The Story of Duc

Cyan and Dylan

I asked Marco to write about Duc and how he became a part of the Davis family:

Dylan Duc Davis Dang (as the official naturalization papers state) was born in Dalat, Vietnam, in 1976. His mother was a doctor, but she died when he was three or four years old, so he was raised by his grandmother. He never knew who his father was. He had two half-brothers, each with different fathers. The oldest was half-american (a "GI-Baby"). GI-babies, like his brother, were considered enemies in Vietnam, were officially discriminated against (no jobs, no school), and were not considered vietnamese citizens, and in the early 1990s the Vietnamese government decided to get rid of them all, since they were then coming of age. So at a time when everyone was smuggling there way out of Veitnam, they gave exit visas to all the GI-babies. Since it was such a disgrace to have a GI-baby in your family, they gave exit visas to their siblings and parents too.


Grandma knew an opportunity when she saw it, in about 1991 she loaded her three grandkids, then about 14, 16, and 18, on the boat with a man who suddenly claimed to be Hau's (brother number two's) father. They spent about a year in a refugee camp in Philippines and then got settled in Maryland where Hau's maybe father left the boys to fend for themselves. The oldest brother was put in charge of the other two, but he wasn't a very good surrogate dad...

Soon the Mormon missionaries tracted out the family and Duc, who was then around 15 (but seemed alot younger) got very interested in the church and was baptized. His brother made fun of him though and used to beat him up when he went to church, so the missionaires one day asked us if we would "adopt" him. We said yes, and he came to live with us. At first he was pretty timid and quiet, but gradually he became one of the family. He helped finish the basement of our house, got a job at 7-11, went to early morning seminary every morning (with some reluctance, some days), delighted us with stories of swimming with snakes and running from lions. He could do one handed pull-ups, was a good gardener, kept pet crickets, made up funny vietnamese rhyming poems, brought home stinky durian fruit, and did well in school (though we were always angry with the dumb high school that segregated all the vietnamese (and other foreign language kids) and essentially prevented them from learning English by letting them take almost all their classes in their native language). And he loved to cook for us. ... he's a great cook! (He had worked for an uncle's restaurant in Vietnam).


After high school graduation he surprised us by going to the bishop in secret and putting in his mission papers. He got his call when we were on a cross-country camper trip -- we had it fedexed to our friends in Iowa where we were passing through on our way to Utah. He served in the Oakland California mission -- where he finally really learned english well, and gained lots of confidence and people skills. And he met a family that weren't interested in the church much, but realized they had met before. They had lived in the same refuge camp in the Philipines when Duc was passing through. They became good friends and after his mission, he went back and lived with them after his semester at UVSC convinced him he didn't want to stay in Utah any longer...! And the nice family had a daugter, Ngoc, who was studying finance at UC Davis.


Duc went back to work for 7-11, but this time on the corporate career track, and pretty soon was a regional trainer and manager. Eventually he was tranferred by 7-11 back to Maryland, where he kept climbing the corporate ladder, and kept up his long-distance relationship with Ngoc (also known as Cyan)(Duc started also using the name "Dylan"). We kept in touch over the years and he showed up for weddings or other big events, and we would always get together when we were in CA or MD, but mostly he was independent. And we were always bugging him: when are you going to marry Cyan? In his own good time, which meant, he wanted a house first. Which he finally bought last year after 7-11 transferred him to Austin Texas, and he bought a beautiful home on 5 acres. No more excuses, so they got officially engaged soon after his move, and last weekend, got married. Now they're on a 3-week honeymoon to Vietnam, and then they'll set up housekeeping in Texas -- living the American Dream! We love you Duc.