Going home

Going home Danny Graves left Việt Nam as a toddler and didn’t return for 31 years. In some ways, he felt as if he had never been gone.
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Ðại học Mỹ dưới mắt sinh viên quốc tế Kể từ sau cuộc Chiến Tranh Lạnh, khoảng thập niên 1990, với sụp đổ của khối Cộng Sản Quốc Tế, gồm Liên Xô và các nước Ðông Âu, dẫn đến việc Hoa Kỳ đương nhiên trở thành siêu cường Số Một của thế giới, số sinh viên quốc tế đến du học tại Hoa Kỳ bắt đầu gia tăng mạnh. Mức độ sinh viên quốc tế chọn Hoa Kỳ làm nơi ăn học càng gia tăng hơn nữa sau khi Cộng Sản Trung Hoa và Cộng Sản Việt Nam khởi sự mở cửa ra thế giới bên ngoài với các chính sách hiện đại hóa và đổi mới nền kinh tế của họ. Hòa nhạc giỗ 10 năm nhạc sư Nguyễn Bích Ngọc Một loạt nhiều buổi hòa nhạc gồm hầu hết các nhạc sĩ cổ điển hàng đầu của Việt Nam dự trù được tổ chức tại Nhạc Viện Sài Gòn. nhân dịp kỷ niệm lễ giỗ 10 năm nhạc sĩ Nguyễn Bích Ngọc, một người thầy violin lâu năm của trường này. Cha chặt tay con gái Nghe báo tin con gái ăn trộm trứng vịt nhà lối xóm, ông bố đã chặt đứt ngón tay út của đứa con gái. Ðây là vụ chặt tay làn thứ nhì xảy ra ở huyện Vũng Liêm tỉnh Vĩnh Long chỉ trong vòng 21 ngày vừa qua. Kỹ sư gốc Hoa bị nghi đánh cắp tài liệu mật hãng Ford Một kỹ sư Trung Quốc bị bắt vì tình nghi ăn cắp tài liệu mật của hãng xe Ford. Công tố liên bang cho biết người này sẽ trực diện thêm nhiều cáo buộc khác, một khi có thêm nhiều tài liệu nữa được tìm thấy từ máy laptop bị tịch thu. Chuyện nước Pháp: Phát tiền gây ra cảnh náo loạn (Từ Nguyên) Internet Mailorama, công ty của Pháp mua bán qua Internet, hoạt động đã lâu muốn có thêm khách hàng, hứa hẹn một chuyện hấp dẫn: phát 5,000 phong bao... cho khách qua đường, trong đó có chứa giấy bạc từ 5 Euro đến 500 Euro, tổng cộng là 40,000 Euro. Thay vì trả tiền cho các công ty quảng cáo, làm vậy cũng là một lối quảng cáo... thần sầu. Chuyện nước Pháp: Phát tiền gây ra cảnh náo loạn (Từ Nguyên) Internet Mailorama, công ty của Pháp mua bán qua Internet, hoạt động đã lâu muốn có thêm khách hàng, hứa hẹn một chuyện hấp dẫn: phát 5,000 phong bao... cho khách qua đường, trong đó có chứa giấy bạc từ 5 Euro đến 500 Euro, tổng cộng là 40,000 Euro. Thay vì trả tiền cho các công ty quảng cáo, làm vậy cũng là một lối quảng cáo... thần sầu. Tê giác còn sót ở Việt Nam Tê giác, một loại thú rừng quí hiếm sống ở các khu vực đầm lầy rừng rậm ở miền Nam Việt Nam trước kia, có dấu hiệu còn một vài con chứ chưa hoàn toàn tuyệt chủng. Cụ Phạm-Đỗ Thành Ông Joseph Bạch Ngọc Hòa Cụ Bà Trương Thị Cầm KQ Joseph Bạch Ngọc Hòa $350,000 cặp bao tay của Michael Jackson	He was born in Sài Gòn, yet never really called it home. He was just 14 months old when his parents — an American serviceman and a Vietnamese woman working at the U.S. Embassy — left Vi?t Nam to start their life together in the United States. Young Danny Graves thrived growing up in Florida. He played America’s pastime, baseball, and was so good that he earned a scholarship to the University of Miami. In the following years, he carved a reputation as one of the best relief pitchers in the major leagues. Had he stayed in Vi?t Nam, he never would have played. Although popular in Japan and Korea, baseball hadn’t reached the fields of the country of his birth. Until late last month. That’s when Graves went home to Vi?t Nam for the first time in more than 30 years, part of a U.S. contingent introducing the sport to his native land. The “Bringing Baseball to Vietnam” delegation, organized by the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, dedicated the country’s first baseball field, and Graves and others led instructional clinics for youngsters who put on a glove and swung a bat for the first time. But however much the athlete taught them, Graves learned just as much about himself and his roots. For him, it was a journey that brought him full circle in his life, being in a place that in some strange way he felt he had never abandoned. “I knew I belonged there,” said Graves, 32, from his home near Orlando, Fla. “We went back to the house we lived in... Of course I didn’t, but it kind of felt like I did remember it.” On the trip, Graves was accompanied by his mother, Th?o, now a widow, and his wife, Andrea. For Th?o, it also was her first visit in more than three decades. “I always said if I ever went back, it would be with her,” Graves said of his parent. With the travel party and his family at his side, Graves made a sweeping tour of the nation. The delegation met with Ambassador Michael W. Marine; visited Vietnamese dignitaries; led a baseball demonstration at the National University for Sports and Physical Culture, in T? Son, near Hà N?i; toured the Qu?ng Tr? Province with Project RENEW, which works to clear the landscape of unexploded land mines; visited the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund Community Library in the Dak Rong District; and sampled the sights of Sài Gòn. In other words, he saw up close the land that he’d only heard about. “The little bit that I knew about it before was from the conversation I had with my parents,” he said. “Everyone riding around on scooters, that was the same” as the stories he had heard. Other than that, he didn’t know what to expect. “I had an unbelievable time,” said Graves, who met some of his relatives for the first time. “If you go into it trying to expect things, if it’s something different from what you expect, you’re almost disappointed.” But disappointed he wasn’t. Neither was Andrea. “I loved it,” she said. “I had the most amazing time. The people we met were great. The people we went with were wonderful.” The experience awakened them to the struggles of those living in an underdeveloped nation. The Graves, who have four children, met people who must cope daily with the effects of poverty and a war long since passed. They were so taken by the small library where Th?o Graves read to the local children that they paid to erect a fence around it to keep out water buffalo that roam near it. Another member of their entourage promised to buy books for the facility as well as fund the hiring of a security guard to watch over it. Andrea Graves said they were particularly moved by what they learned from Project RENEW — another work of the Washington D.C.-based Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund — about the efforts to remove the more than 350,000 tons of unexploded ordnance left from the war. “They teach kids in school what a land mine looks like so that they don’t pick it up,” she said. The field where the baseball diamond was dedicated is behind Lê L?i High School in the town of Ðông Hà, in Qu?ng Tr? Province. Project members had cleared it, making the area safe for play. A group of donors, from the New York Mets Foundation to Louisville Slugger to Levi Strauss, contributed baseball equipment and clothing. Major League Baseball also provided equipment along with an official endorsement and help in conducting the baseball clinic for the students. The youngsters the delegation worked with “seemed genuinely interested and genuinely had a good time, “ said Jan C. Scruggs, founder and president of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund. “It’s easy to forget when you get older how much fun it is to play athletics when you’re a kid. It’s sort of an integral part of your life.” Major-league officials saw to it that the school had videotapes of baseball to better introduce the game. Much of what was on the tape was a highlight reel of sorts of Graves’ career, who has pitched for the Cleveland Indians, Cincinnati Reds and New York Mets and in less than two weeks will open spring training with the Indians. By the time Graves got to the campus, students knew they had a star in their midst. “You would have thought I was like the Backstreet Boys,” Graves said of the reception he received from the youngsters. “When they got to see me in person, they were kind of in awe.” As a relief pitcher, Graves doesn’t get many chances to bat. But aside from leading a pitching clinic, he took batting practice for the kids. “Me, being a pitcher, I’m not a very good hitter,” Graves said. “To them, I was Babe Ruth. Every time I hit the ball, you could hear the kids go, ‘Ahhhh.’ They were in such awe someone could hit a ball like that.” Graves said these participants were the best students he’s ever had in a clinic. “They were very quick learners, very respectful, and listened to the directions. That’s just their culture. That’s how they are,” he said. “I just told them a couple of things, and the next thing, they knew what they were doing. These kids are very athletic.” In any story written about Graves, it’s mentioned that he is the first — and only — major-league player born in Vi?t Nam. He knows it’s only a matter of time before he loses that exclusive title. “I definitely believe that,” he said. “They are really excited about baseball. I know they’ve been wanting this for a while... I truly believe some day they’ll be able to have a World Cup team and another Vietnamese baseball player come to the major leagues.” Scruggs said this one field represents a true field of dreams, a land upon which they can carry out their goals for Vi?t Nam. “At this point, basically what we’re hoping to do, now that we’ve broken ground for baseball in Vi?t Nam, is to leverage the interest of Major League Baseball, people in Tokyo and other places to get them... to get some people in there to build some fields, get equipment and build their national team.” Next month, Major League Baseball will host the first World Baseball Classic, a 16-nation tournament in which the best players from each country will compete for their home countries. Graves said some day, Vi?t Nam will be able to field such a team, and he’d like to be a part of it. “If they continue to be serious about having baseball, I would love to one day be a coach over there,” he said. Both he and his wife said they will return to Vi?t Nam to continue what they have started, one day taking their children to show them their heritage. Graves is known throughout baseball for his charitable work, never one to turn his back on a worthy cause. Twice, while with the Reds, he was the team’s nominee for the Roberto Clemente Award, given annually to a player who best exemplifies the game of baseball, sportsmanship and community involvement. Given his fame, Graves has other celebrity friends — San Diego Padres catcher Mike Piazza and entertainer Nick Lachey among them — who have told him they want to be a part of bringing more of the sport to Vi?t Nam. Graves intends to visit in November, and he said that any off-season, he’ll be ready to go. Besides, after one flight to the country, Danny and Andrea Graves said they were left wanting more. “Totally hooked,” Graves said. “We’ve been on thousands of vacations in our lifetime. To the islands. The beaches. Whatever it may be, and you’re always ready to come home.” And Vi?t Nam? “I could have stayed longer.”
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