Five kids, aged from 3 to 13, are left totally alone in their shabby home in the southern Dong Nai province and the older kids have to fend for themselves and their younger siblings by catching scorpions.

The sad story happened in the province’s Dinh Quan district. The poor kids are named Tuoi, Tot, Tuyen, Nhieu and Kim Cuong, which are indicative of their parents’ wishes for a happy life with plenty of money and diamonds.

However, this is the opposite in reality. They can hardly earn enough to eat, and neighbors said that the youngest kid once fainted from hunger.

According to the neighbors, all the five children and their three older siblings were living with their parents in a small house on the hillside. Over a year ago, their father committed a crime and fled, and a few months later, their mother also disappeared.

Their three older siblings, aged 18, 17 and 15 soon left home too to work in other provinces. They hardly earn enough to support themselves, let alone send money home.

Therefore 13-year-old Nguyen Thanh Tuoi has to catch scorpions to get scanty meals for himself and his four younger brothers and sisters. Tot, 11 and Tuyen, 9 also help Tuoi with the dangerous job.

Buy ants, sell scorpions

On one of the three kids’ “workdays”, while they are weaving through the pepper garden, Tuyen points to a small hole under the rocks and Tuoi immediately thrusts a stick into a bucket. With dozens of ants clinging to the stick, the boy puts it into the cave. Attacked by the ants, the dark black scorpion has to crawl out. Tuoi instantly grabs it by the tail and put it into a bucket. Scorpions can be used as food or immersed in traditionally medicinal wine in Vietnam.

“I was stung by the scorpions so many times that the skin on my fingers has thickened, leaving me no feelings there. I want to stay home with my mom and wish I had enough food and could go to school just like my friends,” the boy sadly said.

The scorpion dealer advances the money so that Tuoi has money to buy ants, which will be used to lure the scorpions out. The boy can catch only about 60-70 scorpions, or nearly 1kg, in a few days and sells them for a meager VND70,000 (US$3.3).

With such scanty sums, the five siblings struggle to feed themselves. When there’re no scorpions around, the elder ones beg for food from neighbors, leaving the youngest one at home. The little girl once fainted from hunger and was rushed to a local clinic.

The elder kids have dropped out of school. Worse, Tot, 11, is suffering from depression, staying silent most of the time, particularly in the presence of strangers.

A neighbor recalled that the kids even ate a dead chicken which they picked up, despite the risk of catching H5N1.

Le Van Tu, a local official, said that they can only donate rice to help kids, but they can’t be helped properly unless there’s an adult at home. Tu said they recently suggested sending the youngest child to a neighbor to look after but her 18-year-old brother disagreed.

UPDATE: A few days ago, after reading the Tuoi Tre article in Vietnamese published on Dec 7, the kids’ mother came back home, explaining that she was away from home working during all these months to earn some money. She promised to take proper care of them and send them back to school soon.