Army Pfc. Tan Q. Ngo

Died August 27, 2008 serving during Operation Enduring Freedom

20, of Beaverton, Ore.; assigned to the 1st Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment, Hohenfels, Germany; died Aug. 27 in Kandahar, Afghanistan, when his mounted patrol received small arms and rocket-propelled grenade fire.

Army Pvt. Tan Q. Ngo remembered

The Associated Press

One of Tan Q. Ngo’s hobbies was cooking. He could turn anything, even potatoes and eggs, into a meal, as long as it was super spicy, said his brother.

“He could put anything together and make it taste good,” Timmy Ngo said.

Ngo, 20, of Beaverton, Ore., was killed Aug. 27 by small-arms and rocket-propelled-grenade fire in Zabul province. He was a 2006 high school graduate and was assigned to Hohenfels, Germany.

“He wanted to protect his country. He didn’t want another 9/11,” said his mother, Binh Thanh Sam. “He said, ‘This is our home now, I want to take care of it.’”

He walked his younger brothers to school. He volunteered through Key Club at school and spent a year in the Job Corps, working to become a chef and then as a house painter. He also liked video games, including Grand Theft Auto and Halo.

“He always said, ‘Mom, I love you,’” Sam said. “He was a big boy, but a little kid at heart.”

He liked nothing better than playing pickup basketball or football, or playing cards with friends. “He had lots of moms; he was a neighborhood boy,” Sam said.

He also is survived by his father, Ut Quoc Ngo.