Forty-six years apart

In 1977, Phan Xuyen, born in 1938 and now living in Dong Kho Commune, Lam Dong Province, led his two wives and young children from central Vietnam to the former Binh Thuan Province to build a new life.

Life in a foreign land proved harsh, marked by illness and poverty.

Unable to endure further hardship, the family moved to Ngai Giao Town, in what was then Chau Duc District of the former Ba Ria–Vung Tau Province, to seek work.

It was there that cracks began to appear within the family.

Mr. Xuyen’s first wife, Pham Thi Doan, took her children  -  Phan Thi Luu, then 13, Hien, 8, Bep, 6, Bai, 2, and a baby she was carrying  -  to Dong Nai Province, where they temporarily stayed with her younger brother.

Seeing that her brother’s household was already crowded and burdened with elderly parents, Doan did not want to become a further weight.

She gathered her children and began wandering from one market to another.

Carrying and leading her children, she eventually fell ill and was hospitalized at Bien Hoa Hospital, then transferred to Cho Ray Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City for treatment.

While their mother was sick, Phan Thi Luu, born in 1966, and her younger brother Nguyen Van Hien, born around 1971, begged for food to care for her as she stayed near a pagoda.

In 1980, during one such attempt to find food, Luu lost her brother Hien.

Terrified, she returned but did not dare tell her mother.

Night after night, she cried in silence and searched for him, but there was no trace.

Not long after, weakened by illness and hunger, Doan passed away.

After being separated from his sister in the city, young Hien could only stand and cry before wandering aimlessly.

Eventually, he slept in an empty stall at Binh Tien Market, in what was then District 6 of Ho Chi Minh City.

The next morning, a woman known as Aunt Nam, who sold brooms, found him and asked about his situation.

Learning that the boy was lost, she took him to the police station to seek help in finding his family.

Despite days of public notices, no relatives came forward.

Having no children of her own and moved by the boy’s plight, Aunt Nam took Hien in as her adopted son.

Back home, upon learning of his wife’s death and his son’s disappearance, Mr. Xuyen rushed to Ho Chi Minh City to search.

He wandered every street, asking countless people about his missing son, but found nothing.

After about a month of fruitless searching, he returned to Ngai Giao with his remaining children to live with his second wife.

Still angry at her father, Luu later took her younger brother Bai and ran away to Ho Chi Minh City again.

There, she begged for food while continuing to search for Hien.

Several times, Mr. Xuyen found and brought her home, only for her to run away again.

It was not until she grew older, felt ashamed of begging and realized the search was hopeless that she returned to live with her father.

At home, she and Mr. Xuyen worked hard to raise the younger siblings, helping them establish farms and homes before she married.

About ten years later, after ensuring his children were settled, Mr. Xuyen moved with some of them to the forested area of Tanh Linh, in the former Binh Thuan Province, where he still lives today.

Wherever he went, he never stopped longing for the son named Hien whom he had lost.

Reunion

Meanwhile, in Ho Chi Minh City, Hien endured a turbulent life.

In his early years with his adoptive mother, he was loved and cared for.

But after she married and had children of her own, Hien was repeatedly abused.

One day, after suffering losses while cycling around selling brooms, he was afraid to return home and face scolding.

He followed a man who made feather dusters to the former Ben Tre Province.

There, he learned the trade and earned a living making feather brooms.

Years later, after hearing that his adoptive mother had died, he chose not to return to Ho Chi Minh City, instead settling in Ben Tre, marrying and raising children.

As he grew older, the longing to find his roots deepened.

He reached out and wrote to the television program Nhu chua he co cuoc chia ly for help.

After a long process of searching and verification, the program found Mr. Xuyen and Hien’s siblings.

On the day of reunion, Luu and Hien embraced each other tightly, sobbing uncontrollably.

Mr. Xuyen, overcome with emotion, could barely speak.

In the overwhelming moment, his emotions surged so strongly that the program host and relatives had to support and comfort him.

Seeing his father still healthy and clear-minded, Hien could not hide his joy.

He leaned into his father’s chest and burst into tears.

After the emotional reunion, Luu shared that besides Hien, the family had lost another relative.

It was her younger sister, known by the nickname Bep.

Bep went missing while their mother Doan was ill and being treated at Bien Hoa Hospital.

Knowing she might not survive, Doan entrusted Bep to someone at the hospital.

That person later took Bep back to their hometown and gave her to a family in the former Dong Nai Province to be adopted.

Some time later, Mr. Xuyen and Luu traveled there to reclaim her, only to learn that the family had moved away without leaving any information.

Neighbors later said they had relocated to the former Dak Lak Province.

Since then, the family has received no news of Bep.

Through the program, Mr. Xuyen expressed his hope of finding and reuniting with his still-missing daughter, known as Bep, born in 1973.

The family earnestly hopes that readers and the wider community can help provide any information.

Ha Nguyen