VietNamNet Bridge – Ta Yen Ray, a 16 year-old living in mountainous Ma Noi Commune, central province of Ninh Thuan, was often called “monster-faced boy” because of his cleft lip.

Doctor Nguyen Van Dau of HCM City Children No1 and Ta Yen Ray after the cleft lip repair surgery. — Photo laodong.vn

As soon as Ray’s mother, Ta Yen Thi Mai, gave birth to him – her fifth child—villagers told her to kill him. His life, they said, would be miserable.

Instead, Mai carried her son to terraced fields, where she made a tent for both of them in order to escape from the villagers’ prejudice.

She said that at that time, she just thought: “God gives him to me. He is bad-looking but he is my son. When he grows up, he cannot do much, but it’s OK if he could help me tend cattle.”

The mother and son, from the Raglai ethnic group, live in a remote area, without any neighbours or friends. Since he was a new-born, his cleft lip has prevented Ray from eating and speaking properly. Breastfeeding was difficult. His mother fed him with spoons of boiled sugar rice water. He has grown up with the sun and the heat of central Ninh Thuan Province.  

Ray does not go to school and cannot speak Vietnamese. He has never seen a television or a telephone. All he knows are his mother, spacious terraced fields and crops.

But last month, for the first time, Ray and his mother left their home to go to HCM City – a big city that they had never considered visiting.

Their mission was potentially life-changing: a cleft-repair surgery for Ray, so that he could eat and talk normally, and escape the stigmatisation that had followed him since birth.

The journey from his tent to the big city was the journey to find a smile.

For the first time, Ray was among thousands of people in a crowded hospital – HCM City Children No1 Hospital. He held his mother’s shirt. The mother, worries etched on her face, kept watching the man who took them to that hospital.

Mai can speak a little Vietnamese, but not enough for her to understand what doctors told her.

The life-changing photo

Photographer Tran Trong Luom is the man who took Mai and his son to HCM City for a cleft repair surgery. Luom met Ray for the first time more than one month ago when he made a visit to Ma Noi Commune, Ninh Son District.

The 16-year-old herd boy reminded Luom of Ta Yen Nghiep – a boy in the photo “Behind the smile” that won a special prize in a photography contest last year.

Nghiep also suffered from cleft lip, more serious than Ray’s. Today, however, Nghiep looks much better after a free cleft repair surgery donated by Smile Train. Luom wanted to provide the same treatment for Ray.

It was not easy to persuade Ray’s mother to go ahead with the surgery, Luom said. She accepted Ray’s abnormality as their destiny. She said she was afraid that with a nice-looking face, Ray would not live with her any more.

Luom even asked for help from elderly people in the village. Mai was partly persuaded by seeing nice photos of Nghiep after a surgery.

When Mai had been persuaded, Ray had his cleft lip repaired at HCM City Children No1 Hospital.

After his one-hour surgery, his mother was happy and surprised. She had not believed Ray’s cleft lip could ever be transformed; moreover, doctors could do it, not Gods or immolation.

It should be earlier

Head of dentomaxillofacial department under HCM City Children No1 Hospital, Nguyen Van Dau said that cleft lip repair should be done at ages of one or two.

Ray received the surgery too late, so he had to have another surgery to heal the inner part of his lips. He must complete physical exercises to improve his pronunciation.

Dau said that he remembered cases in which people with cleft lips received surgeries too late, for examples, 70 year-old woman or 23-year-old twins in Central Highland Region.

They wondered that why they did not receive surgeries earlier as charity groups usually offered free cleft lip repair surgeries and asked local authorities to make lists of eligible people.

Still, the family and Luom are hoping the benefits of Ray’s surgery will be more than physical.

“Ray reminds me of Nghiep. Nghiep used to be like Ray, very shy and alone. However, after the cleft repair surgery, Nghiep is more confident, he goes to school, has friends and studies well,” Luom told Lao Dong (Labour) newspaper, adding that he wanted such changes for Ray. 

VNS