While many women are pampered with flowers and gifts on International Women’s Day, March 8, from their loved men, others are too busy eking out a meager living simply to survive and support their family.

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One of the virtues Vietnamese women are endowed with is wholehearted devotion and sacrifice for the sake of their family, particularly for their husbands and children.

The deeply moving stories below highlight such a virtue.

Female cyclo rider

Nguyen Thi Tro and her husband, Le Van Bi, who went fishing on the Huong (Perfume) River in the central province of Thua Thien-Hue, were relocated to Phu Vang District, some 10 kilometers from the provincial capital of Hue, some years ago.

Bi switched to riding cyclos to support his wife and two kids.

However, misfortune befell the poor family as the husband was diagnosed with a serious liver disease in 2013.

Tro then took on the breadwinning role and decided to ride her husband’s cyclo for a living.

Nguyen Thi Tro is pictured riding her cyclo at noon. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Tro (right) and her young son scavenge for snails for their meals. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Cyclos are used to refer to bicycle taxis that are a sort of pedicab having one or two passengers in a seat in the front and the driver pedaling in the rear.

The woman herself is also suffering from rheumatism and a large tumor on her back.

As Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper reporters gifted her a bouquet, she said it was the first she has ever received on International Women’s Day.

Tro (left) and her son are shown making votive papers for some additional incomes. Photo: Tuoi Tre

The woman makes sure her son is kempt and ready for school. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Tro (left) said this is the first bouquet she has received on International Women’s Day. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Female garbage scavengers

Le Thu Suu, 56, and her sister-in-law rode their carts carrying heaps of rubbish through streets which glitter with bouquets and gifts intended for women on their special day.

She and her husband rented a shabby room in District 12, Ho Chi Minh City.

Suu left her hometown in the northern province of Vinh Phuc and began collecting scrap and garbage in the southern metropolis seven years ago.

The weather-beaten woman also rides carts with as much as 200 kilograms of wares each day to earn some additional incomes.

A Tuoi Tre reporter is seen presenting a bouquet and gifts to Le Thi Suu (right) after she arrived home from half a day scavenging for garbage on March 6, 2015. Photo: Tuoi Tre

Le Thi Dong, 47, who lives in a rented room near Suu’s, has also scavenged for garbage for several years to provide for her ailing husband and growing children in her hometown.

The emaciated woman, who weighs over 30 kilograms, is sometimes on the brink of collapse at the dumping grounds, but pushes herself to stand up at the images of her husband and children waiting at home.

Two middle-aged women support entire family

For years, Nguyen Thi Mai Lan, 56, and her sister, Tram Anh, have been supporting and taking meticulous care of their 85-year-old mother, who suffers diabetes and senile dementia, and their paralyzed 91-year-old father.

Chaos sometimes breaks out in their plain apartment in District 1, Ho Chi Minh City when their three mentally-ill younger brothers, who have depended totally on the two women for care for many years, have tantrums.

Without sufficient medicine, the men would grow furious, hurt themselves, and threaten to kill the entire family.

Lan remains unmarried while Anh is divorced.

The latter runs a small clothing stall in District 3, which is the entire family’s livelihood.

Devoted young wife

Tran Thi My Hanh, from the Mekong Delta province of Ben Tre, is tending to her husband, whose body has been wasted away with a terminal-stage cancer, at the Ho Chi Minh City Oncology Hospital.

Hanh’s mother passed away when she was only three and her father followed his wife some years later.

She toiled hard to support herself and her younger brother.

In 2008, Hanh got married to a young man who lived nearby and they were happily blessed with two kids.

Some years later, her husband was diagnosed with cancer but she could not afford long-term treatment.

During a talk with Tuoi Tre reporters two days ahead of the women’s day, the young woman could not hold back her tears at the grim prospect of losing her husband soon to the sinister illness.

A Tuoi Tre reporter is pictured gifting a bouquet to Tran Thi My Hanh (center), who is tending to her terminally-ill husband (lying) at the Ho Chi Minh City Oncology Hospital. Photo: Tuoi Tre

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