Epilogue-Song of Enlightenment

"A long time ago..." (363)

Life is the longest journey a person will ever take. In the Epilogue of When Heaven and Earth Changed Places, Le Ly tells an anecdote about two young boys.  One boy takes the other's arm. Years later, the boy without the arm attacks his enemy's family.  When the boys meet once more, they are given the opportunity to take one another's lives, but rather they forgive each other and move on "to hear the song of enlightenment."  Le Ly describes in the epilogue of her book her hopes for the future.  She has lived through war and continues to see the fighting within those around her.  Her hope, though, is that someday all will see peace.  She discusses her purpose for writting the book: to pass on her ancestry, to tell the story of the peasants, and to share her experiences in life, many of which most people will never know of. Most importantly she shares her discovery of life's purpose: to grow.

Le Ly's epilogue reminds me of the book, Tuesdays with Morrie, by Mitch Albom.  In this powerful book, Mitch Albom recounts the stories and experiences he shared with a man named Morrie.Every Tuesday, Mitch Albom would visit Morrie, his old college proffessor, and be "taught" about life as Mitch slowly dieded.Mitch Albom captured these lessons in his book inspiring people around the world. People were so moved by Morrie and Mitch Albom's journey that movies, telivision stations, and plays have been performed to continue this emotional story.

                             

No matter where life's journey takes you never forget the lessons you have learned.

The end.

Chapter Fourteen- Letting Go

In the final chapter of When Heaven and Earth Changed Places, Le Ly focuses on letting go of her past and moving on to the future.  As she sees the changes in Ky La, her hometown, she decides not to dwell on the past, but rather to change the future. Though she must once more leave her family, she begins to move on from her childhood.  She begins working not to restore Ky La from the war, but rather to build a new Vietnam through her foundation "East Meets West Foundation." She describes her experience saying:

"By coming back to her place of landing, she completed the first circle of her life. By reencountering her companions on that journey, she recited to them the lessons she had learned, and was judged by the universal law-that more-than-physical bond between beings everywhere and at all times- and was told the purpose of her life." (361)

In this anaphora, Le Ly concludes both her journey and book as she recounts the circle of her life. As one grows into a mature adult and is faced with new responsibilities, one is faced with the challenge of letting go of their childhood, closing another circle, and preparing for the new course ahead.  With only two years left of high school, I too must look to the future.  While the past is full of valuable and unforgettable lessons, one must not dwell on the "good old days," but find the goodness in the life ahead.  As Carrie Underwood teaches in her song "Jesus Take the Wheel," one must "let go" of yesterday and hope for tomorrow.

To listen to "Jesus Take the Wheel" please visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=lydBPm2KRaU.

Chapter Thirteen- Finding Peace

The Vietnam War begins to come to a conclusion for Le Ly as she is married to an American soldier and leaves Vietnam to start a new life in America.  As she leaves behind her past, she states:

"...I feel an immense mountain of peace rising inside me. But to rise above the surface of my life, that mountain of peace must break ground." (318)

Throughout the story, Le Ly uses flashbacks to recount her past as she journeys back to Vietnam to start her future.  From the wisdom of age and experience, Le Ly discovers the power of forgiveness and peace in a time of war. As she forgives her past boyfriends who both physically and emotionally abused her, she is able to find peace with her new husband, Ed. Taking the lessons each relationship taught her, she is able to move on to an unknown future. Yet, she finds that her peace must be broken as she must face the pain of parting with her family so she can find peace in a new family. Similarly, on her return trip to Vietnam, Le Ly is preparing to part once more with her family as her time with them is running out.  Once more, she is faced with the pain of parting in order to start a new life. 

Finding peace is a daily struggle.  Finding peace takes chances and risks as Le Ly risked everything she knew for a new life.  Lee Ann Womack's song "I Hope You Dance" describes perfectly the journey to peace and the challenges one must overcome. Written from a mothers perspective, I feel that this song describes Le Ly's hopes for her sons.  She left her past behind so that her family might live. For her sons, she hoped they could have the opportunities or "dance" that she did not have.  Similarly, Lee Ann Womack's song states:

"I hope you never fear those mountains in the distance
Never settle for the path of least resistance
Living might mean taking chances but they're worth taking
Lovin' might be a mistake but it's worth making"

As Le Ly feels a mountain of peace, she realizes she can no longer settle for the easy path.  She takes chances so that she might find peace.

To listen to the song, "I Hope You Dance", please visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RV-Z1YwaOiw&feature=player_detailpage

Chapter Twelve- Finding a Family

Le Ly stresses several motifs during her beautifuly account.  One of her most prominent and powerful themes, however, is the importance and value of family and respect for elders.  Throughout the story, Le Ly is searching for a family.She searches diligintly for her brothers and sisters to return, for a husband for her son, and for acceptance and approval from her parents.  Acceptance is another powerful theme that appeared continuously throughout  the story, When Heaven and Earth Changed Places, as she discovered that a family could be formed anywhere where kindness and love where shown as she states below.

"Now, after nothing more than a good meal and a little kindness, we were almost talking like family." (294)

This quote reflects the "river" and challenges Le Ly has over come in her life.  As she litteraly crosses the Cau Do River, she also crosses the threshold of letting go of the past and moving on to the future.  She takes an unlikely group of travelers and finds a "family" while she also rediscovers her true family from dating and becoming a mother. 

People and children around the world continue to search for a family.  Worldwide, there are over 130 million orphans searching for homes(http://www.ag.gov.au/www/agd/agd.nsf/Page/IntercountryAdoption_Statistics), but from 1999 to 2010 the total adoptions by the United States was only 224,615 adoptions (http://adoption.state.gov/about_us/statistics.php).  Thus, there are still thousands of children trying to find a family.

Chapter Eleven- Almost in Paradise

Throughout When Heaven and Earth Changed Places, Le Ly uses rhetorical questions to challenge the reader to think deeper.  In chapter eleven, Le Ly is challenged to think deeper into politics and her own life as she examines the world around her.  She is challenged to discover what "paradise" is really like and recalls a time when she was almost in "paradise" when she began working at the hospital in Danang. This new job was a paradise for her as she had never been in an atmosphere of such friendly people before.  On her return trip, she rediscover paradise through the eyes of a young girl.  The young girl, upon seeing Le Ly and her American fashion, is amazed at Le Ly's beauty and dreams that someday she could go to America to be in paradise. The young girl is a worker in a factory in Vietnam under the management of a staff of all men except one woman, Tam, who challenges Le Ly saying:


"The world is always out of balance, eh?" (287)


Although this question is rhetorical, the reader is challenged to look deeper into the words of the female manager.  The world is unbalanced for Tam as she is the only woman manager at the factory.  In addition, the world is unbalanced due to the wealth of some and the poverty of others.  Physically even, the world tilts causing the rotation of the Earth to be unbalanced.  Thus, how can one define balance when everywhere their is unfairness? Le Ly believes she has almost found true love in her boyfriend Red, paradise in her job with good people and pay, family as she is almost home, and peace as the war is almost over. Yet still, from love to peace, nothing turns out as planned as unbalance causes Le Ly's scale to tip too far. 


Today, unbalance continues to tip the world's scale as people are faced with disadvantages physically or are unbalanced statistically in wealth.  The richest twenty percent  of the world's population accounts for three-quarters of the worlds income, leaving the other eighty percent of the population only twenty-five percent of the worlds income.  The unbalance of wealth in society is one of the most dividing factors in the world today. Without balance, one is only almost in paradise.

http://www.globalissues.org/article/26/poverty-facts-and-stats

Chapter Ten- Power on Earth

The world is full of choices and as one matures, they are confronted with more decisions, changing the course of their future.  For Le Ly, her maturity came quickly as she was forced to find a way to live to support her family.   Similarly, the officials of the war were faced with decisions that would change the world, particularly Vietnam.  As Chapter Ten unfolds, Le Ly realizes that their is no future for herself in America and begins to try to find a  way out. As she states below foreshadowing her future, she finds that:

"This since of necessity led to one rash act, that looking back, was to change my life tremendously." (256)

That rash act sent Le Ly on the course to freedom in America.  On her return trip, as she speaks with a few of the officials, they discuss the importance of risk.  Le Ly took a risk by making a rash act, but that risk was necessary for her to reach America.  Without risks, Le Ly would have been struggling to get by just as her siblings and mother were.  Similarly, the officials took risks in the war, risks they thought would save their nation, and continually are faced with the decision of risk taking as they try to rebuild their nation.  Le Ly realizes the fragility of peace and how quickly power can shift.

As Le Ly took risks, people around the world continue to take similar risks that sometimes result in their freedom from poverty.  In Argentina, a young girl born illegitimatelyand destined for a life of hardship and poverty, took the risk of going traveling to Buenos Aires by herself when she was only a teenager to begin a life of her own.  That life led to her becoming one of the most influential women in history.  While she was in Buenos Aires, she met Juan Peron whom she married.  With her help, he became the president of Argentina, making her the first lady.  Shortly before Mr. Peron's second election, she died leaving a nation behind distraught for she had internationally helped Argentinians. Her name was Evita Peron.

Evita founded the Evita Peron Foundation
which provided jobs, education, food, and housing
for Argentine people and people around the world.

Today, books, movies, and Broadway plays
have been made in honor of Evita

Chapter Nine- Daughters and Sons

In chapter nine, Le Ly recounts her experiences as a mother and her bond with her own mother and father.  She reminds the reader and illustrates the love of parents.  During the war, parents were faced by constant fear that their children might never come home. As Le Ly's mother, Tran Thi Huyen, describes the world of a parent during and after the war, she states in the epigraph:

"Troi dat doi thay- heaven and earth changed places!"

This powerful phrase that serves as the title of Ly Ly's book describes the turmoil that the war had turned the world into.  The phrase depicts how a society, though not perfect, once survived peacefully was turned completely upside down due to the fighting that destroyed this peace.  It describes how the parents, family members, and friends of those who died felt when they learned and tried to move on after the death of  a loved one.  With such despair, their was little for the people to look forward to as they felt that tomorrow could at the most, only be the same as today. They could no longer look forward to the return of their loved from war or the victory that would end the fighting as both had been taken away. 

Today, heaven and earth continue to change places for people around the world.  Everyday time a child dies unnaturally before the time of a parent as is customary, heaven and earth changes places for that family and their friends.  At times, those living in poverty begin to loose hope that tomorrow can be better than today.  For them, heaven and earth changed places.

Chapter Eight- Sisters and Brothers

As Le Ly recounts her past journey and continues along her present path, she begins to discover that life is full of parallelism and cycles.  Each day is made of  a continual cycle that fulfills the cycle of a week, month, and year eventually completing the cycle of life from birth to death.  She finds that war and peace cycle continuously.  Thus, in a chiasmus statement she says:

"The more things change the more they stay the same." (219)

When Le Ly returns to Vietnam and sees her siblings for the first time in nearly twenty years, she is surprised by how little has changed.  In Ky La, Le Ly discovers that little has changed since the war began except the name of the town itself.  She finds that the people still use many of the same tools and techniques to farm, despite the technological advances that had developed around the world.  Nearly everything, from the housing to the modes of transportation and even the social ranking is still the same.  When she meets her siblings again, she is overcome with the love, but soon realizes that her relatives still live in a world of fear as she states:

"For them the war has not ended." (218)

In addition, she finds that her siblings, though aged beyond their years, are just the same as their parents in appearance.  Though so much has changed for her, she finds that the fundamental aspects of life are the same.  Despite the world that has come between and separated her family, she is still as much a part of them as ever before.  She finds that a woman can love many men, but that no love is the same as the love and relationship between a brother and sister.  Today, though culture and society place different values on family relationships, I find the power of Le Ly's statements.  My older brother and I have faced the world together, but now begin to go our own ways.  Despite our separation as he goes to college nearly 500 miles away, much of our bond and connection has stayed the same.  We both developed into our own people, but are still connected by our sibling love and know that we will always be their for each other. Despite the changes that we will face in the future together, some aspects will always stay the same.

Chapter Seven- A Different View

"From my father's death, I had finally leanred how to live." (215)

In chapter seven, the story of Le Ly's journey reaches its full climax as she discovers how to live. From her father's death, Le Ly learns that "a willingness to live" is more powerful than "a willingness to die." (215) She also learns that love can not remove all obstacles, but it can create a smoother path. While overcoming the sadness of death, Le Ly and her family are drawn together again to morn his death and are able to work together to find the strength to move on. She is finally able to understand that her loyalty does not have to lie with the Viet Cong or Americans, but rather, it lies with her family, particularly, in an effort to protect her son. She understands that the purpose of her life is to be a warrior for those she loves.

From loss, one often finds new growth. While forest fires can destroy whole woods, new life is sprouted from the ashes and a new-ecosystem is formed.  Similarly, on September 11, 2001, attacks across the United States led to the deaths of nearly 3,000 innocent victims.  Later, countless others would loose their lives from fighting in the Iraq war that followed. In addition, the United States and world would be faced with an emotional, security, health, and economic effects as well as countless other challenges.  Yet through all this turmoil, the United States only grew stronger as new growth formed from the ashes of this loss. As the New York City mayor, Rudy Giuliani, stated, "We will rebuild. We're going to come out of this stronger than before, politically stronger, economically stronger."

Before

After

Chapter Six- A Question of Faith

Le Ly is challenged with overcoming obstacles and finding trust.  She finds that "what she lacked in faith" she "made up for in hope" as she uses optimisim as a source of energy to move forward (168). She became fearful for the life of her father who was alone and chriticized by the village.  She was also fearful of men due to her past experiences of brutallity and she was challenged to rediscover trust. 

"It occured to me then that many things I had previously seen from one side might, in fact, have other prospectives." (185)

Le Ly's motivation to see the world from a more objective view came from the actions of those around her that defiled normal stereotypes of the time.  She learned that not all men were cruel and that cultural or racial classifications were only a method of exterior devision.  True differences in people could only be defined by personality differences.  As a result, Le Ly began working with people who were often avoided by selling on the back market to all men she found trustworthy including those with glasses who had originally been seen as dangerous or Americans who were capable of imprisoning her. 

Descrimination continues to be a component of society today as people struggle to put faith in one another based on age, gender, race, or cultural differences.  From the beginning of time, people have been seperated by physical differences including the enslavement of Isralites in Biblical times to the enslavement of Africans in one's own colonial history.  Countless cases of descrimination are fought in courts across the country and around the world as seen in the 2009 US Statistics of Discrimination and Retaliation. To see these statistics, please visit  http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/statistics/enforcement/index.cfm.

Chapter Five- Losing Love

With the new challenges of being an unwed mother in a society where this was condemned, Le Ly is faced with new challenges and must discover love more deeply.  In chapter five, Le Ly confronted with the truth that the father of her child does not or can not love her.  She is also confronted by her mother who encourages Le Ly to try to kill her child by potions. In addition, Le Ly reflects upon the loss of her beloved brother who had been her best friend and all war victims. She learns that death and tragedy are inevitable parts of life that challenge love.

"Sometimes it is an act of compassion to simply do nothing at all." (144)

Le Ly had the choice of making life for the father of her child, Anh, worse, but rather she decided to do nothing at all. Le Ly could have killed her child and not been burdened by extra costs, but rather she chose simply to do nothing at all. Le Ly could have tried to prevent her brother from fighting and leaving but she new he did not want to go either and that challenging authorities would only cause more harm, so as an act of compassion, she chose simply to do nothing at all.

Daily, people make decisions or are effected in ways that can change not only their lives, but those near them too. Friends and family members of cancer patients are constantly challenged to support and love a person when there is nothing they can do to help or protect them.  While many family members and friends of soldiers wish they could prevent a soldier from fighting, it is out of love for not only their friend or relative, but the nation and world as well that they do nothing to prevent them from fighting.  It is our of love that a parent lets their child fall or be hurt so that in the end, the person can be stronger and better prepared for the future.

Chapter Four- Losing the Way

As Le Ly continues to grow into a mature lady, she is forced to begin her own life.  At first, her choices lead her astray from the customs and practices of the time and she is challenged to discover herself.  She is exiled from her community, the only community she has ever known, after being brutally and emotionally violated wrongly by those she had tried to help.  Le Ly and her mother are forced to begin a new life and are challenged to learn how to survive in a confusing world different from their own safe farm. Le Ly describes her struggles using tautology as shown below to describe her feelings.


"I had no idea what these confused new feelings could mean." (124)

Her journey leads to her search for a better life as she becomes an unwed mother and her search for the strength to move on as she returns to Vietnam in 1986.  Her struggles for acceptance and search for new life are similar to those faced by nearly every person today.  From school to businesses and politics, people fight daily to find support and love from others.  Whether one has moved to a new place or is trying to find a new hope in life, people constantly struggle to understand and find their way.  Guided by their feelings, people look to the past in hope to find a better future like Le Ly on her return journey to Vietnam.  No matter how smooth the path, journeys are unpredictable and one may "lose the way."

Chapter Three: Open Wounds

As chapter three begins, Le Ly is boarding the plane for her return journey to Vietnom.  She is affraid of how her family might welcome her due to the "open wounds" remaining from her departure in the 1970s.  She also fears the "open wounds" that the Vietnom war might have left on a struggling country. As her new journey begins, she reflects upon the journey she has taken to get here and remembers her own wounds in her life. 

During the war, Le Ly was taken captive several times due to her mistakes and the mistakes of others who falsely accused her. She is brutally beaten and morally scared from her experiences.  She must learn to trust in a world that is untrustworthy and how to live in a world of death.  Her experiences are beyond any of a normal child's as she sees suffering and death constantly. The brutallity she witnesses and experiences is beyond that of any movie rated "X" or "NC-17" and worse than most adults today could handle. Her family, community, and world became torn apart as war ripped through Vietnam.  Still, though, she finds hope through deductive reasoning like listed below.

"Living things breathe and as long as I could feel my own breath I would know I was alive." (91)

As Le ly described her experiences in the war, I was continually reminded of those who lost their lives in the World War II Holocaust.  Thousands of people were murdered, some due to their own mistakes while most lost their lives do to the mistakes of others. The people effected by the Holocaust witnessed unimaginable brutallity and the worse of human nature yet still some survived and learned to forgive. 

To learn more about the Holocaust, please visit http://www.ushmm.org/holocaust/.  For further reading about the experiences of war, especially the Holocaust, please try reading Night or The Diary of a Young Girl.

Chapter Two: Fathers and Daughters

As the story progresses, Le Ly informs the reader of the events occurring around her village.  She explains how the war has developed into a violent force that has divided both the nation of Vietnam and her own family.  In the second chapter, Le Ly focuses on her relationship with her father and the moments they share working together in the fields.  She describes the hardships war has caused and her own innocence in understanding which side to support.  She reminds the reader that the truth of goodness is not always clear as her own knowledge is controlled by the government and teachers she has.  She is uncertain of who to support as her siblings go off to separate sides.  Most importantly though, she leans of the sacrifice of war as her father tries to protect her.

"As usual, my father played an important role in keeping me safe and alive...For me and most other children, the new war was still an exciting game. For my father, it was a daily gamble for life itself." (47)

Le Ly has become involved in the war as she serves as a spy for the Viet Cong army.  This position puts her in constant danger and as a young girl, she is often too inexperienced to know how to avoid trouble.  Her father, however, knows of the implications that could arise and works to protect Le Ly.  He acts as her scapegoat and puts himself in such a position, that his own life could be at risk. His love shows the compassion and protection of a father and the bond between fathers and daughters.

Steven Curtis Chapman describes beautifully the love of a father for his daughter in the song "Cinderella". The hardships this father face are similar to the hardships of war while his love for his daughter is like that of peace, but on a very different scale. He describes both hardships and love through a father's eye in the lyrics as listed below. One may listen to "Cinderella" at http://stevencurtischapman.com/cinderella.htm

"She spins and she sways to whatever song plays, without a care in the world. And I'm sitting here wearing the weight of the world on my shoulders. It's been a long day and there's still work to do, she's pulling at me saying 'Dad I need you!'"

Chapter One: Coming Back

     

In many cultures, stories are used to teach morals, explain hardships, and entertain communities.  They are passed from generation to generation uniting society by a common bond.  For Le Ly, a young peasant girl growing up during the Vietnam War in Ky La, stories served as a foundation for her childhood and a means of continuing custom.

"God gave the messenger two magic sacks.'The seeds in the first,' god said, 'will grow when they tough the ground and give a plentiful harvest, anywhere,with no effort. The seeds in the second sack, however, must be nurtured; but, if tended properly, will give the earth great beauty.' Unfortunately, the heavenly messenger got the sacks mixed up, and humans immediately paid for his error: finding that rice was hard to grow whereas grass grew easily everywhere, especially where it wasn't wanted." (6)

As the book begins, Le Ly informs the reader of the value of customs, family, and hard work in the Vietnamese culture.  She informs the reader of the daily life of her early childhood and the hardships she faced as she grew from a seedling to a flowering plant.  The above frame device represents the Vietnamese belief of the reasons for their struggles.  In the story, the seed in the first sack represents rice while the second was grass. They believed that god had not meant for them to struggle, but rather an error led to the hardships she and her family faced as farmers of the land.  Theses seeds, however, can also represent the struggles of society and human nature. At times, it takes work and "coming back" or trying again to succeed.  For community or individual growth, it takes careful planting, nurturing, and the acceptance that success may not occur.  Grass grows wild and can be seen everywhere like one's personal weaknesses and the corruption of society that sometimes grows untaimed.  With a little care the seed can grow and grass can be taimed.

In the first chapter, Le Ly describes her past, present, and future journeys through her life.  She recounts her past to explain her present and describes how her coming back to Vietnam is like the harvesting she did as a child.  She does not know whether her return trip to Vietnam, after having moved to America in the 1970s, will be a success as she tries to reunite with her family or if it will end in her own death. With gentle hands though, she tills the soil and lays the foundation for her journey home in the early stage of the book.

Le Ly's struggle as both a farmer and a traveler are similar to that of the American pilgrim, Laura Ingles Wilder. Like Le Ly, Laura Ingles Wilder wrote a book about her journeys called Little House on the Prarie which described her hardships growing up as a farmer and pilgrim in America. Both Le Ly and Laura Ingles Wilder had their own faults, but planted seeds to better the world.  They both hoped to pass on their stories to generations to come.  They both valued family and viewed customs as an important part of daily life. Today, they both have made an imeasurable impact on society by capturing the truth of the past as their stories are retold orally, in books, and even in movies.

              

When Heaven and Earth Changed Places: Prologue

Life is filled with enldess emotions from happiness to sadness, love to hatred, peacefullness to suffering, and understanding to confussion.  These emotions not only define who one is, but also who one will be as emotions guide one's decisions and actions along the path of life. In Le Ly Hayslip's When Heaven and Earth Changed Places, she recounts the beginning of her journey of life by connecting with the reader through the power of emotions.

In the Prologue of the story about a journey from war to peace,   Le Ly prepares the reader for the path ahead which is characterized by suffering on a road to peacefullness in the antithesis:

"The special gift of that suffering, I have learned, is how to be strong while we are weak, how to be brave when we are afraid, how to be wise in the midst of confusion, and how to let go of that which we can no longer hold. In this way, anger can teach forgiveness, hat can teach us love, and war can teach us peace."  (xv)

This powerful quote reflects the theme of the journey for Le Ly, in that, despite the suffering and hardships she faced, she continued to find the positive in each situation and thus, was able to survive.  Today, Le Ly's lesson continues and is taught by people around the world who, despite being faced with suffering, found the optimism to continue on life's journey.  Josh Bleill is an American hero who on October 15, 2006, lost both of his legs to roadside bomb in Fallujah, Iraq. Though he could have given up, he fought on and today serves as the inspiration for a nation.  Mr. Bleill has come to represent a true soldier's heart as he chooses to not only fight for his own life, but the lives of others.  He inspires people daily through his book One Step At a Time and as the spokesperson for the Indianapolis Colts. One can follow him at http://joshbleill.blogspot.com/.

Josh Bleill leading 66,033 people in the National Anthem at
 the Indianapolis Colts' stadium 

Josh Bleill's Book