The Lunar New Year remains one of the few real reminders of Vietnam that Nga Vương-Sandoval and her family brought with them when they fled the country in the mid-'70s, when she was three years old, and resettled in Denver.
"As a refugee, as someone who was forced to flee my homeland, we were not able to bring a lot of tangible items with us," Vương-Sandoval says. "The most significant items became the intangible items, which is our culture, our language and, of course, our holidays, and that's something that can never be taken away no matter what sort of unfortunate events occur."
Also known as Tet in Vietnam, the Lunar New Year is a celebration of the first new moon and a festive time for Asians around the globe. "It has always been the most significant holiday for me," says Vương-Sandoval.
And this year, she gets to celebrate it by taking the honorary "First Shot" at the Denver Nuggets game against the Sacramento Kings on Wednesday, February 14 — the first home game since the start of the Lunar New Year this past weekend.
Vương-Sandoval isn't the typical fan plucked from the crowd. She's the first refugee project manager for the U.S. Refugee Advisory Board, which advocates nationwide for refugees and asylum seekers. Last year, as the chair of the Lunar New Year Allies Advisory Group, she played a key role in pushing the Colorado Legislature to make the Lunar New Year an observed state holiday in Colorado; Governor Jared Polis signed the bill into law on June 2.
"It's the largest and most celebrated holiday in Asia because it's not based upon religion, it's based upon culture and the Asian zodiac, and that's really special to me," Vương-Sandoval says. "Being that I lost everything when my family and I fled to the United States, and to know that we can have something that special with us now and that it's permanent now in Colorado, to me that's more meaningful."
Vương-Sandoval was also the honorary Colorado delegate for Refugee Congress — she won the 2021 Refugee Congress Excellence Award — and served as a U.S. Refugee Representative for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in 2022. Thomas Evans, the artist known as Detour, devoted a mural to her in 2020 in Five Points; the wall on which it was painted has since been demolished. (Westword named her a person to watch in 2023.)
When she got the invitation from the Denver Nuggets to take the first shot, "I was in a bit of disbelief because I didn't realize that it reached that level of messaging and that the Lunar New Year had reached the Nuggets, something I could never have imagined," she says. "I know the moment is much bigger than me or one person, because it represents a tremendous holiday."
The celebration of the Lunar New Year has become a major initiative for the NBA, and the Denver Nuggets use the ceremonial “First Shot” as a way to engage with and recognize members of the community at every home game.
“Nga stood out for her leadership with the Lunar New Year advisory group, which spearheaded the effort to pass the Lunar New Year holiday legislation. Being among the first states to recognize the Lunar New Year in such a way is something all Coloradans can be proud of,” says Nuggets VP of Marketing Ron Chase. "For this game in particular, we knew we wanted to highlight someone who has done important work for Colorado’s Asian and Asian-American communities and Nga was an obvious choice."
When she got the invitation from the Denver Nuggets to take the first shot, "I was in a bit of disbelief because I didn't realize that it reached that level of messaging and that the Lunar New Year had reached the Nuggets, something I could never have imagined," she says. "I know the moment is much bigger than me or one person, because it represents a tremendous holiday."
The celebration of the Lunar New Year has become a major initiative for the NBA, and the Denver Nuggets use the ceremonial “First Shot” as a way to engage with and recognize members of the community at every home game.
“Nga stood out for her leadership with the Lunar New Year advisory group, which spearheaded the effort to pass the Lunar New Year holiday legislation. Being among the first states to recognize the Lunar New Year in such a way is something all Coloradans can be proud of,” says Nuggets VP of Marketing Ron Chase. "For this game in particular, we knew we wanted to highlight someone who has done important work for Colorado’s Asian and Asian-American communities and Nga was an obvious choice."
Vương-Sandoval is feeling "grateful, excited, nervous...I'm looking forward to something I'll never forget," she says, adding that her husband, a lifelong Nuggets fan, is "beyond proud" he'll get to spend Valentine's Day evening watching his wife take the first shot.
But basketball "is not in my wheelhouse of talents," she admits, adding that "his first response was, 'We've got to get you to the rec center.'" She has gone to the Washington Park Recreation Center the last two nights to practice her free throw, and "I got a couple good shots in," she says.
"I'm representing more than one person in the shot, so I'll give it my all," she continues. "I'm representing the AAPI community. I believe my ancestors will be there. I'm representing refugees and immigrants. I'm representing those who are not professional basketball players but appreciate the game, and I'm representing those who are 5'2."
But basketball "is not in my wheelhouse of talents," she admits, adding that "his first response was, 'We've got to get you to the rec center.'" She has gone to the Washington Park Recreation Center the last two nights to practice her free throw, and "I got a couple good shots in," she says.
"I'm representing more than one person in the shot, so I'll give it my all," she continues. "I'm representing the AAPI community. I believe my ancestors will be there. I'm representing refugees and immigrants. I'm representing those who are not professional basketball players but appreciate the game, and I'm representing those who are 5'2."
This year marks not just the first time the Nuggets have honored Lunar New Year, but the first time it's been observed in Colorado. When the bill passed last year, the country was still dealing with the rise in anti-Asian hate crimes that came with the pandemic; Vương-Sandoval says she feels encouraged that the trend is reversing, given the recent interest in the Lunar New Year.
"There was so much negative rhetoric all across the United States," she remembers. "There was a tremendous uptick of racial slurs, of xenophobia, of hate crimes towards our community. One of the things I've seen emerge since the passage of the bill is that organizations, schools, corporations, government entities, are being very intentional about wanting to learn more about what Lunar New Year is."
Vu'o'ng-Sandoval believes "that curiosity will eventually turn into compassion, and compassion will turn into more unity among our community." And so her first shot will be "a very beautiful moment of advocacy, of cultural holidays and the world-champion Nuggets fused together in something very beautiful and outward to show support for our community."
This story has been updated to include a quote from the Denver Nuggets.
