Obituary of Minh Thi Dai

Minh Thi Dai, joined her eternal ancestral home on Tuesday, January 22, 2019. She was 82 years old.  Her life was an amazing remarkable journey that spanned the globe. 

She was born on September 20, 1936 in My Tho, a city in the Mekong Delta, then French controlled  Indochina, present day South Vietnam. She was the youngest daughter in a family of 13 siblings. She is often known as 13, Sister 13, Aunt 13 and Great Aunt 13. 

Her dad, Dai Vi (Chinese/Vietnamese) and her mother, Tran Thi Mau were landowners and owned a rice mill. Despite being born into a privileged and wealthy family, her life was marked with many tragedies due to wars and the political turmoil of the time.

In September 1940, Japan invaded French controlled Vietnam in their attempt to conquer Asia. With fighting taking place in France with Germany, the French government of Vietnam pulled back their troops from Vietnam to concentrate them in their home country. Resources were stripped from Vietnam to feed the French and Japanese troops. Over 2 million Vietnamese people died from 1941-1945. My mother witnessed many deaths from her home window and when she did venture out at night she would see atrocities perpetrated by the occupying Japanese troops upon her neighbors.  She remembers wagons picking up the starving dead corpses off the streets. This may be why she was particularly terrified of the dark and afraid of ghosts.

The Japanese troops confiscated her family home to use as their regional headquarter.  The family was forced to evacuate their home and was split up to live with other relatives and friends in the country side.  During this exodus, her mother died from pneumonia.  Minh was 9 years old.  At the same time the Japanese captured and imprisoned all Chinese nationals, including her father, believing them to be spies for the Chinese.  During World War II, my mother lived with two adolescent sisters and relatives. As a 9-year-old girl, my mother witnessed terrible unthinkable atrocities of the war. To make money during the war, my mother taught herself to crochet and knit by unraveling existing sweaters and hats and reknitting baby sweaters, bonnets and blankets to sell to foreign mercenaries for money to buy food.

After WWII, my mother attended Lycée Marie Curie, a French boarding high school in the capital city of Saigon.  She excelled in school and graduated valedictorian. She loved sports.  She always pushed the limits and norms.  She wore shorts in physical education class and wore western style attire that showed her bare legs! This was unheard of for a proper Vietnamese young lady in those days. Minh would change into her Vietnamese Long Dress (Ao Dai) before she got off the train to meet her father on the weekend for fear of her father’s disapproval of the western style dress. Her father adored her, and she adored him.  He would bring her to all his friends and brag that she was number 1 in her class. He asked her to play the mandolin and sing, especially the French songs, to all his friends. Those were happy memories for Minh.

After high school, Minh attended the University of Saigon wanting to study medicine. Terrified of ghosts, she could not bring herself to take anatomy class so she switched her major to biology. At the university, she fell in love with a medical student. It was a time of civil and religious unrest in Vietnam. Her dear friend was tragically killed during one of the student demonstrations while protesting. Minh's heart ached for him until the day she died.   

In 1962, she fell in love with a charming handsome man and got married in 1962. They had 4 children together, a girl and 3 boys.  Due to life’s complexities and the war, my mother raised her children mostly on her own.

Minh taught biology and French at Ho Ngoc Can High School then at the Phu Tho Technical College while raising 4 children on her own. 

The Vietnam War raged on from 1963 until 1975. During the chaos of the final days of the Vietnam War, a chance opportunity to escape Vietnam arose. She had 30 minutes to decide.  She couldn’t take any of her belongings with her.  Minh decided to leave Vietnam in the hope of providing a better future for her children.  Despite her family’s protests, she took her 4 children and a nephew, ages 5-16, on an epic journey to a faraway place called the United States of America on the last Pan Am flight out of Vietnam.  She left under the assumed names of a family member who had passage due to their connection to the US Embassy but did not want to take it. Minh's family escaped Vietnam under these assumed names on April 24, 1975, 6 days before the fall of Vietnam to communism. They used their real names only after arriving at the refugee camp at Camp Pendleton, San Diego.

Minh's family arrived in Minnesota on June 6, 1975 without any English, money or other family members. With sponsorship from St. Odilia church in Shoreview, Minnesota, the family began their new life in America. The family is profoundly grateful for the caring people of St. Odilia church for all their love, support and guidance during the early days of their life in Minnesota.

Minh got a job as a pharmacy technician working the night shift at St Joseph hospital in St. Paul. She realized that she could not raise her children working the night shift on a meager income.  She decided to return to school. Minh earned a Chemical Engineering degree at the University of Minnesota six years after arriving in the US while raising 5 children on her own and barely knowing English. Upon her graduation in 1981, Minh got a job as an engineer with the Pillsbury Company. She worked there until her retirement in 1992. She was eternally grateful to Pillsbury for taking the risk to hire here.

Minh volunteered tirelessly all her life: collecting food, water and clothes for the soldier’s families or flood victims during the monsoon season. In the US, she helped many newly arrived refugee families establish their new life in Minnesota. She was a founding member the Vietnamese Community of Minnesota, the Vietnamese Buddhist Temple, and the Vietnamese Language School.  She volunteered for Paint A Thon, Habitat for Humanity or wherever help was needed.

On one of her trips back to visit Vietnam after her retirement from Pillsbury she was disturbed by the condition of the schools she visited in the Vietnamese countryside.  So, true to the belief that anything is possible, she committed herself to doing something about it.  Upon her return to the US she created a non-profit foundation to raise funds to rebuild 4 war ravaged schools in rural Vietnam. In addition to 4 new classrooms and desks for the schools, she provided the village with a well for drinking water, an outhouse for the children at school, and school supplies.

She received numerous awards for her volunteer work, notably the Jefferson Award from the American Institute for Public Service, the Rudy Perpich Public Service Award, the KSTP Eleven Who Care Honoree, and the Pillsbury Reach Grant Award. 

Minh loved public speaking.  It was an opportunity for her to tell stories.  She was a speaker at the 1988 Pillsbury Annual Meeting of Shareholders and received the Area 45 Toastmaster of the Year award in 1988.

When the Minnesota winter was just too cold for her to go get her mail, the children suggested that it was time for her to move to Southern California to enjoy the sun, the ocean, and be closer to her two sons and grandchildren. She loved living in Fountain Valley, California. She volunteered at the senior center, loved to decorate the Rose Parade Floats, and taught exercise classes to the seniors. 

Minh never stopped learning. In her 70’s, she purchased a piano and took music lessons. She travelled and lived in China for 6 months to learn Chinese. She walked the Wall of China, saw the city of lights atop the Eiffel Tower, visited Italy, Germany, Hungary, Korea and Thailand.

She laughed heartily and loudly. She loved to sing at parties. Her favorite song was La Vie en Rose.

She loved pink and wore it boldly. When elder Vietnamese told her that she’s too old to be wearing pink, she would boldly wear a brighter pink the next day. She was a “tiger mom” before the term was in the psyche of most Americans. Her children would either get straight A’s, win math or piano competitions or they were nothing.

She was focused, stubborn and unwavering when she set her mind on something. She had high expectations for herself, her children and everybody else. Therefore, she was often described as stubborn, obstinance and difficult. She did not seem to mind those words. She wore them proudly. She used to tell the children, "So what? I get so many things done by not listening to others.”

In Minh's late seventies, she developed dementia and Alzheimer's disease. Slowly her cognitive capacity and strength weakened. In the last several months of Minh's life, she developed terminal cancer. She still kept up that smile and happy disposition.

It was with great sadness that the children watched their mother slowly lose her ability to read, knit, crochet, play the mandolin, and sing songs due to the ravages of Alzheimer’s disease. She played the mandolin and sang for the residents in Memory Care, even when she only remembered 1 or 2 lines of a song. She loved people and was always ready to give a smile and a hug.

With immense courage and bravery my mother, at 36 years of age, left everything she had known to begin a new life in a new country from nothing. Minh's children are living the American Dream because of the courage and bravery of one woman. She gave up her country, home, and family with the hope of providing a better education and life for her children.

Minh's spirit lives on in her 10 grandchildren who she loved and adored.Minh's children are beyond blessed to have such a strong mother to guide them through life, even when she’s no longer with them. “I can’t do this” was never an option for Minh.  When someone told her it was impossible she only viewed it as a challenge to overcome.  Her love and light lives on in her children and grandchildren.

A loving tribute to their mother from her children: Mimi, Tony, Gau, and Beo.

 

 

Preceded By:

Dai Vi (father)

Tran Thi Mau (mother)

7 brothers and 3 sisters

Survived By:

3 sisters:  Auntie #9, #10 and #12

(Mimi) Trang Thanh LeMinh (daughter) & Thomas Zingsheim (son-in-law)

(Tony)   Tan Thanh LeMinh (son) & Mai Banh (daughter in law)

(Tom)    Tam Thanh LeMinh (son) & (Nina) Tuyet Nga Tran LeMinh (daughter in law)

 (Bill)      Toan Thanh LeMinh (son) & Lisa Ann LeMinh (daughter in law)

 

Grandchildren:

Justin Zingsheim, Jared Zingsheim, Selena Zingsheim     

Sean Leminh, Sabrina Leminh

Natalie LeMinh, Anthony LeMinh

Lauren LeMinh, Allison LeMinh, Melanie LeMinh

 

Condolences may be sent to Mimi LeMinh at 2904 Fairway Drive, Chaska MN or at zing.family@hotmail.com

In lieu of flowers, the family requests contributions in memory of Minh Dai to the Alzheimer’s Association. https://act.alz.org/site/Donation2?df_id=32112&32112.donation=form1&_ga=2.29283964.1958206262.1548394241-1458214785.1548394241

Minh was cremated on Saturday, January 26, 2019. Her ashes will go to Giac An Tinh Xa Buddhist Temple in Garden Grove, California for prayers and eventually released in the Pacific Ocean.