Pahoua Thao remembers coming to Madison in 1992 after her family left a refugee camp in Thailand and stayed briefly in Oklahoma. She was 7 and spoke no English.
Before she arrived, she expected the United States to be like heaven – bright and shiny.
“Not that I was disappointed,” she said. “But it was a cold day, cloudy. And very quiet. I think I had expected more people.”
Now 22 and on the verge of graduating from UW-Madison, Thao is a self-assured young adult who’s already making contributions to the community that helped her grow up.