It was December 8th, 1979. A real winter day.
Posted at 5:00 am.
It was freezing cold as Claude Thibault and Madeleine Guertin made their way from Sherbrooke to the Longue-Pointe military base. Goal: to pick up the Cambodian refugee family they had agreed to sponsor.
You see yourself moving and feverish again, like young parents preparing for the birth of a newborn. In fact, it's as if they welcomed three at once: little Vath, 4 years old, and his parents Pam Yoth and Tum Hun. Thanks to the sponsorship program just launched by the government of René Lévesque and celebrated these days in Film Ru, the small family that fled the Cambodian genocide had the right to a second life, a second chance.
Forty-four years later, when little Vath, now an adult, remembers his first snow with the Thibault family, the emotion is still palpable.
Madeleine sees herself again in the car that brings the little family back, exhausted from the journey to her new home. She watched as Pam Yoth, her son on her lap, sat in the back seat, driving through a winter landscape with strangers whose language he didn't speak.
PHOTO JOSIE DESMARAIS, LA PRESSE, OLD PHOTOS OF CLAUDE THIBAULT AND MADELEINE GUERTIN
The Thibault family opened their arms to this family who had been staying in a refugee camp in Thailand.
“He held Vath close, strong in his arms and close to him throughout the journey,” she said, mimicking his gesture. “Vath, you were little, you didn't really know what was going on and that's why he wanted to protect you. »
The scene remained in the memory of the godmother, whom her sponsors still call “Mom” even 44 years later, for a long time.
I remember that love. All this affection. It was very, very beautiful.
Madeleine Guertin
A universal beauty that must be preserved and that gives full meaning to the gesture of human solidarity that the Thibault family wanted to show by opening its arms to this family who stayed in a refugee camp in Thailand.
“Think about it… They didn't know us at all. They didn't know where they were going. They knew nothing about our country. That's what made me want to get involved. I put myself in her shoes. They have to flee their country and leave everything behind. You have to be strong to go into exile, take control of yourself and trust. »
PHOTO JOSIE DESMARAIS, THE PRESS
Claude Thibault and Madeleine Guertin
Madeleine later understood, when Pam Yoth knew French well enough and felt confident enough to tell her story, that Vath's birth mother had been murdered in Cambodia. Tum Hun, whom Vath considers his mother, is Pam Yoth's second wife, whom she met in a refugee camp. The story of the father's escape on foot with his orphaned son and brother-in-law from Cambodia to Thailand shocked her deeply.
“Your father said there were anti-personnel landmines and he saw his friends step foot in them. “Sometimes he was forced to eat leaves…” she said to Vath.
“Do you have any memories of it?”
– NO. And maybe it’s better that way…”
Vath's first memories are fond memories of Quebec. He, who had never seen snow before, remembers his amazement as he stepped off the plane. “That impressed me! »
It is also a lasting memory for his parents. But unlike their four-year-old boy, they suffered from post-traumatic thermal shock rather than wonder. When they discovered Quebec's winter panorama, they first thought about how animals could survive cold and snow and how humans could live in such a climate.
They quickly found the answer from their sponsors. Your warm welcome warmed the coldest winter. Beneath the snowflakes, hope became possible again.