It's Thanksgiving week.


I'd like to share a thanksgiving report my lady and I received two nights ago...about America.


We traveled with Win and Dawn(husband and wife, naturalized citizens native to Vietnam. Names protected.) to hear their son sing in a state wide concert. Win is one of my favorite heroes. He was an officer in the Republic of Vietnam's Army and served along side our service men there.

After we cut and ran and snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory (I'll write about that soon enough) millions were left to deal with a hateful communist enemy. Win and family were soon overcome by the communists.

Dawn had a private school in Saigon which was quickly confiscated as well as their home. Dawn and her three little daughters were cast onto the streets. Win was locked up in a communist jail...for eight years...three in solitary confinement. Win was regularly tortured by the communists, demanding a recanting...

Their crime? They were Christians...Vietnamese Catholic Christians.

They would hang Win upside down in some type of plastic bag and beat him with rods over his entire body...demanding that he renounce Christ. His response was always the same to the guards beating him, "I love you and Jesus loves you."

After eight years he escaped one day amid bullets "popping and wising" (his words) around his head like bees. Somehow...after several days...he managed to make it to a beach ...and eventually to America. He then resolutely began a five year journey to rescue Dawn and two of their daughters from Vietnam...remember the "boat" people? Ultimately he was able to rescue their third daughter. Dawn, Win, and one of their daughters currently live in our community where I have gotten to know them.

Coming back from the concert two nights ago I was able to ask Dawn about her years in Saigon with Win in prison and their former lives shattered.

Her response took me off guard.

"Oh, Chuck...I always would dream about coming to America...it was the dream that kept me going...I would just dream about maybe one day coming to America...all the time."

"Dawn, you dreamed about coming to America?" I asked.

"Yes, Chuck, I would dream about coming to America...because America is Paradise!"

"Paradise?"

Giggling in her delightful Vietnamese voice she said, "Yes...Paradise...for you see here we can work, and own our own home, and I have my own business now...yes Chuck...America is Paradise!"

Dawn was dead serious. I fought back tears.

We live in Paradise...don't let anybody tell you different...I've a credible source.

XtnYoda, shalomed