Reunited Through Tennis

“If it wasn't for tennis, we would have never reconnected.”

Today, Rosie Tran and Emily Clark are best friends. Last year, they were reunited through tennis.

Tran and Clark moved to the United States after the Vietnam War in 1975. They originally met and grew up in the same Vietnamese community in the 1980s called the “Vietnamese Youth Organization” in West Philadelphia.

They learned English, organized dance events for their Vietnamese New Year, and in their spare time they learned sports like tennis, track, soccer, swimming, ping pong, and volleyball. But since their younger days in Philadelphia, they moved away, got married, had kids and lost touch for almost 30 years. Until 2020.

In 2020, Tran and Clark both started playing more tennis. Tran, originally a volleyball player, picked up tennis to pass the time. Clark had been playing tennis for years. One day, they both arrived at the courts at Louise Moore Park in the Bethlehem, Pa. area.

“She was playing on the court next to me and we exchanged phone numbers, but didn’t realize we had known each other before,” Clark said.

They had both changed their Vietnamese names to American names and did not recognize each other at the time. Until they bonded over something else they shared a love for: Vietnamese food.

“We started talking about our past, present and future,” Clark said. “And that’s when it clicked. We screamed, hugged and cried. We just couldn’t believe that we had known each other years ago.”

Now, they are inseparable.