Garden City ? Ngoc Hong Le never thought his journey to freedom would begin in prison, nor did he think he would ever leave his homeland.

Le was born and raised in Vietnam. He married his wife there and had five children.

He said, through an interpreter, that in Vietnam, he was never free. As a South Vietnamese soldier in the 1960s, he did everything in his power to fight the communist overthrow.

He helped American prisoners of war escape from the Viet Cong, but he himself eventually was caught in 1975 and imprisoned for six years.

Le said the Viet Cong forced his children out of school and threatened to take hostile measures against anyone who helped him or his family.

“I was afraid,” he said. “In prison, I knew I was alive, but I worried for family.”

Once he was released from prison in 1982, Le was placed on probation.

“The communists told me where to work, so I work,” Le said. “They tell me where my kids go to school. Everything government controlled. No choice. Just do what you’re told.”

Southeast Asian Mutual Assistance Association has been in Garden City serving the Asian community since 1989.

Its doors were open to Le when he first set foot on Kansas soil in 1994, and to him, the agency was hope.

“Many of the people we help are refugees,” said Shelly Dinh, director of the agency. “Most of them don’t know English, have no housing, no job. I help them.”

The agency, located in the middle of East Garden Village, has its own suite that Dinh manages full time.

Dinh said her budget allows only for her and a part-time employee, but, she said, she doesn’t mind working long hours to help refugees settle into their new environment.

Dinh said when Vietnamese refugees first came to the United States, many families were split apart because U.S. sanctions allowed them to take only children who were younger than 21. Those older than 21 had to remain in Vietnam.

She said many of the more recent refugees are those older children originally left behind during the Vietnam War.

“I help them with bills,” she said. “Many don’t have a car, so I use mine and pick them up. I’m here to help, not judge.”

In 1982, Le was no longer a prisoner, but he wasn’t free either.

He said he would spend the next 11 years on probation, scraping by, unable to provide an adequate living for his family.

Dinh said the American government had lobbied for his release in 1992, but the Vietnamese government refused.

Dinh said Le received an American sponsor who had raised enough money to bring him and his wife to America, but he had to leave his children behind. His sponsor was Catholic Social Service, an agency in Garden City.

“I cried,” he said. “The Viet Cong had been cruel.”

He said he was particularly concerned about his children, whom he couldn’t protect while he was in the United States.

In 1994, Le and his wife were America bound.

The couple was sent to Garden City to start over, which proved to be trying.

Both had to adjust to a democratic society – a society where choices existed regarding employment and housing, where children could go to school and people could live without the threat of government retaliation for speaking one’s mind.