese (41:39)

Travel with me, if you will, to a space called the Panhandle in North Texas. Travel with me, if you will, to a time in the year 1960, 50 years ago, specifically the Saturday before Easter. I was in my last year in seminary at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, but I was also pastoring four churches that I had just gone to two months before in January. And I was on that Saturday. I was agonizing to finish my sermon that I had worked on all week long, trying to get it down to the perfection that Christian preachers try to do on Easter. I had put in some of my own experiences and my reflections. I had also dropped in some wonderful quotations from the theologians of the day. And I was ready to preach that day, but I had to wait another day. Now, that Saturday in the evening, some of the 14 of the kids from the four churches that I was serving, Sadler, Gordon, Gunter, and Tioga, they came over to a special time that would prepare them for Easter. At 9 o'clock they all left. And one guy was left. His friend had left him behind and had forgotten him. And Brian asked me if I could take him home to Tioga, and I said sure. And I told my wife where I was going and what I was doing. And so Brian and I jumped into my station wagon and we headed off. But for me, this was virgin territory, uncharted. I had driven these roads in the last two months during the day on the major thoroughfares, but I had not traveled those country roads in the dark. I got Brian to his home, dropped him and headed back. It was about 10:00 at night, and I was needing to get home and get to bed so I could be prepared for the four messages the next morning. And then it happened. I had forgotten to fill up my gas tank that day. My car started to sputter and spit, and then it died. What do I Do. I'm out here in the middle of nowhere. I can't see anything. And so I wondered, where do I go? Who can I find? There was no house around. There were no gas stations around. And so I apprehensively but knowingly got out of my car, locked it up, and started going someplace, not knowing where I was going or when I was going to get there and what I would find when I got there. So I'd walked almost two hours, or at least it seemed two hours. But actually, I found out when I got to the place. I'd only been gone 35 minutes. But I saw in the distance a gleaming light. And like a moth being drawn to the flame, I went to that glow. And as I neared it, I heard twanging, blaring music. And I found myself at a country roadhouse surrounded by pickup trucks and motorcycles. Now, I had never been in one of these, and I didn't know what to expect. But I knew that I had to have somebody try to help me. And I wondered if I would find anybody like that here. So I apprehensively went into the roadhouse, and over on the side, there was a little room. And there were three guys in there playing pool. And so I thought, well, maybe they could help me, or at least they could tell someone who could help me. So I went in there, and just as I walked in, one guy came up to me and he said, hey, I'm Eric, and do you want to play pool? I thought maybe they thought I could be hustled because I had. Well, I looked like I had money. But anyhow, I said, well, I used to play pool when I was in high school. And then I thought to myself, and I had done pretty well, but I hadn't played for six years. He said, well, would you break on a game of stripes and solids? And I said, sure. So I racked them up, went to the get the cue stick, chalked it up, put talc on my hands, and stroked and cracked the rack, meaning they broke. One ball went in. I did it again. Two balls had gone in, three balls went in. And by now I realized that I had, amazingly, gotten back my. My youthful talent of pool. Well, to make a long story short, I put in four more balls. There was only one ball left, the eight ball. This is the piece de resistance in eight ball. I called it for the left corner pocket. I stroked, hit, and it went in. And immediately Eric said, oh, we've got a pool shark in our midst. He was kinder than another guy. He Said, okay, are you a pool hustler in the neighborhood? Well, I thought to myself, what do I say? And Eric said, okay, come and sit down. We sat down, and a couple of other guys joined us at the table. And he said, I want you to tell us why you are in our neighborhood. Oh, man, what did I say to these guys? I said, okay, I'm the new preacher at the Tioga Methodist Church. I'm on the way back to Sadler, which was about 30 miles away. I ran out of gas. I've got to get home because I'm preaching at four churches in the morning and because it's Easter. Roy said, what's Easter? Two of the guys chided Roy because of what he had said. But he said, honestly, I've never been to church before, and I want to know the story about Easter. So I thought to myself, what do I tell Roy? Do I give him the sermon that I had prepared and that was filled with illustrations from Paul Tillich's the New Being? Or do I try to find new ways to tell the story? The old, old story to the new ears of Roy? So I thought for a moment, and then I swallowed and started in. Now, there was this guy named Jesus, and he gathered around him 12 guys, his friends, and they were his gang, and they roamed the countryside together, and they talked about peace and justice and love and God, and they did great things, but the authorities wanted to get him, and so they tried to find ways of either capturing him or killing him. Well, I told a little bit more of the story until I came down to the end and I said, one night, one of the gang ratted on him to the authorities. And so they caught Jesus, and the next day they hanged him on a tree and they killed him. Two days later, they went, some of the gang went to try to find him in the tomb where they had laid him, and he wasn't there. And they searched around and asked around, and finally someone said, God has raised Jesus from the dead and has given him new life. Now, Roy, that's the story of Jesus, and that's the story of Easter. And Roy blurted out, man, that's an awesome story. And I said, you know, I believe in an awesome God. After a brief period of silence, Eric seemed to be the leader. And he got up and he said, let's go get the shark some gas. Hey, I had a new name, the Shark. And I had a bunch of new guys as my friends. Well, anyhow, we went outside and they siphoned some gas from someplace. I don't know where they put it in a can. Eric gave me the can and said, hey, sit on the back with me. And so I got on the motorcycle with him and this was another new first. I'd never been on a motorcycle before. So we traveled three miles down the dusty road. I got off, poured the gas in the can, gave the can back to Eric, and they took off without saying a word. And I was sorry to see my new friends go. Well, I finally got home about 12:30, and my wife was frantic because she didn't know what had happened to me. You see, that was BC before cell phones. And she said, why don't you come to bed? And I said, I can't come to bed. I had a great experience tonight. I got stranded, I got friends, I played pool. I told the story of Easter to new people. I have got to rewrite my sermon because the intellectual sermon that I have prepared for my people tomorrow is not their story. And so she went up to bed, and I hurriedly wrote down the new message that had come to me as I was driving back on that awesome travel from the roadhouse. I went to bed. I felt great and spent and excited. This was going to be a chance to tell the story of the faith that had meant so much to me and had called me into ministry. So I woke up the next morning. I had headed off to the first three churches on the circuit. And each, after each church, I felt more confident and more expectant. And I realized that if at all possible, I would never preach sermons the old way. So I got to Tioga at 1 o'clock and I walked in. And there the people were, 80 wonderful people dressed in their finery. As we were beginning to sing the last hymn or the first hymn, what did I hear outside but a roar of motorcycles coming up? And in walked seven guys dressed in their black leather jackets and their black leather pants, their uniform that they had on last night. And the usher looked at me and wondered what he was supposed to stay. And on his own, he said, could I help you? And Eric, in his great basso voice said, hey, we're here to hear the shark tell the story of Easter again.

Kathryn Burns (54:05)

That was Wayne Reese. He's been a United Methodist pastor for more than five decades and has served congregations in Texas, Indiana, Michigan and the uk he lives in Nashville, Tennessee with his wife and has four daughters, 14 grandchildren, and four great grandchildren. Full disclosure, I first heard this story at dinner back in 2003, but because Wayne's my uncle, we didn't want to be accused of favoritism, which is probably why we waited nearly 10 years to have him tell it at the Moth. That's it for this episode of the Moth Radio Hour. We hope you'll join us next time. And that's the story from the Moth.

PRX Announcer (54:49)

Your host this hour was the Moth's artistic director, Kathryn Burns. Kathryn also directed the stories in the show along with Meg Bowles. The rest of the Moss directorial staff include Sarah Haberman, Sarah Austin, Janess and Jennifer Hickson. Production support from Jenna Weiss Berman and Brandon Echter. Moth Stories Are True is remembered and affirmed by the storytellers. Moth events are recorded by Argo Studios in New York City, supervised by Paul Ruest. Our theme music is by the Drift. Other music in this hour from Tin Hat and Smokin Joe Quebec. The Moth is produced for radio by me, Jay Allison with Vicki Merrick at Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. This hour was produced with funds from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the John D. And Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. The Maul the Radio Hour is presented by the public radio exchange. Prx.org for more about our podcast, for information on pitching your own story and everything else, go to our website, themoth.org.