-
Chapter 7: Managing
- NUS Press Pte Ltd
- Chapter
- Additional Information
MANAGING 148 [18.117.81.240] Project MUSE (2024-04-17 20:57 GMT) MANAGING 150 homemaker Hello everyone, my name is Thúy and I’m 45 years old. Right now, I’m living happily with my husband and two kids. I’m very lucky to have a boy and a girl. My boy is 13 and in eighth grade, and my youngest is 8 and in third grade. Now I’m working a job that doesn’t have a name [laughs]. Just kidding, I don’t have a job; instead, I devote my day to my little family, and I know a lot of women like that. You think staying at home all day means my hands and feet aren’t put to use? If you think that, you don’t know what it’s like to be a mother [laughs]! My husband and I have a beautiful relationship. We were in love for ten years and lived together before getting married. At the time, everyone teased me about being too picky and giving my old man Phúc — my husband’s name is Phúc — a hard time by making him wait [laughs]. But when I was young, I had a lot of dreams and ambitions, I wanted to explore more, I didn’t want to get married and have kids early. So I only got married in 1995, when I was 29 years old. Three years later, I had my first child. MANAGING 151 People often say that I should’ve been a man because I’ve got a strong sense of determination and I always do what I say. I always try my best but sometimes things just don’t work out as planned. When I was in high school, I wanted to go to a university. My dream was the National Economics University. I still remember the afternoon when my best friend and I were walking around the lake, and over the community loudspeaker system they started reading out the entrance score requirements for the annual university entrance exam. As I listened to the results, I froze. I’d gotten 13.5, and the entrance score was 14. I’d missed by half a point. I was sad for the rest of the day. The thought that I’d failed by just half a point kept going round and round in my head. But I decided not to dwell on it, and I asked my parents to give me another year to study to pass the exam. The extra year might mean I could fulfill my dream of going to university, but even if it didn’t, it would be a chance to try my best and have no regrets. Do you understand? I mean, it was my last chance. If I passed, I would be a serious student. And if I failed, I wouldn’t give it a second thought, I’d find a suitable job and work hard at it. You know what I mean? If you know you’ve given it all you’ve got, you can feel comfortable and accept the truth, even if it’s a sad truth. And the result was … I still failed [laughs]. You want to know if I was sad? I’d be lying if I said no. But if you ask me if I regretted it, then no, I felt like a weight had been lifted from my shoulders and I accepted the result. Maybe I’m not fated to study in a university environment but I can keep studying in the school of life. That’s how I motivate myself [laughs]. My first job was at a wood processing plant. The plant made a lot of different products, from wooden toys to massage tables; sometimes we received custom orders for specific products. I worked there for three years, from 1986 to 1989. Then I took a MANAGING 152 training course so I could work in the music conservatory making and fixing the instruments. I remember the time I won the “golden hands” award for my work. It came with a gift of 100,000 đồng [$5]. These days that doesn’t sound like much, but at that time 100,000 đồng was a lot of money. Then in 1995, I married my husband. At the time, my husband’s family was very poor, and I knew that if I married him we couldn’t expect to depend on his family. But I loved...