In conversation with Genevieve Kingston, moderated by Carol Fitzgerald; 2:30 – 3:20 pm at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church
Vicky Nguyen
Vicky Nguyen is the NBC News chief consumer investigative correspondent and anchor of NBC News Daily. She reports for the TODAY Show, Nightly News with Lester Holt, and NBC News Now. She graduated as valedictorian from the University of San Francisco. Nguyen lives in New York with her husband and three daughters. Her parents are always nearby.
MFOB featured book: Boat Baby
You may know Vicky Nguyen from her role as chief consumer investigative correspondent on NBC News Daily and the TODAY Show. But what you might not know is the incredible journey that brought her to the United States and to television screens across the country. In 1979, her parents fled Vietnam by boat with an eight-month-old Vicky in their arms. After surviving a harrowing encounter with pirates, they arrived at a refugee camp in Malaysia, where she would take her first steps while they awaited sponsorship to the only country her father would consider: America. Thanks to a letter her mother wrote to the Oregon office of her employer in Saigon, they made it. After they resettled on the West Coast, they quickly realized that getting to America is only half the story—the second half would be how to make it here.
In her new memoir Boat Baby, Nguyen explores the heroism, heart, and humor of her upbringing. Eventually settling in Northern California, her parents jumped headfirst into the dream of American entrepreneurship, running a food truck and later a furniture store. Though there was hardship, they never lost sight of their sense of humor. Their grit and resilience in the face of the enormous challenge of making a life in an unfamiliar country would teach her well, especially after she set her sights on a career in television journalism. As her career took her across the country, she would often be one of few Asian American women in the room in a fiercely competitive industry that can flatten its talent to stereotypes.
Nguyen’s parents have moved through life with the attitude “Why NOT us?” and that outlook has been the greatest gift they have given her. It has carried her to the top of her field and through her challenging road to motherhood. It is the legacy she will pass to her three daughters. Above all, Boat Baby is about the ties that bind a family together through tragedy, migration, setbacks, and successes. Brimming with laughter and optimism, Nguyen’s story serves as a potent reminder of the promise of America.
