A rainbow-hued Tet parade in Little Saigon

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http://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-ff-0202-tet-parade-20140202,0,6829319.story



Viet Rainbow of Orange County participants, from left, Timothy Truong, 23, of Westminster, Peterson Pham, 22, of Garden Grove and Nam Nguyen, 22, of Fountain Valley march in the Tet parade in Little Saigon. Inclusion of the LGBT community in the parade was a controversial issue.

A rainbow-hued Tet parade in Little Saigon
By Anh Do
February 1, 2014, 7:05 p.m.

At last, they marched.

On Saturday, dozens of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender immigrants marched in the annual Tet parade in Little Saigon. The rainbow flag, a distinctive symbol of gay pride, fluttered alongside emblems of California, the United States and South Vietnam.

"We love you," participants yelled at friends, family members and thousands of others lining the parade route in Westminster, many dressed to celebrate the Lunar New Year. "We love you, too," some eager youths responded, whistling with joy.

The historic moment followed months of fighting as organizers initially sought to ban LGBT activists from joining one of the community's biggest events. But after increasing political pressure, the Vietnamese American Federation of Southern California called a local assembly and voted in January to open participation in the parade.

"We did it," said Hieu Nguyen, founder of Viet Rainbow of Orange County, which organized after the ban was announced last year. "It goes back to what we all believe: We are here to stay. We are a part of this community, and as a community, we are not complete without each other."