If Walls Could Speak

Last week I was very surprised to get a visit from Fred Lam Diep, who now lives in Australia with his family. I first met Fred almost 26 years ago when he was a teenager without a country. He was one of the many children who attended the school we were running in our basement for Vietnamese refugees. Fred’s visit to the same building in which he was once a refugee would have stirred deep memories for him. Here’s a little of what he said as he looked back on his time in Hong Kong...

"I will never forget the day I came to Hong Kong: March 18, 1979. I was a carefree boy, but at 15 I began wondering whether I had a future. Every month the camp management published a list of people who had been placed in new countries.  I lined up with everyone else, hoping to find my name on the list. For ten years I walked away from that notice board every month, disappointed. My frustration increased with every omission; I kept asking myself, "When is it my turn?

"I also remember how you later placed me in my first job. We used to call you 'Mama' because you were always pushing us to improve ourselves and study hard so we could have a better life away from blue collar work. After some years, my older brother and his family were sent to the USA, and another brother went to the UK. When they left I felt I'd lost a piece of myself. I have never understood why the UNHCR separated us like that.

"This building is a tangible link to my past. My niece Molly asked me if she could return here as a teacher, thinking the school was still operating! Her cousins that lived here also want to come back and visit."

Fred really stood out among his peers. He was bright and had a fighting spirit. I knew he had what it takes to succeed. I arranged for him to become my interpreter. He accompanied me into the refugee camps and together we found jobs for the unemployed Vietnamese. I could see he was proud of his accomplishments. That was my first taste of mentoring, (informal as it was) and I saw its impact on troubled teens. I have believed in it ever since.

It's most appropriate that the name of this place is the New Horizons Building because if these walls could speak they would tell of the hundreds of thousands of despairing people who have come here for help and have left with new horizons ahead of them and hearts filled with hope.

Please pray with us that this building, which is of historic value to Hong Kong, can continue to be utilized by Christian Action so that the doors remain open for thousands more displaced, marginalized, and abandoned people who need our help, compassion, and welcoming love.

"...I was a stranger and you welcomed me."

(Matthew 25:35)