Huge mosquito

The separation

Mr. Le Dinh Keo (born in 1924, now deceased) spent time working on cargo ships in Sai Gon before he started his own family, which included daughters Le Thi Bong and Le Thi Nu.

His wife one day incurred a huge debt and took the whole family to a temporary accommodation in the market as putting their house on sale was the only way to get the debt paid off.

Mrs. Le Thi Nu

Not long after marriage, Keo’s wife left. He and his daughters lived a vagabond existence, struggling just to keep their heads above water.

In 1966, days of deliberation went by, Mr. Keo decided to put his daughters Le Thi Bong (13 years old), Le Thi Nu (5 years old) up for adoption to two families in District 4.

Mrs. Phan Thi Ngoc (nearly 90 years old, living in Canada) as a loving old woman, adopted Le Thi Nu. “I wanted to take them both, but I didn’t have the capability.”

It was imprinted on Nu’s mind the first time she got sent home for a visit to her birth father. “I gave him some money from my piggy bank but he refused to take it and instead gifted me a roast duck and some bread before I got back to my foster parents’ home, saying ‘enjoy them my daughter, there will be no next time visit’,” Mrs. Nu recalled with tears streaming down her cheeks.

Mrs . Le Thi Bong

Those lengthy 53 years

Mr. Keo departed in 1968. The sisters got a chance to mourn their father at his funeral after completely losing touch.

In the following years, Mrs. Bong worked different jobs as a banana trader at the pier and a chef at restaurants in District 4, thinking that her younger sister had settled down in America leading a full life with good education. Mrs. Bong married at 20 and still lives in the Xom Chieu market area, district 4.

As for Mrs. Nu, in 1975, she together with her adoptive parents moved from District 4 to Ba Diem commune in Hoc Mon district in Saigon. She led a rather strenuous life providing support to her parents in the fields. They in 1990 moved to Canada without Nu. She soon married a carpenter in Tinh Bien district, Tay Ninh Province and gave birth to seven children. She stayed partnerless and raised them all after her husband’s death, unfortunately.

Mrs. Le Thi Nu holding a photo of her birth father.

Nu lived with a longing to reconnect with her older sister but her search for Mrs. Bong was not feasible due to unstable living location and having no aid.

“I miss her, every night, for decades. I have never forgotten the visit when I was seven and she was 15. I took her to the market and her utterance upon seeing anything there was ‘do you want it? Take it, take it, I’ll pay’ despite me repeatedly shaking my head.”

Mrs. Nu’s son also started his search for his aunt whenever he heard someone with similar name or age, but was always left disappointed.

Affecting reunion

A TV show named ‘As if we were never apart’ (Nhu chua he co cuoc chia ly) after receiving two matching letters about finding relatives contacted two of the senders for a reunification on the program. There was initially some trouble in contacting Mrs. Bong due to the change in her address but it finally went smoothly.

Moment of rejoice

Ms. Bong shared that over the past few decades, she took the onerous journey to look for her lost sister, which was made even harder due to her illiteracy. She had to reach out for help to post a newsletter for the search of Mrs. Nu.

The second they saw each other again, no one could refrain from shedding tears. With hands held, embraces locked, they filled in the other with stories missed, recollecting those days, with that pure joy of being able to stay close to your flesh and blood.

Tu Anh

Dozens of children in Vietnam have been born to infertile parents under a program that pays for the costs of the expensive in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment for low-income couples who struggle to conceive naturally.

The annual program, known as ‘Uom mam hanh phuc’ (Sowing Happiness), was launched in 2014 by Prof. Dr. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Phuong, who spearheaded the introduction of IVF treatment in Vietnam in the late 1990s.

Each year, organizers select from hundreds of applications and provide financial as well as medical support to some dozen couples who need help the most.

Selected couples are sponsored for all steps of a standard IVF treatment, which is a process of fertilizing an egg with sperm outside of the body.

This treatment involves monitoring and stimulating a woman’s ovulatory process, removing ova from the woman’s ovaries, letting sperm fertilize them in a laboratory, and implanting the resultant embryo in the female’s uterus.

A couple plays with their child born through in vitro fertilization sponsored by a program that supports infertile couples in Vietnam. Photo: Huu Thuan / Tuoi Tre

According to Dr. Dang Quang Vinh, deputy director of My Duc General Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City that provides the treatment, selected couples will have all their medical costs covered, including those of storing unused embryos, which can be accessed for future IVF attempts.

Under this program, each couple can save up to VND80-100 million (US$3,500 – 4,300) per attempt.

As of the time of writing, 80 children have been born to parents who underwent IVF treatment sponsored by the program, while six mothers are expected to give birth through IVF treatment soon.

This year, on its fifth annual call for candidates, the program has received 621 applications from infertile couples from across the country and selected 167 satisfying all criteria laid out by the organizers.

“As our funds are limited, we have no choice but to give priority to couples who are in most dire need of financial support,” said Dr. Vinh said.

Dr. Dang Quang Vinh, vice-director of My Duc General Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City. Photo: Huu Thuan / Tuoi Tre

The program is funded by donations from My Duc General Hospital employees and philanthropists. In 2017, VND2.7 billion ($116,000) was raised from these donations to help 33 couples selected for the fourth edition of the program.

“It pains us every time we have to reject an application,” he said.

The birth of ‘Treasure’

Hoang Van Hung, 36, and his wife Huynh Kim Hue, 29, who live in a small house in District 12, Ho Chi Minh City, were one of the 86 couples who were blessed with a child after being chosen for the program.

The couples’ dream of having a child became more and more far-fetched as they still struggled to conceive years after getting married.

Hue managed to get pregnant after their first attempt at seeking medical intervention by manually inserting her husband’s semen into her uterus, but their unborn child was pronounced dead by doctors eight weeks into her pregnancy.

After spending some time getting over the shock of their first child’s death, Hung and Hue sought help from private clinics multiple times to no avail.

Huynh Kim Hue plays with her first child born through in vitro fertilization sponsored by a program that supports infertile couples in Vietnam. Photo: Duyen Phan / Tuoi Tre

Financially exhausted, the couple decided to apply for the third edition of the ‘Uom mam hanh phuc’ program and got selected to undergo free IVF treatment at My Duc General Hospital.

It was Dr. Vuong Thi Ngoc Lan, Dr. Phuong’s daughter, who implanted the lab-cultured embryo into Hue’s uterus.

The couple’s happiness doubled when the first ultrasound result came out, showing that Hue had conceived twin babies.

However, one of the babies was pronounced dead after only 11 weeks.

Following this incident, Hung told Hue to refrain from all labor activities and to spend her days watching comedies to stay in a good mood.

Hue gave birth to the remaining twin on October 15, 2016 after 37 weeks of pregnancy. The couple had asked doctors to perform a C-section three weeks earlier than the expected date for fear of another miscarriage.

“It was only after hearing our child’s first cries that we could breathe a sigh of relief,” Hung said.

“It was a special moment that we wouldn’t ever be able to forget.”

A medical worker tends to the first child of Hoang Van Hung and Huynh Kim Hue after the boy is delivered at My Duc General Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City on October 15, 2016 in this photo provided by the couple.

They named their first child Bao Lam, which translates as ‘treasure of the forest.”

Now pregnant with her second child through IVF treatment, Hue said she and her husband could finally put an end to their restless search for a child which they had thought was without any hope.

Renewed hope

According to a 2018 research conducted on 14,300 married couples in Vietnam, 7.7 percent of the couples who were in childbearing age suffered from infertility.

The research estimated that around one million couples nationwide were infertile, half of which were under the age of 30.

Although the figure is not high when compared to the average global infertility rate of 6-12 percent as per WHO statistics, Dr. Phuong said it is alarming due to the fact that unhealthy lifestyles contribute much to infertility in Vietnam.

Heavy smoking and drinking habits affect one’s ability to conceive naturally, she added.

Prof. Dr. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Phuong, former director of Tu Du Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City. Photo: Duyen Phan / Tuoi Tre

More than 20 years since the first child was born through IVF in Vietnam in 1998, tens of thousands of children have been born thanks to this medical technique, Dr. Phuong said.

“Although the cost of IVF treatment in Vietnam is the lowest in the world, it’s still a huge expenditure for low-income couples,” Dr. Phuong said.

“If [all infertile couples in Vietnam] get access to free IVF treatment, around 70 percent of them will be able to conceive,” she added.

Dr. Phuong expressed her hope that IVF treatment will soon become available in each of Vietnam’s 63 provinces and municipalities so patients can cut down on their traveling and accommodation expenses.

An infertile patient undergoes a medical checkup at My Duc General Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City. Photo: Duyen Phan / Tuoi Tre

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With an orchestra spread out across the entire parterre, audiences limited to the balconies, and no breaks but plenty of disinfectant, the Sofia Opera is one of the few music venues still hosting live performances in Europe.

Across the continent, a third wave of COVID-19 infections is keeping opera houses and other cultural venues closed — loud singing poses a particular risk as the virus spreads through droplets — but in Bulgaria, classical music plays on, from “Tosca” to “La Traviata”.

“I am hungry for music. And the risk, why think about it? It’s not riskier here than in the supermarket or the subway,” says 81-year-old Petya Petkova, who attended Verdi’s “La Traviata” with her daughter last week.

Despite the disinfectant, social-distancing and staff taking people’s temperature, a festive spirit reigns at the historic opera house in the Bulgarian capital, a stark contrast to its silenced counterparts in Paris, Vienna or Milan.

Bulgaria first eased pandemic restrictions in June and allowed operas, concert halls and cinemas to reopen at 30 percent capacity, leading the Sofia Opera to arrange plastic and fabric flower bouquets as placeholders on the majority of the crimson plush seats.

“We perform in front of 250 spectators, but it’s better than not playing or performing,” Sofia Opera director Plamen Kartaloff says.

Even as Europe struggles with a third wave of infections, in part due to a number of mutations that spread more easily, Kartaloff expects the opera to remain open.

Acoustic challenges

Tragedy has touched the operatic community, and not just on stage: In November, Bulgarian tenor Kamen Chanev died of COVID-19, three weeks after he debuted Otello in the central Bulgarian city of Stara Zagora.

Remembering him, soprano Stanislava Momekova, 36, becomes serious.

“That’s the risk of this profession — it holds us like a drug, it’s stronger than fear,” Momekova says.

For American conductor Evan-Alexis Christ, who saw his performances in Germany cancelled, bringing “La Traviata” to the stage feels rewarding, despite a number of “acoustic challenges”.

From the pit, the orchestra had to move to the parterre, where musicians now sit far apart from one another. The singers on stage are even farther away.

“We are acoustically louder for the audience than normal so the orchestra has to play very quietly and listen even more to the singers,” Christ says.

“But overall I think everyone is very happy, also the musicians and the singers who are able to perform,” he adds, praising the discipline of the musicians, who, with the exception of singers and tube instruments, perform with face masks on.

Luring younger audiences

To Christ, the opera in Sofia and in Madrid, which has also kept its doors open, are proof that it’s still possible to play for a live audience.

“My feeling is that people are incredibly hungry, they want to hear music,” Christ says, adding that he hopes “to make a difference” for the 250 people in the audience that night.

Thanks to Kartaloff’s ingenuity, the Sofia Opera has found a number of ways to perform amid the pandemic: “Swan Lake” was staged on the pontoon of a lake near Sofia, while other operas reverberated through an old Roman fortress.

Some musical theatre performances were limited to adults with children, a way to focus on the audience of the future, Kartaloff says.

As clubs and bars have mostly remained closed, Bulgaria’s opera halls have become more alluring to younger audiences, including students who put on their prom suits to see “La Traviata”.

“It’s a huge pleasure to have the chance to attend a nice event such as the opera,” 38-year-old Nikolay Onufriev, who’s only been to the opera once before, says.

“It’s a way to escape from the grey, everyday life that we have amid the coronavirus pandemic, and for me, this is something big.”

Loship will use the investment to expand its delivery network, human resource, technology and market. — Photo tvphapluat.vn

HÀ NỘI — Loship, Việt Nam’s fast-growing one-hour-delivery e-commerce startup, has announced its latest investment from Skype co-founder Jaan Tallinn.

Tallinn participated in Loship’s Series C funding through his investment vehicle MetaPlanet Holdings.

This capital injection marks Loship as the first portfolio company of MetaPlanet in Việt Nam and Southeast Asia. The investment comes four months after the startup secured capital in a bridge round led by Vulpes Investment Management.

According to Loship CEO Nguyễn Hoàng Trung, the fresh capital will be spent on expanding the firm’s delivery network, human resource, technology and market.

“A huge portion of the funding will be poured into upgrading our app and developing technologies in Loship,” Trung said, adding that they will also ramp up their marketing strategies to cement Loship’s presence in the domestic market.

“It didn’t take me very long to realize Loship was on to something,” Loship quoted Tallinn as saying in its announcement.

“MetaPlanet is planning to pay more attention to the rapidly growing economies in Southeast Asia. So I’m delighted to be off to a strong start in Việt Nam by adding Loship as our first portfolio company there.”

Founded in 2017, Loship traces its roots back to Lozi, a review app allowing users to find food, beverage, and coffee shops, before transitioning into a one-hour-delivery services platform.

Loship has closed its series A and B rounds from investors such as South Korea’s Smilegate Investment, Hana Financial Group, DTNI, and Golden Gate Ventures. — VNS