Funding for this program is made possible by the Mississippi Gulf Coast National Heritage Area the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources, and by Mississippi State University.

[thoughtful music] [Emma To] My earliest memories of Biloxi was whenever we lived in Bayou Auguste.

I remember it was just a whole community of Vietnamese people living there, so I saw a lot of people who looked like me.

[rustling] When you first walk out, there's a big oak tree that they built the project's building around.

You see a bunch of Vietnamese kids playing in the parking lot, and they'll get this little ball that looks like it's tie dyed from the Family Dollar off of Division Street.

And we will play kickball with that ball, and then you'll see other Vietnamese kids playing Chinese jump rope.

You see my brothers who were in their teens, who were obsessed with football because I think that made them feel more American.

[crickets chirping] And we played until the lights, the night light came on, and then we all went inside the house.

And at night, I remember we had to lock the deadbolt, and then we had a chain lock, too because you would get robbed.

We got robbed all the time.

Mom and dad were just trying to make it in America, and.

I didn't even realize life was anything different.

[fireworks popping] [calm music] [background chatter] When my parents first moved to Mississippi, they lived in Pascagoula, and they lived in a house that they rented.

But when they were figuring out where to move to in Biloxi, a lot of the Vietnamese people told them, hey, you want to live in this area, which is the Biloxi Back Bay or the East side near Point Cadet.

My parents would say, "why?"

It was like, "well, this is the part where they accept us, and if you go to other parts, they might not accept you."

[Tim Isbell] It looked like it-- not that I've ever been to Saigon before, but it looked to me like a Biloxi version of Saigon.

And what I remember was that they really relied on each other.

I think just had wanted to have Vietnamese around them, because they knew that was people who would always look after them.

[To] When we lived near each other, we could help each other.

[thoughtful music] Like, if my mom's like, "hey, where do we go get food stamps?"

There would be a Vietnamese person who knew.

"Hey, I go get it on this day.

You want to come with me?

We can help you apply."

Or, "hey, how do I register my kids for school?"

Or "hey, where do we take our kids to the doctor?"

It wasn't unheard of for my mom to show up to Coastal Family Health Center clinic.

And she would sit there, and a woman would be pregnant with her eighth baby.

And she didn't know how to fill out her paperwork.

She was illiterate.

She never had more than a first or second grade education in Vietnam, and my mom would get up and go over there and help her fill out her paperwork.

So we really relied on the commu-- the community became your family.

[background chatter] If you wanted to adjust better in America, you wanted to be near people who understood you and not judge you, and not rush you to integrate.

I think that being around people who understood their struggles and their trauma and all that, that was healing on its own-- just to be around people where you didn't have to explain yourself all the time.

[BACKGROUND CHATTER AND LAUGHTER] [Reporter 1] It began at predawn like a regional marathon race with hundreds of competitors from Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, and Texas huddling at the starting line, all anxious to drop their nets and bring home the big catch.

At 6:00 AM, the sun signaled the start of the race, and the boats scattered, hoping for the best spot in the field.

[thoughtful music] [To] I remember my dad first coming home stressed out and talking about how the gas prices went up.

The gas prices went up, and the value of shrimp was going down.

A bank had loaned us money to buy a shrimp boat at this point, and they were like, "how are we going to pay for this bank loan if the value of shrimp has gone down?"

[helicopter sounds] [Charlie Nguyen] Out on the gulf, they don't have shrimp, the whole gulf.

They have just a certain spot.

First come, first serve.

And it's hard.

Sometimes we had to anchor it up three- to four-day waiting period, waiting for something to show up.

[Reporter 1] Just three days into the Louisiana season, there was little left to catch.

That's why shrimpers are making haste in Mississippi's waters.

Did you not get anything?

Not enough.

[Reporter 1] Not enough?

Not enough.

[Reporter 1] This lone shrimper moved away from Cat Island jockeying for a better position, still unsure whether there would be a substantial payoff in his net at the end of the day.

[Reporter 2] Are you getting enough shrimp in right now?

[Man 1] Right now, we're not.

Everything we're getting in, we're selling, and we're having to go to-- resort to Chinese shrimp and Ecuador and all these other countries just to fill the orders.

[Man 2] I'm peddling.

I just can't sell to the dealers.

The last couple of years, it's been going downhill, and that's-- import price is killing us.

The shrimp we were getting $1.90 for last year, the year before last we were getting $4 a pound for it-- $3.40 to $4 a pound.

This year, we're lucky if we get $2.50 to $3.

And it's just about cut it in half.

[Isbell] The Vietnamese were not having the shrimp that they needed to keep staying in Biloxi, and I think some were thinking about leaving.

I always felt bad for them because once you find a place that you like, you don't want to have to turn around and leave and start all over again.

[BACKGROUND BOAT SOUNDS AND CHATTER] [thoughtful music] [Interviewer] Did it change anything when the casinos came?

[Nguyen] Yes, it changed everybody.

It changed that-- their family too.

It changed everything.

[Official] It is my pleasure to grant final approval to commence gaming operations for the Isle of Capri Casino in beautiful Biloxi.

All right, let's go.

[Reporter 3] As luck would have it, Senator Tommy Gallott did roll a seven-- a perfect way to welcome the coast's newest industry.

All that was needed was one final signature on one final permit, this one from the state gaming commission.

[Jeannette Cressman-Vu] Most people, the fishermen wife, at that time, they'd just go help their husband on the boat.

But when the casino opened, a lot of them go to school and become dealers.

[To] They were offering free classes to how to be a table game dealer, and my mom went to a table game school.

And I remember, she would pick me up from Head Start, which was preschool for low-income families, and then drive over the I-110 bridge of the Biloxi Back Bay, and then took me to her table game class that she had to take.

And she bought me a Barq's Root Beer and a yellow bag of Lay's and then sat me in the chair, and she said, "you sit here and drink your root beer, and Mommy's going to go learn how to be a table game dealer."

And back then, they hired everybody.

They just needed people because they were opening all these casinos.

My mom, making $40,000 a year, that's a lot in the '90s for someone who doesn't have a college education, who couldn't speak English as her first language.

So we didn't qualify to live in the housing projects anymore, so we moved out.

[crickets chirping] And we lived in a rental house that was a shotgun house.

Do y'all know what a shotgun house is?

Yeah, so it's pretty much front door all the way out to the back.

And so when the casinos came, it drove a lot of the Vietnamese out of the projects.

And they even build their houses on Oak Street, and Oak Street is pretty far.

I mean, it goes from the beach all the way down to Biloxi Back Bay.

[Cressman-Vu] More shops open.

Like business, they open more business.

And restaurant and everything growing better and better.

Business is really booming.

[Thomas Vu] After we stay here for long enough, all the immigrants before, they build up their own culture.

Like, the Vietnamese too, we are doing we are doing same way.

And after you stay here long enough, you want to build a Vietnamese school.

You building a Vietnamese class.

You want to build the church, the Vietnamese church-- [applause] --where they can pray in our language, our own language.

[To] I think when you are away from your first home, and then when you come to a new home, I think you try to build it to where it feels more like a home.

It's kind of like when you move into a house, and you buy things that speaks to you or is more like you.

And this is their new country.

This is their new place that they're going to live until they die, probably.

Building something that is theirs, to call theirs in their community, give them a sense of permanence here.

[ominous music] [Vu] I remember that day when we hear the news that Hurricane Katrina coming to the coast, come to Biloxi.

[Tanya Kennedy] There are hurricanes every year in Biloxi, but small ones.

And we're not scared.

We're not afraid because they come and go.

It's nothing affect us at all.

[Cressman-Vu] We never leave home.

We stay home all the time.

If we live anywhere, we maybe just go Ocean Springs with my children and get together, or they come to my house all the time because my house be pretty strong.

The police keep on drive by the house, tell us to leave, and we just stay inside.

We don't want to leave.

[To] I remember my brother calling my mom.

He was like, "Mom, you need to come up here and evacuate."

My mom's like, "no, it's OK.

We'll stay down here.

We'll just board up the windows."

And my brother was like, "no, it's going to be a serious storm.

I don't think you realize how big it is."

[Meteorologist] This is not a storm that's going to move to the east of us.

We are not going to be on the West Side of the storm on the current track.

We're going to be on the east side of the storm, and from the looks of things, we're going to be very close to the center of the storm.

[Official 2] We've been fortunate with the last few that's come through where we've pretty much dodged some big bullets, but this one didn't isn't a bullet.

This is more like a cannon.

It's coming.

We're going to get hit.

[To] Palace Casino told my mom, "don't come to work because we're shutting down."

Like, that's how bad it's going to be.

We packed up our stuff, and we drove up to Jackson.

And my brother had an apartment, and we stayed there.

And we were thinking, it's going to blow over, and we're just going to go home once it's over.

[rain pouring] [Vu] My family left here the last minute.

We went to Mobile, and at that time, the wind already built up.

It's getting stronger here, and the sky is so dark.

And we're lucky.

We just passed the ocean and Biloxi Bridge.

And I think it's maybe about a half hour, an hour later, they closed.

They closed, so nobody can get to-- [Reporter 4] I'm really in the middle of Highway 90 right here, and this water is getting deeper.

I'm not going to stay here much longer, folks, because this-- in fact, we need to back up now, Greg.

This water is coming in quickly.

It is coming in fast.

It is deepening quickly, and we are going to seek higher ground right now.

But this gives you some idea of the power of this storm as Katrina begins to make her presence felt on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

[To] When Hurricane Katrina hit here, it's, I think, only a few hours-- only a few hours-- maybe about four or five hours.

And the next day, the city of Biloxi is gone.

[waves crashing] [somber music] [helicopter sounds] [Interviewer] When you got back here, what did Biloxi look like?

A bomb.

[laughs] A bomb went off.

[Kennedy] Debris all over the street.

It looked terrible.

There's nothing here at all, nothing at all in this street.

Highway 90 is the worst.

Highway 90 is the worst.

[Cressman-Vu] As soon as the hurricane finished, me and my husband drive home.

And at that time-- I wouldn't do it again now-- at that time, we drive home, electric wires all over the place.

And water on I-10, some of them where exit, water all the way top.

Everything gone.

Business is gone.

His business is pushed down almost on the street.

And Grand Casino is on the Highway 90.

[Vu] Everything-- the trees fell down, and most of the houses in Biloxi Back Bay, the hurricane tear up and wash away up to the ocean.

[Reporter 4] The scene along the beach is one of devastating damage.

We are out here in the late afternoon, almost early evening hours, and you can see the wind still from the backside of Hurricane Katrina, a devastating storm that caused a lot of damage, from what we can see so far, particularly along the immediate coastline.

Businesses demolished and destroyed here, signs with pieces strewn about.

Folks, it is just the worst damage that I have seen on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, and I have been covering storms since I moved here 16 years ago.

[Vu] When I went to my house, there is nothing left Only thing left is the foundation, the slab.

That's all.

Nothing left.

[Kennedy] The day after, my husband come out, and he called me.

And he cry, he cry.

That's all.

And I said, "are you kidding?"

He said, "no, we lost all.

Everything gone."

I thought he was kidding.

My husband, he used to be a joke a lot.

But he said, "no, I'm serious.

Everything's gone."

[Interviewer] What did you feel at that moment?

[Kennedy] I feel light like a paper.

My body, I feel nothing by that time.

I feel dead.

Yeah.

[Interviewer] How did you feel at that point?

[Vu] I would cry.

I said, "everything we build up, everything we saved, it's gone.

We feel terrible."

We feel so deeply down.

We feel like nothing left, and I don't know how to survive in the next days coming.

[Interviewer] So that's the second time then at that point in your life where you've lost everything?

Yes, second time.

First, 1975.

Second, 2005.

[laughs] In '75, we lost by the country, and 2005, we lost at Katrina in the United States.

Bad dream.

[laughs] Very bad.

[thoughtful music] [background chatter] [Vu] I think about a month later, we have-- the people that are still living in the city-- we have to do something.

We cannot just sit there or run away.

We still have a job to do.

We have to find a way.

We have to find a way to survive.

[Deanne Stephens] Shortly after Hurricane Katrina, several of us went down to Point Cadet, and what had happened within that time, of course, was total destruction.

But what we saw in Point Cadet was the Catholic Church and the Buddhist temple working together for the people.

And when groups came in, they set up relief stations in the parking lot of the Buddhist temple and the Catholic Church and offered assistance and sustenance to everybody.

There was no difference.

There was groups helping, and the two churches were working together.

And in my viewpoint, to see that and to see them outreaching together to help the people in the area, which were mostly Vietnamese-- but when everybody in the Point area found out about the efficiency of what was going on down there, many made their way to that area to receive assistance.

[hopeful music] This was food and clothing and durable goods and diapers and things that would be needed.

And those two entities literally lifted together that community.

That's what I saw.

[closing music] Funding for this program is made possible by the Mississippi Gulf Coast National Heritage Area, the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources, and by Mississippi State University.