MULTIGENERATIONAL CELEBRATION. The Oregon Vietnamese Community Association recently held Tet in Portland 2008, a celebration of the Vietnamese New Year. Known as Tet Nguyen Dan (or "Tet"), the event has grown from a 20-table party held at Benson High School’s gymnasium to its current format — a two-day festival held at the Oregon Convention Center. Performing for the crowd are members of the International School’s Little Dove of Peace Art Troupe’s alumni dance group. (AR Photo/Jin Huang)

From The Asian Reporter, V18, #7 (February 12, 2008), page 1 & 20.

By Ronault L.S. Catalani

Why does she do it?" a young dancer was asked. What makes traditional Vietnamese dancing cool? She is, after all, an energetic young American woman, a face and a place with so many options.

Elegant and precise on stage, eyes polished with joy right after, Cindy Huynh paused a long second before answering. "‘Cause you’re part of our community during cultural events like this. You’re actually doing it, instead of just watching it."

Ms. Huynh, a Pacific University senior and the daughter of a parent educator at Portland’s Asian Family Center, must make her elders proud. Her on-point reply would have made a fitting event tagline for the Oregon Vietnamese Community Association (OVCA), the organization that recently presented two days of traditional and contemporary celebration, February 2 and 3.

"Our community, all these volunteers," said OVCA board president Bac-Ai Nguyen, his gaze sweeping across 60,000 square feet of packed Oregon Convention Center floor, "make it possible for us to cherish and build our Vietnamese heritage."

And this is extraordinary, both cherishing a 2,250-year-old civilization and building her heritage 7,000 deep blue ocean miles from her soil. And yet, Ong Bac-Ai’s OVCA board and volunteers, elders and youngsters, have done it. Indeed, to quote traditional dance student Cindy Huynh, they’re "actually doing it" year after year.

"The year 2008," the board president stated in his Lunar New Year greeting to fellow countrymen and event guests, "marks exactly 33 years that Vietnamese Americans have been away from our homeland and celebrating New Years on foreign soil."

Every New Year since OVCA began organizing families for the celebration, Tet Nguyen Dan (or simply "Tet") has grown as vigorously as Oregon’s Viet Kieu community.

From humble beginnings as a 20-table party in Benson High School’s gym, OVCA core energy and community need grew their 2003 Portland Tet event into a 17,000-square-foot party at northeast Portland’s Holiday Inn. The grassroots organization more than tripled even that expansion by moving up into their present two-day extravaganza under the twin spires of the enormous Oregon Convention Center.

Portland Mayor Tom Potter opened the 2008 celebration. Also part of the Saturday morning welcome was City Commissioner Sam Adams, who noted, "It is wonderful to be with you for my fourth time joining in the Tet New Year celebration." Mr. Adams, a longtime Asian community supporter and mayoral candidate, thanked OVCA and Vietnamese Americans "for helping to make Portland a better city." He went on to wish all 7,000 of Saturday’s Tet celebrants "health and prosperity and peace in the next lunar year, the Year of the Rat."

OVCA’s Bac-Ai Nguyen predicts outgrowing even this premier event site over the next three years.

Sunday’s Masters of Ceremony were KATU journalist Ms. Thanh Tan and Mr. Duke Minh Tran, recently retired board president of the Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization. Performing artists were international and intergenerational, acts were both traditional and contemporary. The audience was often awed.

Classical singer My Huyen sent elders into deserved reverie. Orange County actor and guitar man Adam Ho, his spiked hair adding several inches to his height, knocked his startled audience off their feet with his stunningly unique rendition of Carlos Santana’s "Black Magic Woman." He brought the number to a thundering crescendo, leaving hearts thumping, then politely turned left and asked stage managers, "Should I keep going?" Teenagers squealed, middle-aged knees hopped, grandmas sat smiling ear to ear. He had them all.

Sunday’s crowd got two more American rock classics from Mr. Ho — John Lennon’s "Come Together" and John Fogerty’s "Proud Mary." After a breath, the young Mr. Ho shifted seamlessly into the Vietnamese popular tune "Lau Dai Tinh Ai." All of that with fresh soul. All of it deepening those elders’ satisfaction with their legacy, cherished and growing even this far away from home.

Noting the Viet Kieu community’s cultural integrity, watching event MCs gently aid American-born Vietnamese working their elder’s native language, Oregon entrepreneur, public schools advocate, and Portland mayoral candidate Sho Dozono commented on the difficulty "of cultural continuity, of keeping our languages and cultures alive in the U.S."

"As an Asian American," he went on to say, "I’m so proud of this community celebrating this way, as Vietnamese and as Americans. Celebrating Tet New Year with all of Oregon. Mr. Bac-Ai and his board have been exemplary leaders."

Leadership was a central theme in many, if not most, of Tet in Portland 2008 proceedings and presentations. Most inspiring in the traditional Asian sense, as well as in a modern American immigrant’s estimation, were this year’s OVCA scholars. Ten finalists were announced, asked on stage, and awarded community scholarships. Grade point averages ranged from 3.91 to a perfect 4.0. All contestants were rated on family and community commitments, extracurricular school activities, educator recommendations, and personal essays. One of Jessica Tran’s teachers described the Clackamas High School senior as one of the most "caring and intellectually inquisitive" young adults she’d ever met. The best things a teacher can tell a parent, and some extraordinary expectations of their student.

The 2008 top OVCA scholar award was granted to Elvis Nguyen. As surprised as the Lakeridge High School senior was at the honor, Mr. Cuong Nguyen was even more moved. Overwhelmed with a father’s pride and a working man’s hard-earned fulfillment, Elvis’ biggest supporter said there were no parenting secrets to his son’s success, but "there should be no doubt in his family that everything he does, and everything Elvis’ mother does everyday, is for making sure their son does well in school."

"Ladies and gentlemen," MC Duke Minh Tran announced, "In front of you are our future Vietnamese-American leaders. They will carry on our next generation. We are so proud of them."

Editor’s note: The Asian Reporter sincerely apologizes for not being able to publish the diacriticals marks essential for proper Vietnamese grammar.