Students Grab Tiger by the Tail

It might have been Saigon, in happier times.

Banners in Vietnamese proclaimed “Happy New Year” and “Welcome, Year of the Tiger.” A long cloth dragon snaked through laughing, shrieking young people. Musicians played drums and cymbals, and girls in white dresses danced to Vietnamese music.

And everywhere, the rich, spicy aroma of Vietnamese food wafted through the air.

The scene was Cook Elementary School in Garden Grove, and the occasion on Friday was a celebration of Tet, the lunar new year.

Fifty-six percent of the students at Cook are Vietnamese, Principal Lee Kolb said. “And they are excellent students. They love to come to school, and they’re very interested in education.”

Many of the younger students were born in this country to immigrants who fled during the fall of South Vietnam. Others, born there, have only hazy memories of their native land.

“So we try to keep our culture alive,” said Thanh-Thuy Le, a teacher at the school and a native of Saigon.

Six-year-old Brigitte Le-Thanh, serving as mistress of ceremonies, was born in Orange County and knows Tet only from the Garden Grove celebrations. But Cindy Luong, 12, who left Saigon when she was 5, said: “In Saigon, the dragons were much bigger. When it’s Tet over there, it’s very beautiful.”

Le said this was Cook’s “ninth year of celebrating Tet. And we love to welcome guests. It would not be Tet without guests.”

The guests, including officials of the Garden Grove Unified School District, were invited to lunch, prepared by Le and other teachers, of fried rice, egg rolls, shrimp chips, rice cake and stuffed chicken wings.

Boys in blue jeans draped with the dragon costume wound through the classrooms and around the schoolyard. Shawn Vatnsdal, 12, walking in front and waving a fan, said: “I’m supposed to be the god of the earth. I wave the fan at the dragon to tease him.”

Flashing a smile, Vatnsdal said: “My family name is Icelandic. I’m a descendant of Vikings.”

Le said many non-Vietnamese at the school take part in the Tet activities. “We try to involve everyone--Caucasians, Cambodians, Laotians,” she said. “We’re a melting pot.”