What Vietnamese want. Photo by Linh Nguyen/Nguoi Viet

Vietnamese-style yogurt has become scarce recently. Several food places, markets, restaurants, don’t carry that special kind of yogurt, called “da-ua” and pronounced yah (as in papa) oor (as in poor).

The OC Weekly was the first publication to spot the absence. It noted that the reason was a letter from the OC Health Care Agency warning sellers not to sell dairy products from unapproved sources. The letter, says the OC Weekly, actually dates from months ago.

Nguoi Viet’s editor Linh Nguyen went out to check and, sure enough, he had trouble finding that form of yogurt made in that special way only Vietnamese (and maybe Taiwanese) can appreciate: from sweetened condensed milk. Many small to-go places just shrugged and said they’re out. Others pointed him to supermarkets. But there’s no da ua in the supermarkets either.

The HCA’s spokesperson Deanne Thompson told Linh Nguyen that the “California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) must approve dairy products manufactured in the State.” No approval, no sale.

Thompson didn’t think there was a special inspection by HCA targetting Vietnamese da ua. Another official at the HCA thought, however, that the CDFA did go out specifically to shut down an unapproved major maker of da ua, thus shutting the line of supply to Little Saigon.

Have no fear though. There’s another, approved source, already in business. So stocks may be filling up soon with this new supplier’s goods. How the CDFA suddenly woke up to the unapproved da ua source, is another story.

Last weekend was a slow day in the office, so the Bolsavik went around and took some pictures of the weekly protests outside of Nguoi Viet.

Here’s an update on what’s happening now. Every day, the protestors, usually about 4 or 5 of them, still come to Nguoi Viet and open the truck with the photos of former South Vietnam’s generals who died defending the country in the last days of the war. That’s the truck in the foreground.

On week-ends, though, they would come out more in force, each person would carry a flag and they would march up and down Moran Avenue. They would stop for a while at Bolsa, the main thoroughfare of Bolsavikland, and then march right back.

These protestors apparently are very adamant that people know there’s still a protest going on.

A few weeks ago, the L.A. Times ran a story by My-Thuan Tran, here, about the thriving Little Saigon media market. It contains a line about “ending the 18-month demonstrations.”

That little throwaway line turned out to tick off the protestors big time.

Viet Weekly, which has become something of an unofficial spokespaper for the protestors, devoted two whole pages to crapping about the story and saying, basically, “we’re here, we’re here, get used to it.”

The number of people showing up each week-end depends on whether there’s an event at the Nguoi Viet Community Room. There have been some week-ends where the room had a major event and the number of protestors reached as high as 15.

The photo to the right was taken when there was a seminar for people who care for family members with Alzheimer.

Soon-to-be placed in “round black filing system”

The Nguoi Viet lawsuit never went into its damages phase because the protestors threw in the towel.

On Wednesday morning when the damages phase was supposed to begin, Ky Ngo, Trong Doan and Cung Tran (in Vietnamese: Ngô Kỷ, Đoàn Trọng, Trần Thế Cung) resumed settlement talk instead of having to hear evidence of how destructive they’ve been.

The parties arrived at a stipulated judgment whereby the protestors promised they would pack up and go home.

This is not at all surprising to the Bolsavik, who has said at least twice before (here and here) that Ky Ngo and his gang are showing signs of fatigue.

It seems that the protestors would rather be found liable, so they can say “We were oppressed” and conveniently go home without looking like they’ve surrendered.

No more Ky Ngo.

No more yellow trucks.

The Bolsavik is missing them already.

Ky Ngo, Trong Doan and Cung The Tran (in Vietnamese: Ngô Kỷ, Đoàn Trọng, Trần Thế Cung) — all of whom deny being the leaders of what they term the “spontaneous” protest, were found liable after just a few hours of jury deliberation. (Ky Ngo, in particular, uses the term “spontaneous protest” – “biểu tình tự phát” in Vietnamese – so often that he even takes to employing the abbreviation ”BTTP” in his emails.)

Ngo, Doan and Tran were all found liable for interference with business and for nuisance. Ngo and Doan were in addition found liable for trespass.

For the first few days of trial, Cung The Tran came to court on crutches. Perhaps expecting a favorable outcome, Tran walked in unaided today to the jury’s verdict reading.

The Bolsavik’s query: Which of the three yellow-painted cars will Ky Ngo claim exemption from seizure resulting from the judgment?

The Reg’s Deepa Bharath has the story here, which includes a nice and convenient summary of the whole protest, for those of you new to the issue.

The vote was 4-1, with Councilman Andy Quach‘s appointee Andrew Nguyen (the Westminster school board member) voting in favor of the restriction. The appointees of Tri Ta and Tyler Diep also voted for the restriction. The lone nay came from Gil Cruz, the appointee of Frank Fry who just didn’t think the parking restriction would be effective in stopping the protest.

At the hearing, Parking Enforcement gave their opinion that, sure, they can chalk the tires to enforce the parking restriction, but, no, they have better things to do than to hang out at the Moran Street cul-de-sac all day (unlike, ahem, certain people). Nonetheless, if the restriction is there, tickets will be handed out.

Nguoi Viet brought droves of employees to the hearing. The protestors, however, did not come.

It appears to the Bolsavik that, strategically, they’d rather this item pass so they can scream and yell about being oppressed while at the same time receive a convenient excuse to end the whole shenanigan and achieve “peace with honor.”

The restriction won’t be final and the curb won’t be painted until the City Council votes on it on May 13.

Then, good bye Ky Ngo.

An obscure item on the agenda at the City of Westminster’s Traffic Commission meeting on Tuesday may spell the end of Ky Ngo’s reign of the patch of grass across from Nguoi Viet.

On the agenda (here) for the Westminster Traffic Commission for tomorrow night is the following:

“Request for the Installation of 24-Minute Timed Parking Restrictions at 14801 And 14802 Moran Street”

Though innocuous, if passed the item will put a stop to Ky Ngo’s protesting.

Those addresses are the properties on the two sides of Nguoi Viet. Building 14801-14805 on the left belongs to Dong Loi Seafood, a wholesaler which has its own retail store that that location. Ky Ngo has been setting up his lawn chairs and other paraphernalia on Dong Loi’s sidewalk (picture above).

The other building, at 14802-14810 on the right, is the warehouse for Thuy Nga, the producer of the popular Vietnamese variety show Paris by Night. That’s where Ky Ngo usually parks his car and displays the rest of his stuff.

A 24-minute parking restriction would make it impossible for Ky Ngo to camp out at the site.

This item is so unusual for the zoning in the area that there can be no doubt that it’s on the agenda to specifically target Ky Ngo and Ky Ngo only.

Using parking laws seems to be the city’s solution to this thorn on its side. The entire area including Nguoi Viet’s building (see zoning map at right, taken from the city’s Community View here) is zoned M-1, i.e. for light industrial (“M” for manufacturing) – not for offices or business. (The lone CM – i.e. “commercial-industrial” lot belongs to Dong Loi.)

Unlike “C” zones (business, commercial and office), where parking restrictions tend to be the norm, industrial zones almost never have parking rules. In Westminster’s industrial zones west of Hoover, for example, it is not unusual to find semi-trucks parked smack in the middle of Hazard, right in the median.

The area around Moran Street, however, has been highly gentrified, with hundreds of offices moving in to locations that are zoned for industrial. It is only a matter of time before the zoning is changed, and in the meantime, a creative parking rule is just as good as any to get Ky Ngo and his band of protestors to move out.

On the other hand, recently the things Ky Ngo is saying on the used-to-be-his-sworn-commie-enemy-but-now-is-his-favorite magazine Viet Weekly seem to reflect a degree of fatigue on his part. This move by the city may give him the perfect excuse to go home without appearing to give up.

Things have not been going well for Ky Ngo lately.

First, the permanent fixture outside the offices of Nguoi Viet Daily News was told by the Wesminster PD to move his stuff. The Bolsavik is not sure on what grounds the police did it, but it may have something to do with his truck not having moved from the spot on public land for several weeks. Or maybe it’s unsightly. Or whatever.

Anyway so Ky Ngo was forced to get his stuffs out of there a couple weeks ago. That made him and his group very unhappy, so in consolation someone made him a sign that says (pictured) “Someone is still helping the Vietnamese traitors.”

A day or so later, a little sign was added on top saying “Today.”

Thus, apparently, “Today someone is still helping the Vietnamese traitors.”

But who? Who is still helping which Vietnamese traitors??

Sunday morning, some smart aleck gave an answer: “Ngo Ky” – says the addition at the bottom.

By mid-afternoon Ky Ngo had found out and tossed away the whole thing.

What he does have left is a convertible that he parks with the roof down and two flags flying.

A false rumor sent around the emails and posted on an unmoderated Internet forum was elevated when Nguoi Viet, the highest-circulation Vietnamese-language newspaper in the U.S., republished it as “news” on its front page in today’s issue.

The phony rumor purports to claim that the Commonwealth of Massachusetts passed a law banning the display of the flag of North Vietnam, which is now the official flag of Vietnam.

The three-out-of-six-column headline in Nguoi Viet proclaims, “Massachusetts passes law banning communist Vietnam’s red flag.”

Wow! Awesome!

Problem is, Massachusetts did no such thing.

Funny enough, the “news” item purports to quote from the law; and the quoted language is written in the present conditional tense (you know, with “would”) – a tell-tale that should have raised a big red flag.

The quote goes: “This bill would provide that the old South Vietnamese flag be the only flag depicting the country of Vietnam that may be displayed at any state-sponsored public function or in any public institution of learning….”

The “news” item carries a dateline from “Vietland,” but apparently it is referring to the source not the location. Vietland.net is a free-for-all forum where anyone can post anything as long as it meets the site owner’s definition of anti-communism.

This particular item comes from an email that had been circulating for more than a week. The original email was accurate — that such a bill had been introduced. Somewhere, somehow, the email was modified (maybe on April 1?) and became – that the bill was passed.

And that’s how it was published on Nguoi Viet, purporting to claim that the bill is numbered H 3415, that it passed the House unanimously 145-0 and the Senate also unanimously 37-0.

Actually, the bill numbered H 3415 (here) did pass but has nothing to do with any flag. It’s a resolution that allows the governor to use the state’s Rainy Day Fund to cover the deficit.

The actual flag bill is numbered S 1419, here. It has been referred to committee, just like its predecessor last year.

The source of the confusion seems to be the Beacon Hill Roll Call, the newspaper covering the Massachusetts legislature.

In a story here, the paper recites, on top, the passage of the budget act. Then, in the bottom, it includes a summary of other miscellanii. That’s the language Nguoi Viet quoted from and (dare the Bolsavik say it?) foolishly thought that it meant the flag ban had passed.