In this 2007 essay, filmmaker Doan Hoang talks about making her award-winning documentary, Oh Saigon, and about raising money to build a school with VRE in her father's hamlet.

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"If I could put my finger on the moment my family fell apart … it would be April 30, 1975, the end of the Vietnam War."

I say this line in my documentary, Oh, Saigon. It's a film I made about my family – my family in Vietnam, as well as my family in U.S.

My parents, brother and I were airlifted on the last civilian helicopter out of Saigon. I was three years old. My sister, Van, had been left behind in the chaos of the war. It would be six years and a harrowing boat ride before she joined us in Louisville, Kentucky.

But she joined us, and I thought of us as a united family. After all, we kept in touch with our grandparents, aunts and uncles in Vietnam.

Or so I thought. It wasn't until my first trip to Vietnam, three years after graduating from Smith College, that I realized our family had deeper divisions than I ever imagined.

On that trip, I met Hoàng Thiên Dú'c, called Hai, a pool hall owner, and Hoàng Thiên Dú'ng, a fisherman. They were introduced to me as uncles. I didn't think much of it at first – in Vietnam, I address any man older than myself as "uncle." But then the truth came out – these were my father's brothers – brothers my parents hid from us.

My father had been a South Vietnamese pilot in the war. To his shame, my Uncle Hai joined Ho Chi Minh to fight the French in 1945. He continued to fight for the communists, returning to Saigon the day we left. I never knew this past, until Uncle Hai and myself – his American niece -- had this memorable and embarrassing exchange:

Me: What was it like to live with the Communists all these years?

Uncle Hai: I am a Communist.

Awkward silence.

Me: … umm, what was it like to fight against your family?

Uncle Hai: Uncle Ho [Chi Minh] and the Communist Party are my family.

More awkward silence.

My father's other source of shame was my Uncle Du'ng. He was a sergeant in the South Vietnamese army and was shot twice before he deserted.

My father hadn't spoken to my Uncle Hai in 59 years and my Uncle Dú'ng in 35 years, until this trip to Vietnam reunited them.

As a filmmaker, I knew this was something I had to capture. I needed to record my family's story and to come to terms with my past. I needed to know what really happened. These people were my family, but they were also revolutionaries, communists, capitalists and refugees. They had endured war, kidnappings and imprisonment. I needed to understand my family, to talk about things that were forbidden and to know my roots.

Beginning in 2000, I began filming interviews with my family in America. I kept he camera rolling as I journeyed back to Vietnam and interviewed my family there.

I learned to respect and love my Uncle Hai and his irreverent sense of humor. He supported me and my film unconditionally. And he and my father became friends again, laughing together like children after long years of separation.

I grew to know and love my Uncle Du'ng, the happy-go-lucky fisherman in Phan Thiet, in the hamlet – now a city -- where my father and uncles grew up. He lives together with four generations of his family under one roof. Despite being very poor, he cooked amazing feasts for me, and nursed me back to health when I became ill. He, too, became friends with my father.

I returned seven times to see my family in Vietnam. In that time, I learned how they saw the good times as lucky, and they were positive despite enduring starvation, imprisonments, war and natural disasters. They loved me despite the advantages I had and even offered sympathy when I shared a couple stories of discrimination from my youth. When my father and uncles were reunited, I saw how people with widely divergent beliefs could accept, love, and help each other.

But it hurt me to see the poverty and lack of educational opportunities that my cousins grew up with.

My cousin Lam only went to school until age 7. After that, he had to work to support his family. Now he is a photographer for tourists.

Lam took me to the beautiful nearby sand dunes and beaches of Mui Ne where he works. The dunes are full of children who sell drinks and sand dune slide rentals because their families can't afford to send them to school. It broke my heart when I placed my partially eaten food in the sand and hungry children swarmed it, divided and devoured it.

Hurricanes recently devastated this area – a number of homes and buildings have been damaged, and the school needs repair. The children in school need support in buying required school books and uniforms.

After seeing the poverty of the children in my father's city of Phan Thiet, and my cousin's Mui Ne, I set up a the Nuoc Fund with Vietnam Relief Effort to build a two-room school in one of those areas. We've already raised $3,575 and need at least $6,500 more.

My Uncle Hai passed away last month. In the 10 years since I've gotten to know him, he had become not only my uncle, but also my hero and my friend. Unlike many children from Phan Thiet, he received an education and used it well, living in Mali, Czechoslovakia, and Paris. But like my father, he started out with very little. He wanted this generation of children from Phan Thiet to have better.

(For more information on the film, visit www.ohsaigon.com. If you would like to help us build Ms. Hoang's school, please make a donation to VRE referencing Doan Hoang's Phan Thiet fund. You can contribute online or send a check to VRE at 421 Degraw Street, #4L, Brooklyn, NY 11217.)