Photos by Stephanie Klein-Davis | The Roanoke Times

Phasook "Noot" Lenoel, the owner of the Red Jasmine Thai restaurant in Vinton, is trying to bring her brother to the U.S.

Noot ran a restaurant in Vermont before moving to Roanoke in 2007.

Cape Cod Serenade — fresh shrimp, scallops and vegetables in yellow curry sauce — is prepared at Red Jasmine by Pun Kwanmuang, Noot's brother-in-law.

Restaurant regulars plan to celebrate with steamed dumplings once Noot's brother enters the country.

Fran Deeds (left), a retired teacher and friend who has become Noot's "American mother" dines at Red Jasmine three or four times a week.

The U.S. Embassy in Bangkok seems to have a hard time believing that Thai native Piya Thongprasertseree is indeed the brother of a 50-year-old Vinton restaurateur named Noot.

In recent months, officials have required Noot's brother to make the six-hour round-trip journey to Bangkok from his home in Pattaya, Thailand, to be interviewed -- on five separate occasions. If and when he clears the last of the hurdles, he will be allowed to travel to the United States to help Noot in the kitchen of her Pollard Street Thai restaurant, called Red Jasmine.

But proving a transcontinental blood link isn't easy. In 13 years, Phasook "Noot" Lenoel, 50, has spent more than $3,000 on applications, affidavits of support and DNA tests. She's mailed and faxed all manner of documents to the Department of Homeland Security and to Thailand, including family photographs featuring the two of them as well as a record of their frequent long-distance phone calls.

While experts say the long wait to sponsor the immigration of a sibling isn't unusual, multiple interviews to clear the final hurdle is.

So is the response of Noot's customers, who have e-mailed, called and written letters of support, trying to help her penetrate the red tape.

In so doing, they have become the very thing Noot has been searching for all along -- her family.

'American mom'

At the center of Noot's Herculean effort to bring her brother to Virginia is retired Roanoke County schoolteacher Fran Deeds. Deeds and her husband, Clyde, eat at the restaurant three, sometimes four times a week.

They never had children of their own, but they are intellectually curious people who travel often and have a way of taking people under their wing -- whether it's a relative suffering from Alzheimer's or a student from a broken home.

They were banking in downtown Vinton in 2007 when Fran noticed Noot's new restaurant across the street and asked a teller if it was any good. Noot's mother was visiting from Thailand at the time, and the two struck up a friendship, with Noot translating and Fran firing away questions about Buddhism and Thai food.

The Deeds had never eaten Thai cooking before, but they fell in love with the restaurant's cheery decor and chicken satay and, by the time Noot's mother flew back home, it was official: Fran was Noot's "American mom."

Fran crafted a stained-glass portrait of the Buddha, which hangs in the window of the bar. When Noot travels next month to watch her daughter graduate from Cornell University, she will be wearing a dress that Fran bought for her -- although presently they're arguing over style. Noot prefers muted colors and flowing designs while Fran bought her a fitted dress with bright polka dots, about which Noot declared: "I look like a Dalmation!"

When the Deeds leave for their annual Florida wintering, they take along a tub of Noot's sweet and sour sauce. When Noot and her daughter butt heads, Fran plays mediator.

"She entered from the sky, and she adopted me," said Noot, whose nickname translates loosely to "tiny, tiny thing."

Noot is 4 feet 11 inches and weighs 82 pounds. Fran has never worn a size zero in her life.

Noot loves to tell other customers, "This is my mom," just to see the shock on their faces.

One last hurdle

If only the embassy in Bangkok could hear the regular customers' pleas for steamed dumplings, maybe then they'd understand. With Noot's sister away on an extended vacation, there is nobody left in the kitchen who knows how to make the restaurant's most-requested appetizer.

"When my brother arrives, we'll have it again," Noot tells them.

In the meantime, her brother-in-law is doing most of the cooking. Noot says it's difficult to find people locally who know Thai cooking, and she's had a hard time convincing the Thai cooks she knows in bigger cities to move to Roanoke.

She emigrated to Boston with her first husband, a Frenchman, 26 years ago and, after establishing U.S. citizenship, later ran a Thai restaurant in Burlington, Vt. Noot moved to Roanoke in 2007 to open Red Jasmine, located in the spot of the former Cafe Succotash, at another relative's urging. (Noot is now divorced.)

In earlier years, she says she had no trouble getting green cards for other family members, which is why she didn't think to hire an immigration attorney to help with her brother's paperwork -- a decision she now regrets.

"Making him go through five interviews is not normal," Salem immigration lawyer Christine Poarch said. "But where there is a prevalence of fraud -- which has happened in Southeast Asia -- there tends to be a greater amount of security and suspicion."

Homeland Security approved Thongprasertseree's immigration late last year, according to documents, but every embassy interview has presented a new hurdle to clear: more paperwork to produce, more tests to pass.

Since DNA evidence of the siblings' relationship was confirmed recently, Poarch expects the application to be approved -- although she recommended that Noot call U.S. Rep. Bob Goodlatte's office for help expediting the process.

Fran, who has already contacted Homeland Security and the embassy numerous times, said last week that she planned to call Goodlatte's office next.

With the economy slowed and restaurant business down, the addition of Noot's brother in the kitchen will help. "He'll work partly in exchange for living with me here," Noot said.

She'll sleep better, too, not having to stay up till 3 in the morning helping her brother -- who doesn't speak English or know the letters of the alphabet -- organize the five-inch stack of immigration paperwork over the phone. ("I tell him to look for paper that starts with a Q at the top. I say, 'Look for the circle with the tail,' " she said.)

When he does arrive, Fran and the rest of the Red Jasmine regulars will celebrate with Thai dumplings. "The whole town is waiting for him to make it here," Noot said.

Red Jasmine Thai Cuisine is at 210 S. Pollard St., Vinton. 345-1165.