Van Thanh Luong had a dilemma. It was late 1982 and after eight months on a Malaysian island with thousands of other Vietnamese refugees, he'd finally been flown to Melbourne and bussed to a migrant hostel in Springvale.

Just about the only valuable possession he had left was a scrap of paper with a phone number for his elder brother. But as he stood outside, with little English and no money, the 18-year-old Luong had no clue how he was going to call it.