Vietnam apparently inaugurated a general consulate in Houston yesterday, and hundreds of Viets came out to protest.

Or rather, hundreds minus one, because the email from the organizers noted that they saw “one person who’s been on (internet) forums attacking the community thus giving the communists an advantage.”

The protests started around 9:30am and ended at 1pm.

The protestors in front of Nguoi Viet, now steady at a handful of people each Sunday, had a visitor yesterday. OC Board of Education member and Republican Assembly candidate Long Pham stopped by and gave them stuff.

Not sure what it was Pham (far right in inset) gave them out of the back of his van, but they appreciated it. The shortest man in white jacket is Captain Thìn; the tallest is Captain Lâm. Not sure of their last names.

Who, you ask? Good question. For many, the answer is “Who cares?” For the few that do care, however, let’s take it from the beginning.

First, part (a):

Remember this group?

The first time we saw them, they were on the Bolsavik here.

That was when they called themselves the “Strike Force to Protect the Yellow Flag” (in Vietnamese: Lực Lượng Hành Động để Bảo Vệ Danh Dự Cờ Vàng)

And then they renamed themselves “Vietnamese People Against Communists,” but in fact, they want people to think they’re still a “force.” Their Vietnamese name was “Lực lượng chống cộng sản và tay sai,” a literal translation of which would be “Force Against Communists and Lackeys.”

That “force,” however, didn’t last long. After no more than a couple months of flexing whatever muscles they have, the group faded into the sunset. Remnants of the group are still hanging around outside Nguoi Viet’s office.

Now on to a different group. Part (b).

Remember this scene?

These are the merchants of Garden Grove’s Main Street, counter-protesting against people who were picketing Viet Weekly. Read here.

The group picketing Viet Weekly calls itself the “Coalition Against Resolution No. 36” (Vietnamese: Liên Ủy Ban Chống Nghị Quyết 36). The 36 in the group’s name refers to a resolution of the Communist Party of Vietnam calling for the country’s communist government to “reach out” to Vietnamese living abroad – which many read as euphemysm for proselytization and assimilation.

The Coalition lasted just long enough to carry Assemblyman Van Tran‘s water during last year’s elections and accuse Janet Nguyen of being a commie. (See here.)

After the elections, the Coalition led by Van Tran’s PR man Hung Phuong Nguyen (that’s him in suit at the far right of the picture, presenting a Van Tran commendation to some group in Houston) quickly rolled over and ended their picketing of Viet Weekly.

The Coalition too faded into the sunset.

OK then.

Part (c) now.

Meanwhile, there’s a third group calling itself the “Special Committee Against Communists.” That’s the one first mentioned at the top of this entry.

This “Special Committee” previously was best known for loud and vulgar protests against Lee’s Sandwiches. It later subsumed itself under the Coalition and faded off together with the umbrella organization.

Or so everybody thought.

On Saturday, it was ressurected for a brief hour or so, only to disband.

But only to regroup. Apparently, extremists are like the Energizer bunny, complete with bangs and whistles and equally hard to figure out where they’re going.

With former members of: (a) the Special Committee; (b) the Coalition; (c) the Force slash Strike Force; plus some new people; but sans Hung Phuong Nguyen or the original leaders of the Nguoi Viet protests, these people fashioned themselves into a new group, with a new name.

The new group’s grand name: “Committee Against Communists and Lackeys” (in Vietnamese: Ủy Ban Chống Cộng Sản và Tay Sai).

Apparently, one of the organizers said, the “lackeys are more dangerous than the communists.”

What are some of these “lackeys”? By the group’s definition, said lackeys include stores that carry DVD’s produced in Vietnam. This group intends to make the stores stop carrying these fares, according to Nguoi Viet here.

Some habits die hard.

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.

One of the top Viet singers was almost subject to a protest over a star that appears on a poster for an August concert at Bally’s in Atlantic City. This poster, the one pictured above.

See that star? Yep, that’s what community groups upon community groups were threatening a boycott over.

The hapless victim, singing sensation Don Ho, hurriedly sent out a massive email and a profuse apology and thereby averted any additional problems.

Now, if that reminds you of the “Macy’s star” belt buckle conundrum (read here and here), you would be absolutely correct. Even Don Ho made an allusion to it.

In an email sent to the “Vietnamese Community of Northeast U.S.” Don Ho wrote, “I know the community is very sensitive about stars, so I don’t own any star in my wardrobe or in my home, except for a star that I would put up at Christmas time like all Catholic families do.”

So now you know. And the Bolsavik has always thought that “fashion nazi” is just a figure of speech. Shows how the Bolsavik can be so very wrong.

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.

Asking the question on Bolsavik.com (see here and here) is just the right place, because OC Vietnamese-language media would not give you the answer. They would rather pretend none of it ever happened.

And why is that?

Because not too long ago they were singing high praises of the people doing the disruption.

The woman who was interfering with the ceremony and trying to plant the yellow South Vietnamese flag on the altar while people were carrying out the respect ritual, is Bùi Kim Thành, a land protestor from Vietnam who was allowed to immigrate to the U.S. after negotiations between the two countries. Read here.

Until recently, Bùi Kim Thành had been hailed as a hero, and Nguoi Viet was her head cheerleader, worshipping the grounds she walked on even after it had become obvious to everyone else reading her interviews on Nguoi Viet that she’s, well, not all there.

The disruption of the Hung Vuong ceremony arose because it had been reported – rightly or wrongly - that the headquarters of the Hung Vuong society (in Vietnamese: Hội Đền Hùng) failed to display the South Vietnamese and/or failed to give the South Vietnamese flag its proper position of prominence and respect. (The story differs depending on who you talk to.)

The president of the society Neil Nguyen (Vietnamese name Nguyễn Xuân Nghĩa) also caught flak because he allegedly was marching in the Tet Parade without carrying the South Vietnamese flag. Some people went so far as to blame his alleged “commie-ness” on, get this, his marriage to a citizen of Vietnam. (Click here if you read Vietnamese.) Read more about Neil Nguyen here.

The Bolsavik first mentioned Bùi Kim Thành in a story about her brief involvement with the Nguoi Viet brouhaha here.

According to Vietnamese legends, Hung Vuong are the first kings of ancient Vietnam.