Posted on 06/05/2006 5:08:41 AM PDT by Ellesu
BAYOU LA BATRE, ALA. -- The afternoon before Hurricane Katrina arrived, Vo Loan, 11, who like other Asian-American children in Bayou La Batre serves as English translator for her parents, was out with her mother when the police rapped at their door.
Her father, Vietnam-born Nguyen Hung, answered.
The two officers warned Nguyen in English that flooding from the major hurricane could be deadly and that his family should evacuate.
He didn't understand, he explained to a reporter last week, speaking through his daughter at their small white house. "My van was broken, but I could have found another way to get us all out," Nguyen said.
When Katrina stuck early on Aug. 29, the family escaped the rising water in their home by taking shelter in their beat-up 1989 van in a nearby parking lot on higher ground.
"There was no communication infrastructure in place for the Asian community on the Gulf Coast before the storm. None," said Nguyen Dinh Thang, executive director of Virginia-based Boat People SOS. "We knew we had to change that before this year's storm season."
To that end, the Vietnamese advocacy group has spent the nine months since Katrina laying the groundwork for a Gulf Coast-wide news network set to be available through satellite television and radio spots this hurricane season.
The programming, for now, is broadcast only in Vietnamese, but the group hopes to open a Biloxi, Miss., radio station this summer that could also deliver information in Laotian, Cambodian, Spanish and other languages.
(Excerpt) Read more at nola.com ...
/sarcasm
Why do that when they can do this?
To that end, the Vietnamese advocacy group has spent the nine months since Katrina laying the groundwork for a Gulf Coast-wide news network set to be available through satellite television and radio spots this hurricane season.
And get it paid for by tax payers.
After, what, 30 freakin' years, you'd think that would be something that someone just might be able to accomplish.
I say kudos that they have taken steps to ensure their own safety instead of just whining about how EVIL we are for not providing this service for them. Now they need to take the next step and learn the language of their adopted country.
Of course that big green and red blob on the weather channel, the grocery store shelves emptied, and the neighbors nailing up plywood and heading out weren't clues.
Or the fact the police spent the time to try to tell him SOMETHING!
I say FRiends, this article has been FReeped.
If I were living in a foreign country for a very long time, I'd at least take the time to learn to speak THEIR language..........
I've lived in Japan through two typhoons. Either you learn your local environment or you're in trouble. That's just natural existence.
Se habla Espanol, Senor?........
But if you were to say "free government handouts" ,they would all come running your way in a stampede
That's just typical of the lazy incompetent US police not bothering to learn every language in the world on the off chance they might need it. . . . ./sarc
This is a lot more warning than people would get in most other countries. Plus here you have TV and radio weather 24/7. Free English classes. No excuse.
***Of course that big green and red blob on the weather channel, the grocery store shelves emptied, and the neighbors nailing up plywood and heading out weren't clues.***
Yep, and if you speak only a foreign language, you have to shop SOMEwhere where they speak your language, and you usually live in an area where people speak your language, as well. So how come NOBODY told them?
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