Bayley LuuTomes’ parents fled Vietnam with him when he was a baby, landing in a refugee camp in Thailand and eventually making their home in Tawa, New Zealand. The urban architect and now presenter on My Dream Green Home talks to Emily Simpson about growing up, coming out, and the beautiful resilience of plants.
My very first memory was being about three years old and living in New Zealand in the refugee settlement in Māngere, Auckland. Because I didn’t know any better, it was what it was. I was around my parents all the time which, looking back now would have been great. They didn’t have jobs so I was never in daycare or anything.
The first school I can remember was Tītahi Bay in Porirua. We had a council house there. School to me was interesting – we were all the same age but we all looked different and had different backgrounds and there were no preconceptions of social separation. I thought that was the norm.
Then I got a little bit older and everything changed. Kids start picking up traits at home and around the neighbourhood and that’s when being different wasn’t so beneficial. My parents always had ethics of head-down-bum up, work hard keep yourself to yourself. Don’t get involved with what’s around you, concentrate on what’s in front of you. Sometimes in the playground, that approach doesn’t go to plan. You need to be a bit more confident – have a different survival instinct.
My parents really didn’t talk about home, it was only in my teenage years my mother told me the story of them fleeing Vietnam post war. My mother gave up her mum, her dad, her uncles and aunts, her way of life, not even knowing if we were going to survive, but the fear of staying was greater. My grandfather had been forced to fight for his country because it was on the verge of being taken over by the communist regime. That wasn’t a life my mother wanted to live.
The boat was a rickety old fishing vessel. It was wooden, unreliable, it shouldn’t even have been in the water. It held about 30-odd people, and we’d all be hidden underneath the cargo somewhere. I was nine months old when they started the journey. My mother at one point prayed and asked me to not make a peep. Then I was so still and quiet, she thought I was dead. I was doing as I was told.
My parents had been farmers in Vietnam, and my father was also a carpenter. Here they did anything and everything. My mother worked in hotels, she cleaned toilets, she changed people’s beds, then she upskilled and became a cook and a chef. My father learnt a new trade, he makes furnishings for homes, curtains, blinds, drapes. That wasn’t his natural talent but the opportunity came up. They reinvented themselves.
At a very young age I realised I was interested in plants. I remember my parents telling me that when we were in the refugee camp in Thailand (where my brother – his name is Thai – was born) every family was given a little plot of land and my parents farmed every inch of that land, they grew everything they could get their hands on and they would trade with other families. We didn’t have money all we had was what we grew as currency. So subconsciously I was introduced to that at a very early age.
I was a driven teenager, more focused on where I wanted to be than where I was. I did as I was told. I involved myself. In my senior year of college I was awarded the citizenship award for someone that made an impact. I was someone that everyone knew, whether they liked me or not.
I didn’t come out then. Even in high school I had girlfriends and went to proms and all that jazz. Absolutely, I was in denial. I guess coming from an Asian background being gay was not a lifestyle that was understood or promoted or encouraged. It was all about getting ahead, getting married, working to provide for the family and your kids doing the same. That mouse-wheel mentality. For me to break that kind of cycle was nerve wracking and untraveled.
Part of me was ashamed, part of me was, why have I been thrown this curve ball in my life after a challenging start already? But I learned to accept that it wasn’t a choice. And when I met my (late) husband he taught me to love myself for who I am, not who someone wants you to be. It’s so different now for kids… Although there will always be bullies.
Even to this day I haven’t come out to my father, I haven’t said ‘look Dad I’m gay’ but he knows. I came out to my mother and my brother when I was 21, at university. My mother kind of joked around and was more light-hearted about it which was comforting. She said ‘it’s not your fault, I blame your father’ because on his side of the family a couple of my relatives are gay.
I went to work in the advertising industry. I loved it, I thrived. I liked the competitiveness and the creativity involved in selling people cr*p they didn’t want. Deep down I’m a creative person. There’s always a functionality in what I do but I shine more when I have creative freedom.
I met my husband in a very romantic situation. He flew for Air New Zealand, he had an overnight in Wellington and we met in a bar. I was in my early 20s. Our wedding was a very very very tiny ceremony. Couple number 26 on the civil unions register and then we went and had a lovely lunch and he flew to work the next day. About seven or eight years later he got sick. He passed away ten years ago last December.
When I decided to make a switch to horticulture, we’d just built a brand new house. My husband said ‘let’s build our dream garden’. That’s how it started. We entered the local garden competition and it was voted on by the public and we won and he said, ‘maybe you’ve got something?’ That was an Oriental garden. It had a pond, maple trees, magnolias. I was learning so we put in plants that we liked the look of and when things died we’d go okay that doesn’t work. I realised I needed to learn more and I went back to study horticulture.
When My Dream Green Home came up, it was very unexpected and I was fortunate to be in a position to be able to take the opportunity. I was thrown in the deep end. It was sink or swim. And I adapted and enjoyed every moment of it. It was one of those ‘why not?’ situations.
I love cactuses, succulents, euphorbia, very robust plants that have been thrown the hardest conditions but they still find a way to survive. They soak up the rain and then they flourish and perform and then they wilt and are dormant until another burst of rain. They don’t flower for long but when they do it’s so beautiful. I love that they’re resilient and they’re determined.
Plants will surprise you, they’ll find a way to survive. They’ll only give up after they’ve exhausted every possibility. When plants regenerate, they learn from the past and change their chemical structure to survive in a different environment. I’ve also found myself in what wasn’t my natural environment. But I forged a path.
My Dream Green Home is on Wednesdays, 7.30pm on TVNZ 1, and TVNZ+.
