AVI

Adopted Vietnam International

AIM

Adopted Vietnamese International (AVI) was launched in April 2000 on the 25th anniversary of the end of the Viet Nam War. AVI is a volunteer network that is dedicated to Vietnamese adoptees from past generations to today.  The first main generation was adopted before, during, or in connection with the Viet Nam War or its mass exodus that directly resulted. Generations that followed came with refugees arriving in the 1980s and more recently, through international agreements between various nations.

One of the main aims of AVI is to provide a range of resources and opportunities for adopted Vietnamese to explore their community and history and to share their unique insights on adoption with adoptive parents and birth parents, the wider trans-racial adoption community, younger generations of adopted Vietnamese, general members of the Vietnamese Diaspora and other cultural communities. Since its launch over ten years ago, the AVI network has offered a range of Internet initiatives, creative projects, adoptee events, and research.

STATUS

AVI is a community network run on a voluntary basis.  All individuals in key roles are volunteers who were adopted from Viet Nam.

COMMUNITY HISTORY

Throughout modern history, a number of orphans Vietnamese orphans have migrated to Western nations for adoption, beginning as early as the 1950s during the French occupation and throughout the Viet Nam War with America and its allies in the 1960s &1970s. Then, in the final months of the conflict, approximately 3000 Vietnamese more war orphans (mostly babies) were airlifted in a remarkable military and humanitarian project known as Operation Babylift with most adopted by families living overseas. Some were never adopted and placed into state care and foster situations.  Operation Babylift stands as a remarkable event in the Viet Nam War and the history of adoption from Viet Nam due to the extraordinary mass-evacuations it involved, and a tragic plane accident known as the C5-Galaxy Crash.

Adopted Vietnamese war orphans from these eras, including many survivors from the C5-Galaxy Crash, now reside today in countries such as the US, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Switzerland, Finland, and France.  There is also a growing number who have chosen to return to live in Viet Nam. -AVI