100 From Around Globe ‘Honor Us’ by Taking Oaths

Wilfredo Arreola remembered working the dry corn fields of central Mexico for pennies a day, the agonizing decision to leave, his years underground as an illegal alien evading the dreaded U.S. immigration officers.

“Mostly,” he said, “I remember it as being very hard . . . a very hard life.”

Hoanglan Thi Nguyen also remembered, but her memories are of a harsh Communist government in a unified Vietnam, the wild midnight escape from Saigon, the journey across Cambodia in an ox cart and the 13 months in a crowded Thailand refugee camp waiting for permission to emigrate to the United States.

Arreola, 38, and Nguyen, 24, don’t know each other and in other circumstances would have little in common. But Thursday they found themselves sitting next to each other in the replica of Independence Hall at Knott’s Berry Farm being sworn in as U.S. citizens.

They were among 100 people from 30 countries who became citizens in an elaborate ceremony designed to coincide with the bicentennial of signing of the U.S. Constitution. And it was done in a very American way: with a full-dress military honor guard, the ringing of church bells, speeches by dignitaries and the subsequent release of 5,000 red, white and blue balloons.

Those chosen to be sworn in at the special ceremony, presided over by U.S. Circuit Judge Warren J. Ferguson, were selected at random from thousands of applications at the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service office in Los Angeles. Their heritages reflected the ethnic flavor of Southern California, coming from such diverse countries as Burma, Colombia, Poland and Jordan. Vietnam and Mexico led the list with 18 representatives each, followed by the Philippines with 10 and Kampuchea (Cambodia) and Colombia with three each.

California Chief Justice Malcolm M. Lucas, who is a resident of Los Alamitos, welcomed the new citizens. “You do us honor by your choice (of the United States),” he told them, adding that the group “reflects the diversity of our nation and our state.” He urged them to exercise their right to vote and to get involved in community activities.

Thursday night, Gov. George Deukmejian, and his wife, Gloria, held a Bicentennial of the Constitution dinner on the east lawn of Independence Hall. About 800 people paid either $200 or $500 each to attend the dinner, which raised funds for the California Bicentennial Foundation for the U.S. Constitution, the group coordinating state activities commemorating the Constitution.

“Today marks a very special day in the history of our nation, for today we celebrate the creation of the single most important governmental document in all of our lives,” Deukmejian said.

As the guests mingled, Virginia Knott Bender, whose late father Walter Knott had Independence Hall built 21 years ago, said: “I love this! Just think, Knott’s Berry Farm has been here 60 years, and we get to celebrate this birthday in an exact replica of Independence Hall.”

The Rev. Robert Schuller, pastor of Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove, said: “This (the Constitution) is the whole basis for our possibility thinking. The Constitution makes it possible to dream the great dream.”

Those receiving “Spirit of America” awards were: George L. Argyros, Newport Beach; Margaret Martin Brock, Los Angeles; Athalie Irvine Clarke, Newport Beach; Rafer Johnson, Los Angeles; and Daniel D. Villanueva of Los Angeles. A “Bicentennial Citizen” award was bestowed on Raymond D. Edwards of Glendale.

Very Personal Celebration

But for all its pomp, the celebration earlier in the day at Knott’s was a very personal one for people like Arreola, Nguyen and Carmen Quezada, who left the poverty of her native Ecuador swearing that her children would one day enjoy opportunities she never had.

“This is such a special day, there is really no way to describe it,” Quezada said in Spanish while cuddling her 3-week-old daughter, Jessica. “There is no other country like this where there are so many opportunities, such freedom to work and do as you wish. I want my children to appreciate it as I do.”

“It’s the liberty we have here that is important,” added her friend, fellow Ecuadoran native Martha Velazco, 38, of Norwalk, who also was sworn in Thursday. “We have waited for this day and now we feel so lucky, so fortunate.”

Velazco said her parents, who live in the Ecuadoran capital of Quito, did not yet know of her citizenship. She planned to call them Thursday afternoon in a free, two-minute telephone call provided for the 100 new citizens by AT&T.;

“What will I tell them?” she asked. “Maybe nothing more than . . . somos gringos ,” meaning “we’re gringos.”

For many who became citizens Thursday, it was the liberty cited by Velazco--political and economic--that drove them to leave their homes.

Nguyen’s story is chronicled in history. After the fall of Saigon in 1975, her father, Long Nguyen, was imprisoned because he had served in the South Vietnamese army and had taught English at a local language school.

He spent two years and seven months in a “re-education” camp for people the government considered political dissidents.

“After that, we knew we had to leave,” said Long Nguyen, who now works with a hospital supplies center in Irvine. In January of 1980, Long Nguyen, his wife and four children piled into a car hired on the black market and drove to the Cambodia border. Then it was two days across the country in an oxen-driven wooden cart to the sprawling refugee camp of Sikiu just across the border into Thailand.

“It was very hard for all of us there,” said his daughter, now an honor student at UC Irvine majoring in computer science. “I still miss my country, all my friends behind. But I appreciate this country and everything it has done for my family. I am so proud to be an American.”

The family emigrated to the United States in 1981 and lived in Texas and West Virginia before finally settling in Santa Ana.

Arreola’s story is not unlike those of many Mexicans who flee poverty at home. He first came to Los Angeles in 1969 and worked illegally in a small sheet-metal factory. But after two years, he was arrested and deported to Mexico.

He returned immediately, married a fellow Mexican native, continued to work illegally and settled near Santa Ana, where they live in a small house with their five children.

“There is no way to compare what we have here and what I might have had I stayed in Colima,” Arreola said. “Here, if you work hard, you can own a house, a car. In Mexico, I worked hard all day and didn’t even earn the minimum wage,” which now stands at just above $2 a day.

Still, Arreola said he is proud of his Mexican heritage and at times feels “half American and half Mexican.”

“I don’t want to lose that. I love both countries, but now this country is truly mine.”

Times staff writer Ann Conway contributed to this story.