Giving Their Support

Orange County’s Vietnamese community has opened its collective wallet and heart to those in need in recent years. Funds raised include:

* $124,000 for victims of a typhoon that ravaged southern Vietnam in late 1997. Nearly 5,000 people walked at Mile Square Regional Park in Fountain Valley. Donations went to the American Red Cross in January 1998.

* $103,000 for victims of a hurricane in Central America and typhoons in Vietnam in late 1998 at a walkathon, the first organized by Latinos and Vietnamese. Donations went to the American Red Cross in January 1999.

* $265,000 raised during the flag protests in Westminster. Protest leader Tuan Anh Ho used the money to buy a Garden Grove building in March 1999.

* $63,500 raised for victims of Vietnam floods at a show held at the Asian Garden Mall, featuring 40 entertainers. Money was turned over to the American Red Cross in November 1999.

* $14,000 raised in walkathon plus an anonymous corporate donation of $100,000 for flood victims in central Vietnam. The money was funneled through religious organizations in December 1999.

* $53,000 raised last February for Si Nguyen, an ailing man who had cancer and wanted to return to Vietnam to spend his last days with his family. He has used the money to build a new house and saved the remainder for his children.

* $100,000 raised for a war memorial at a concert in May. Those proceeds were added to an earlier total of $430,000.

Source: Steve Linh Nguyen and published reports.