Siu Black raises pigs and makes YouTube videos.

Siu Black's day now is like any other elderly person in a Vietnamese village: Waking up at 4 a.m. to drink coffee, then feeding the pigs, watching the news, exercising, looking after her grandchildren while her daughter-in-law goes to the market, cooking... Siu finishes her day and goes to bed at 7:30 or 8 p.m. The daily routine of the Ba Na singer is vastly different from her peak: "Back then, I didn't go to bed until 2 a.m."

Siu Black sings for charity in the rain.

Siu Black recently had a successful performance in Da Lat. The singer of "Ly ca phe Ban Me" (Ban Me Coffee Cup) still possesses the same passionate and fiery spirit as ever, only her appearance has changed. Previously, Siu Black weighed up to 70 kg, but now she weighs only 53 kg, looking much more slender. Many speculated that Siu was worried and therefore lost weight or made an effort to lose weight to feel more confident about her appearance. All those assumptions were wrong.

Siu shared honestly and humorously: "I've been overweight for quite a while, only 20 years. Now I really like seeing chubby people because I can't get fat even if I want to. Unlike before, when I wanted to lose weight but couldn't." Siu Black revealed her health condition: "I have diabetes. I'm very strict with my diet and take my medication regularly, but my blood sugar levels are still high. I come home from work hungry, but just eating a little carbohydrate makes my blood sugar jump to 20 immediately, and my blood pressure also increases. The doctor once suggested I be hospitalized, but I asked to stay outside. Because just seeing a needle makes me panic, my heart rate becomes unstable, and my blood pressure becomes unstable."

I asked Siu Black, "Are you phobia of hospitals?" Siu admitted that she was afraid of hospitals: "Back in 2010, while judging Vietnam Idol, I had a motorbike accident and seriously injured my leg, so I had to go to the hospital. Since then, I've been afraid of hospitals." But once she's on stage, Siu Black transforms into a different person, interacting with the audience naturally and friendly, singing until she's completely exhausted: "I've always been full of fire. Even when I'm very tired, as soon as I hold the microphone to sing, all the fatigue disappears. After singing, my body is completely worn out."

I am a Ba Na person from Kon Tum.

I shared my feelings about Siu: "It seems like after the storms passed, she found peace again!" Siu agreed: "Exactly. Very peaceful. I'm not the type to compete or cause trouble with anyone; the trouble started when I opened that restaurant. I built it myself, and I ruined it myself… Back then, I just wanted to do business, to get rich. The failure made me realize that not everyone who wants to do business succeeds. If I had listened to my family back then and not done anything, maybe things would have been better. It's all my own doing; I'm not blaming anyone else." Siu Black, with her once infectious laughter, now prefers a quieter life: "There are quite a lot of rumors circulating about me. I don't want to clarify them, but it makes me hesitant to appear in public."

Today's audience sees Siu Black maintaining her strong stage presence, but they don't know that there was a period when she lost her voice. Looking back at those sad, dark days, Siu Black's return is a journey of overcoming herself: "Only those who have experienced personal crises truly understand. It took me quite a long time to recover. I once thought I couldn't sing anymore, that I didn't want to sing anymore. Then I locked myself in a small room to think. I realized I had lost so much, sacrificed so much… And I came out of that small room and went back to church to listen to the priest's sermon. He preached many things, and gradually I regained my confidence and my form. For years I didn't sing and thought I had lost my voice forever, but thanks to singing in church, I rediscovered my feeling. After that, I practiced on my own and returned to the stage." When she stumbled in life and had to leave the city and return to the village, the villagers didn't mock her but welcomed her with open arms: "Everyone comforted me: 'Thanks to you, people know more about Kon Tum.' Because whenever I go on stage, I always say, 'I am a Ba Na person and I live in Kon Tum.'"

Siu Black and her family members

Wherever God allows me to sing, I will sing.

Today's Siu Black remains rich in spirit. Not only are she loved and respected by her villagers, but she has also reunited with the father of her children. Will this "broken mirror mended" bring peace and happiness? I asked Siu. She neither sugarcoated nor painted a bleak picture of reality: "We understand each other better, and we both know we're getting old; we live for our children and grandchildren." When the pandemic broke out intensely, Siu Black realized even more deeply how essential the presence of men in the household was: “When COVID broke out, I was in a panic. I even had to sell the pigs at a loss because I didn't have money to buy feed. I spent all day confined to the village because the local authorities encouraged people to stay home and not go out to prevent the spread of the disease. My family has three men, and they were all quarantined. My husband and two sons went to get COVID vaccinations, and unfortunately, a COVID-19 patient was there. As a result, everyone in the village who went to get vaccinated that morning had to be quarantined. Oh my God, there were no men in the house, only me and my two daughters-in-law, and we didn't know what to do! During that time, I cried every night, reciting prayers, just hoping that my husband and sons wouldn't get COVID and would return safely.”

Comedian Thuy Nga teaches Siu Black how to make YouTube videos, but Siu Black is still clueless about the internet. Siu Black only uses her phone for calls: “I have Facebook, but I don’t do anything on it at all; whoever wants to post something can post it. It’s not that I don’t care about social media, but I don’t know how to use it, even though I’ve been taught. I record videos but have to wait for someone to post them for me. Now I know how to post a little bit, but it still doesn’t seem right, because when I ask people if they see what I post, they say they haven’t.” Yet, she created her own YouTube channel: “SiuBlack Kon Tum Life.” Speaking about this strange story, Siu laughed: “It’s thanks to comedian Thuy Nga. When Thuy Nga came back to Vietnam, she called me: ‘Sister, where are you?’ I told Nga I was in Kon Tum. Nga said: ‘That’s so far!’ But she still asked if I could come visit her. Unexpectedly, Nga actually came to visit me. It was Thuy Nga who taught me how to make YouTube videos. Since then, I’ve been filming my daily life, when I perform, when I sing at church, or when I participate in events…” I encouraged Siu Black: “If you diligently ‘nurture’ your YouTube channel, it might be more profitable than raising pigs.” Siu Black laughed heartily as if no storm had ever passed.

But Siu Black tried to suppress her fears; she didn't dare complain much, because some people had criticized her: "Many people suffer more than Siu Black and don't complain, so why does Siu Black complain?" Misunderstandings between people are common in life. Siu didn't blame anyone: "I don't crave anything anymore. I had everything before, so now I just let it go. Whatever God tells me to do, I do it, just live peacefully, without complaining. If my life is difficult, I say it's difficult; how could I say my life is happy? But it's true that there are so many poor, homeless people out there, they're even more struggling than me, so I tell myself to live in silence."

Siu Black feeds pigs.

Siu Black's current business is doing "stable," but she shared: "The price of pork isn't as good as it used to be. Before, raising pigs was profitable, but now it's all losses. Because the price of feed is very high now, while the price of pork only hovers around 40-45 thousand dong/kg; at 50 thousand, I can still break even. So I switched to raising fish. I needed to change because I'm a farmer, so I'll do whatever is profitable. I still raise pigs, but less, only a few dozen." Thanks to her husband's diligent efforts in learning fish farming techniques, Siu Black feels more secure. The debts are still outstanding; Siu Black has only paid off a small portion, but with her dedication to her work, she can certainly hope to be debt-free someday.

“Are you planning to move to the city again, or will you stay in your village for the rest of your life?” Without hesitation, Siu replied to my question, “Right now, I’m committed to Kon Tum; I have no other plans. I don’t have anything else to do that would require me to go far away. I’m content with my life as it is. I live on what I have.”

Does Siu Black regret her lost glory? The nightingale of the Central Highlands no longer yearns to return to her heyday: “I’m old now. Let it be. I’ll sing as far as God allows me to sing. My life is peaceful now; I get to sing, travel, and return to my children and grandchildren. That’s my happiness. It’s just that sometimes when I look back at the past, I feel a little nostalgic.” Siu may not be young anymore, considering her age, but does her voice ever seem to be affected by time? “Your eyes are green, or is spring coming? / The smoke from a cigarette lingers over a cup of Ban Me coffee…”

Tienphong.vn