A life worth living

Lawyer Doan Trong Nghia - from the Ho Chi Minh City State Legal Aid Center, a close friend of Mrs. Tam in many legal assistance cases, including obtaining personal documents, verifying identity, and intervening in property rights for the poor - laughed after hearing my story and said, "Yes, 'Mrs. Tam' is indeed not a busybody! She handles things properly and helps those she needs to the end!"

Ms. Tam Ha (left) takes Ms. Le Ngoc Lan - Bi's mother - to the Long Hung Commune Police Station, Phu Rieng District, Binh Phuoc Province to verify her identity.

This year, Mrs. Tam Ha is 84 years old, an age when she should be enjoying a peaceful retirement, but those who know her see her busy every day, rushing from one place to another.

Just last October, she had to take a motorbike taxi to a newspaper office in District 3 to help Nguyen Van Thang (nicknamed Bi, who suffers from epilepsy and mental disorders) receive charitable donations for his mother, Le Ngoc Lan, to pay for her treatment. She said that Bi could go alone, but she was very worried about leaving the young man, who is prone to fainting and seizures, to travel over ten kilometers like that.

Talking about Bi's mother and daughter would take days to finish. Nearly four years ago, Bi's mother sought out Mrs. Tam to beg her help in finding her mixed-race American daughter, who had been lost for almost 40 years after the war. Hearing the story, Mrs. Tam felt sorry for the mother and decided to help. Unfortunately for her, the "As If We Never Parted" program on Vietnam Television had just ended, so she couldn't ask the station for assistance. So she relied on other channels on social media, asking her children and grandchildren to spread the word. Unexpectedly, that small message she sent reached her daughter, Lan, who then returned to Vietnam. She said that after returning to America, her father had sent many letters searching for her mother, but to no avail. He passed away early, leaving a will for his daughter to find her.

When Mrs. Lan and her daughter embraced each other, overwhelmed with joy and sorrow, Mrs. Tam Ha couldn't hide her tears of happiness either, saying it was truly a miracle. Her daughter invited her mother to visit her in America. After meeting her daughter, Mrs. Lan revealed another hardship to Mrs. Tam: having to flee from the beatings and pursuit of her violent husband at the Phu Rieng rubber plantation since the 1990s, neither Mrs. Lan nor her son (Bi) currently possess any identification documents. Thus, Mrs. Tam Ha embarked on another arduous journey to help Mrs. Le Ngoc Lan and her son find their identities.

Ms. Tam Ha (left) prepares the paperwork to help Nguyen Thi Lan, a mentally ill woman who collects scrap metal, obtain a health insurance card after 40 years of living without identification documents.

With decades of experience dealing with over a dozen unfortunate lives and the arduous task of tracing identities, Mrs. Tam Ha meticulously assisted Mrs. Lan and her child. She inquired about Mrs. Lan's birth certificate and place of residence before she started working as a rubber plantation worker in Phu Rieng. Then, she traveled back and forth dozens of times by motorbike to Go Vap, Binh Thanh, and even Phu Rieng to retrieve original records. After finishing Mrs. Lan's case, it was Bi's turn. Unfortunately for Mrs. Lan, just as she had successfully identified the two of them, she discovered she had late-stage liver cancer. Holding her health insurance card in her hand, on her deathbed, Mrs. Lan choked back tears: "Thank you, Mrs. Tam, for giving me back my life and a future for Bi. The greatest blessing in my life is meeting you. My only regret is that I met you too late, so I couldn't continue living, or join you in doing charity work and giving back to life."

Mrs. Lan passed away, but thanks to Mrs. Tam Ha, Mr. Bi received a health insurance card, completed his personal identification documents, and had a small sum of money for medical treatment.

The story of Mrs. Lan temporarily concludes, and when asked if she was happy, Mrs. Tam Ha replied: "My heart is heavy, not as light as I thought. There's Binh, an orphan, 35 years old and still not daring to get married because he has no family ties; the son of the first chairman of this ward after liberation is 50 years old and can't take care of himself; and the very poor members of the Agent Orange Victims Association where I am a member are struggling to care for their children and grandchildren who are also affected by the poison… look, my dear!"

Indeed, many people around still wait, hope, and seek help from this 84-year-old woman. Because they know she can save them. There are many seemingly "insurmountable" situations that Mrs. Ha has tackled and eventually resolved. For example, the case of Mr. Duong Phach, who suffered a traumatic brain injury in a traffic accident and couldn't afford health insurance; the case of Mrs. Nguyen Thi Lan, an elderly woman who collects scrap metal and has lived without identification for over 40 years due to mental illness; and the cases of children without birth certificates because their parents are separated or not married.

Counting by my calculations, there must be more than 20 such cases that Mrs. Tam Ha has helped. Not just for a day or a couple of meals, but for each person, each case, she would run back and forth dozens of times, drafting petitions, preparing power of attorney documents, and acting on behalf of the elderly, the sick, and orphaned children to retrieve documents from various districts and counties. Once, a judicial officer in Go Vap district "tormented" her, making her travel from District 12 to Go Vap nine times in three months to correct the accent mark on the name of a nearly 90-year-old woman to match the personal documents of her sons. She didn't complain about being tired, but only told the officer: "What you're doing is a sin against the people!"

Mrs. Tam Ha and her family

Whenever someone complimented her, after a moment of silence, Mrs. Tam Ha would often softly say, "She's a student of President Ho Chi Minh, my child."

Perhaps no one says they learn from and follow Uncle Ho as naturally, calmly, and sincerely as Mrs. Tam Ha. Following Uncle Ho's example, Mrs. Tam Ha loves and helps everyone with all her heart and soul.

Ms. Tam Ha recounted that when she was only 7 years old, her father sent her and her younger brother to the Military Cadet School of Zone 9. Little Tam vehemently refused, so her mother had to give her a red Ho Chi Minh-themed silver coin and persuade her, saying, "Going to school means following Uncle Ho," before she and her brother finally agreed to go. At 13, she relocated to the North and was sent to school for another 10 years.

After graduating from the University of Education, she was assigned to Tan Yen High School in Ha Bac province as a teacher. In 1965, Ms. Tam Ha and her comrades crossed the Truong Son Mountains to work in the Southwest region of the resistance war. After the country was reunified, she pursued a career in teaching and received the title of Outstanding Teacher while serving as the Vice Principal of Tien Giang College of Education. In 1990, she retired and moved to District 12, Ho Chi Minh City, where she began caring for the poor. She said she did this in accordance with President Ho Chi Minh's teachings: fighting foreign invaders, eradicating illiteracy, and now fighting poverty…

The stories of Mrs. Tam Ha's selfless acts of kindness and service to society could go on forever, as she has done so much good. We have passed by countless houses built thanks to Mrs. Tam's efforts, countless roads opened thanks to her community mobilization, and witnessed countless lives where children were able to live today thanks to Mrs. Tam's scholarships, insurance cards, birth certificates, and identity cards. Many people say they will be indebted to Mrs. Tam Ha for the rest of their lives.

We, those who knew, accompanied, and loved her, are waiting for "Tam Ha's Memoirs." A woman who lived a life worth living. We wait – because we've heard her say that she's writing a little for herself each day; we wait – because we know that whatever she promises, she will surely deliver.

Source link: https://thanhnien.vn/mot-cuoc-doi-dang-song-185231118230333514.htm