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Boat People   

Have you ever heard of the "Boat People”?

The term came into common use during the 1970’s and refers to the refugees in Indochina who left their country in mass in old and crudely made boats. The trigger for the mass flight was the end of the Vietnamese War on April 30th 1975 when the communistic North-Vietnam won the war.

Afraid of oppression and poverty the refugees decided to leave the country on old and mostly overcrowded boats (150 to 600 people per boat) to seek asylum in Malaysia. Some of them, like my family and acquaintances of mine were lucky and were picked up by a German, a French or an American ship and got the opportunity to start a new life in one of those countries, however many refugees died at sea (estimation: 250.000 to 500.000 people). At the end of the 1980’s the wave of refugees slowly died down, since finding asylum became more difficult. During that time many families were split because they could only afford to send one or a few members of the family on the boats.

Today the term boat people also refers to refugees from North-Africa, Cuba and Haiti and Indonesia etc. who try to sail over to Europe, the US and Australia.

If you got interested please check it out on the internet.

Hien (Germany)

by chitchatcafe | 2011-09-20 16:04 | マンツーマン 英会話 札幌

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