ProtagonistNguyen Do Thinh

Nguyen Do Thinh was born in 1962 in Đà Nẵng in South Vietnam. At the end of the war in 1975, he moved to Saigon to live with his sister and her three children. There, he finished school and passed entrance examinations for university. But instead of commencing his studies, he was called up to the army in 1978 for the war against China and Cambodia. Through bribery, his mother managed to secure him the chance to become a sailor instead. It was also through bribes that he was able to go to the GDR as a contract worker in 1982. In East Germany he fought for the right to study and education, but his first role upon arrival was as a “cargo handler” in the port of Rostock, where he was tasked with loading and unloading ships. He later obtained a qualification as a fitter and even took the master craftsman’s examination for mechanical engineering. In 1987 he was transferred to nuclear plant construction in Stendal and worked as an interpreter there.
Thinh experienced the xenophobic arson attacks on refugees and former Vietnamese contract workers of the night of 24 August 1992 in Rostock-Lichtenhagen.. Around 150 people barely escaped with their lives when youths set their accommodation,Sunflower House, alight.
Nguyen Do Thinh stayed in Rostock and founded the German–Vietnamese friendship society Dien Hong, in which he has been active for many years as a board member and social worker. He also works as an interpreter and runs a Vietnamese restaurant.