JavaScript is off. Please enable to view full site.

In northern Vietnam, daughter hires investigators to monitor papa’s secret expenditures

In northern Vietnam, daughter hires investigators to monitor papa’s secret expenditures

Monday, May 04, 2020, 10:16 GMT+7
In northern Vietnam, daughter hires investigators to monitor papa’s secret expenditures
Thuy is seen telling the detectives about her family issues. Photo: Vu Tuan / Tuoi Tre

Two investigators had a one-in-a-million job of tailing an aged cattle raiser in Nam Dinh Province, as per the request of his very daughter. It turned out that the old man simply wanted an upgraded earning for their family’s finance.

For months, silence has billowed over the family of Tuong, a cattle raiser living in Nam Truc District, Nam Dinh, located in northern Vietnam.

Not a single member of the family has been talking to the others.

Every meal they had was in utter silence, as if the house were badly haunted.

After many failed attempts to dig into what had occurred to her father, Thuy – his eldest daughter – opted to leave for Hanoi to seek a detective agency.

Intuition told her that papa might have been having an affair, for it was quite the norm around her neighborhood.

Two months earlier, Tuong had sold more than a dozen pigs. Then he took the money to the capital for some secret transactions.

He went on to sell his cows.

Nobody knew what the old man was up to.

Even the strip of land he once promised to be the dowry for his daughter’s wedding was gone. As he was an authoritarian patriarch, nobody dared to speak up.

“Does he often go out?” asked a detective from the agency.

“Yes, he’s been frequently going out around 2:00 pm, but he always gets home for dinner,” Thuy said, sobbing.

The investigator ruled out the chance of an extramarital affair.

Based on his analysis, the man was still healthy and he spent the nights at home.

He did not enjoy socializing, and did not use his phone in a secret manner.

That is a total far cry from those fornicators who would stick their phones around and set up new passwords to deny their wives and children access.

Other hypotheses were discussed. Could it be something bad that he was not willing to share even with his dearest family members? Could he have been blackmailed for something he had done?

The detective team believed Tuong was being coerced into spending money.

If that was the case, the job should not be pure investigation, but a rescue attempt.

They marked the case as one that might require the police force.

Two agents were sent to work undercover in Nam Dinh Province.

Detective Minh pretended to be a shoe peddler, and Detective Hung a door-to-door leaflet deliveryman for a cattle food company.

Minh was hanging around lottery stations in the commune to sniff around, but nobody ever mentioned Tuong.

He was not gambling at all, so they ruled out the chance that he was deep in debt.

Another investigator approached the bank and concluded that Tuong had no bank accounts. So it was not a loan case, either.

Hung knocked on Tuong’s door with a pile of brochures and gave him a presentation, after which the old farmer sighed, “Come back here when I have bought a new female cow.”

The investigators guessed that he might have entrusted someone with his money, for it seemed that he still wanted to keep the cows and make some money out of them.

Judging from his saddened eyes, the team thought he might be involved in something against his will.

According to them, he was definitely being a victim. Where could he have taken the money?

A page from the diary of Thuy, the eldest daughter of a farmer who dabbled his feet in the stock market. Photo: Vu Tuan / Tuoi Tre

A page from the diary of Thuy, the eldest daughter of a farmer who dabbled his feet in the stock market. Photo: Vu Tuan / Tuoi Tre

The stock

One Wednesday morning, the man borrowed around US$500 from his daughter, saying he had something in banking business to attend to. She gave him the money and texted the detectives.

He took the family’s bicycle and took off. Minh, the shoe peddler agent, tailed him closely.

The man pulled up after a 10km ride, in front of a stock exchange.

Hung kept a watch outside while Minh sneaked in. The old man fixated his eyes on the changing numbers on the trading screen.

It turned out that the man simply dabbled his feet in a field he had not fully understood.

The detectives quickly notified the daughter of all that occurred.

The man returned home to find his daughter and wife awaiting at the gate.

They locked him in a tearful embrace.

“Daddy, please don’t buy stocks anymore.”

A few months ago, one of his business partners from the city picked a huge winning stock. Their earnings were way more than what he could get in a year of raising cattle.

Not contented with the way things were, he decided to sell his swine herd for some funds. But his stocks were all negative.

He kept his family in the dark lest they might discover his losses, and sold the cows hoping he could win it back.

Yet the losses snowballed.

Now, their family meal that day was no longer silent. The daughters called their husbands and children home to celebrate the return of their ‘prodigal father.’

They planned to take out a bank loan and buy him a pig herd as well as a calf pair.

The two detectives came home. They could not believe that the stock market had already made it to the peaceful country.

At least, the farmer could still make it out of the hole, back into his family’s loving arms.

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!

Vu Tuan - Tien Bui / Tuoi Tre News

Read more

;

Photos

VIDEOS

‘Taste of Australia’ gala dinner held in Ho Chi Minh City after 2-year hiatus

Taste of Australia Gala Reception has returned to the Park Hyatt Hotel in Ho Chi Minh City's District 1 after a two-year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic

Vietnamese woman gives unconditional love to hundreds of adopted children

Despite her own immense hardship, she has taken in and cared for hundreds of orphans over the past three decades.

Vietnam’s Mekong Delta celebrates spring with ‘hat boi’ performances

The art form is so popular that it attracts people from all ages in the Mekong Delta

Latest news