My Heritage is a story of love and separation, friendship and conflict, hope and endurance, life and death through the eyes of three generations of the author's family. It shows the influence of historical and mythological figures, language and poetry on the lives of ordinary Vietnamese. It brings to life traditional festivities in villages, revolutionary activities in French colonial towns, mass destruction in provinces subjected to 'US free bombing', chaos in the cultural melting pot of Saigon, and sufferings under the Communist regime.
From the late 1930s to the early 1940s Minh Hien's grandfather was the Village Chief of Cultural Activity and her granduncle was the Chief of their ancestral village in North Vietnam. Her grandmother was a tobacco merchant. In order to attend school, her father lived with Grandaunt Trinh, who was one of the richest women in Ho Chi Minh's ancestral land. When Vietnam was divided in 1954, her father fled the Communist-dominated North, leaving behind his wife and baby son.
Minh Hien's mother was born in Quang Tri, the first province on the southern side of the Ben Hai River. She lost her father at the age of eight. Bound by family tradition, she worked selflessly for her extended family.
Minh Hien was born in central Vietnam and grew up in Saigon. 1975 saw the Fall of Saigon. In 1977, her brothers were forced to live as fugitives and finally escaped from Vietnam. In 1981, at the age of seventeen, she herself fled her country in a small boat.
My Heritage 'not only recounts the events, persons and places that featured in Hien's life; it gives the reader an unforgettable insight into daily life, into the strong web of relationships and friendships that form the framework of one girl's story and of her country's strength. The detail is amazing, and it lets the reader experience through each of the senses the sights, sounds, and even foods of Hien's homeland ... The horrors of the War, its aftermath, the subsequent lack of freedom and the loss of all once held dear -- these form the matrix out of which the family's dangerous escape is narrated. Yet through all the fear and constant tension, the inherent strength and love of Hien's parents and siblings shine forth. It is hard to put the book down as the net tightens around the boys and the father bargains for their escape with everything he has earned in a lifetime.' Catherine Hammond, Editor.
Author Biography:
Pen name: Minh Hien. In 1981, when seventeen-year-old Minh Hien fled Vietnam in a tiny fishing boat to follow her quest for education, she left behind her parents, her safety and her customs. Through the rough waters, she carried a rich culture and the stories of three generations in her heart, which she now shares in her memoir, My Heritage: Vietnam fatherland motherland. In July 1981, Minh Hien, who spoke very little English, arrived in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia. In November, the following year, she sat for six level-three matriculation examinations and was awarded the prizes for the highest mark in Analysis and Statistics and the Tasmania University Exhibition. She then enrolled for a Bachelor of Engineering and was awarded the H.M. Bamford Scholarship. Four years later, she graduated with honours and was awarded a postgraduate scholarship for a research degree in engineering, specialising in Adaptive Control. In 2006, Minh Hien received an Australian Society of Authors Mentorship to write My Heritage. She has been selected to participate in the ACT Writers Centre's Hardcopy 2019 national professional development program to write her memoir. Minh Hien has worked with more than ten organisations in various industries in Hobart and Sydney and held many senior positions in various professions. She worked at Tasmania Migrant Resource Center, Electrolyic Zinc Company of Australasia, Telecom Australia, University of Tasmania, Australian Newsprint Mills Limited, Tasmanian General Insurance Office, Hydro Electric Commission, Credit Union Services Corporation Australia Limited, Macquarie University etc. She worked as an engineer, IT programmer and consultant, systems accountant, manager, educator, researcher, etc. While working, she studied for eight qualifications in the fields of Engineering, Accounting, Commerce, Management, Arts and Education. Among her postgraduate qualifications are a Master of Engineering Science, a Master of Commerce, a Master of Arts in Writing and a Master of Higher Education with Australian universities. Minh Hien has presented papers at international conferences: the International Federation of Automatic Control in Newcastle, Australia in 1988; the International Conference on Information Systems Management and Evaluation in Ho Chi Minh City, Saigon, Vietnam in 2013; the European Conference on IS Management and Evaluation in Ghent, Belgium in 2014; the International Conference on Computer Research and Development in Nha Trang, Vietnam in 2016, the European Alliance for Innovation (EAI) International Conference on Nature of Computation and Communication (ICTCC) and International Conference on Context-Aware Systems and Applications (ICCASA) conference in Tam Kỳ, Vietnam in 2017; the International Conference on Language, Society and Culture in Asian Contexts (LSCAC) in Hue, Vietnam in 2018; the 41st ACM/IEEE International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE) in Montr�al, Canada in 2019; the 5th VietTESOL International Convention in Hue, Vietnam in 2019, etc.
