(PLO) – “On the first day of Tet, before the respected village elders, he steeled himself and once again dug a hole to bury his child in line with the custom. But when the earth had been filled up to the child’s shoulders, seeing the innocent child screaming, he rushed down, dug the earth away and lifted his child up, then he knelt to apologise and accept punishment before the villagers. The child was born into this world for the second time”.
Overcoming custom, born a second time
Ji A village in Krong Nang, Krong Pa District (Gia Lai), lies hidden deep in the majestic Central Highlands mountains and forests. There, many customary laws still exist that fill many people with dread whenever they are mentioned.
Nineteen years ago, on a New Year’s Day, a boy named Nay Djrueng, the eighth child of K’Bor Djoang and Nay H’Che (both born in 1947), was born crying. But unlike the joyful spring atmosphere, that night was a terrifying sleepless night.
The baby boy was born with no legs and no arms, wriggling in a thin blanket, reminding his parents of their second child, who had also been born that way more than a decade earlier. Before the eyes of the village, the second child had been forced by everyone to be buried alive by his own father’s hands in a hole he dug himself.
That haunting memory seemed buried and forgotten with the passing years, but who would have thought… “A child who does not look like a human is the child of a demon. If you do not bury it alive, it will bring harm to the whole village. Yang will punish us…” Such ignorant beliefs, passed from one generation to the next, kept echoing in his head.
Because of that custom, he was haunted by many sleepless nights. Even wild animals cannot bear to eat their own young, let alone a father, a mere mortal? Every time he looked at Nay Djrueng, thinking of the moment when he would once again bury his own flesh-and-blood child with his own hands, he was filled with sadness and resentment.
He hated the demons and ghosts that had made his child into a monster, not yet understanding that the consequences were caused by wartime poison.
On the first day of Tet, before the respected village elders, he steeled himself and once again dug a hole to bury his child in line with the custom. But when the earth had been filled up to the child’s shoulders, seeing the innocent child screaming because he could barely breathe, he rushed down, dug the earth away and lifted his child up, then he knelt to apologise and accept punishment before the villagers. The child was born into this world for the second time.
The father’s breaking of the custom to save his child made him a “criminal” of the J’rai people in Ji A village. That whole night, Nay H’Che’s family had all their buffalo, cattle, rice and paddy seized by the village to offer to the gods and to Yang, and they were driven deep into the forest to live…
In utter hardship, they led one another to rebuild their lives from nothing, amid the contempt of the villagers. In the days that followed, fortunately local officials heard about it, came to explain and advise, and Nay H’Che’s family was allowed to return to their old home and live normally.
But the miracle did not stop there; Nay Djrueng continued it, bringing pride to his parents and his village when he entered university.
At just six years old, the child with a disability already knew to cling to his father’s legs and beg to go to school. After a moment of surprise, his father silently looked at his son and then looked towards the distant school in the village, shaking his head.
Deep down he also wanted his son to have an education, but he feared that friends would tease him and cruelly remind him of his misfortune, so he gave up the idea. But after many sleepless nights listening to his son begging him, one morning he carried Djrueng on his back to class and asked for him to be admitted. Although they were reluctant to take Djrueng, fearing he would disrupt the class, the teachers could not refuse because of his enthusiasm.
The miracle of the boy with no arms
From then on, Nay Djrueng was carried to school by his father every day. After a month, once he knew his friends and the way, he had to get to school by himself on… his two knees, because his father was busy earning a living in the forest.
“The mountain road was muddy and full of stones; some days, going home, my knees were bleeding and aching. It was not until grade 3 that my father bought me a pair of plastic sandals, and from then on my feet hurt less,” the student recalled. Nay Djrueng’s road to school became less arduous in lower secondary school, when he entered a boarding school.
Each new class and new school meant more curiosity and mockery from new friends. “Sometimes when I saw friends teasing me, I would rush at them to hit them in anger; if I could not hit them, I would… cry. That was how I finished lower secondary school and went on to upper secondary school. But the hardship was not over; at school I had to climb several flights of stairs, trying to arrive early to keep up with the lessons,” he recalled. But he never once thought of dropping out.
Although he was born with a rather sweet singing voice and had once decided to change direction just after finishing grade 9, applying to join the music troupe of a centre for people with disabilities in Hanoi, missing school made Nay Djrueng return to his studies.
| Nay Djrueng |
“In grade 11 I started learning IT, and I began building a website for friends with disabilities so they could have the chance to chat and share with one another and rise up together in life. I never expected that, because of that, when I finished grade 12 I would choose IT as my career direction,” Nay Djrueng added.
His first impression of university life was the dormitory manager. He carried the boy with a disability’s suitcase up to the fifth floor for him, while the boy had to hurriedly climb after him, exhausted but warmed by the encouragement and sharing of many people.
Friendly, energetic and sociable, with some natural talent for music, Nay Djrueng was elected class monitor by his classmates. Not stopping there, this pupil from a Central Highlands village eagerly joined his class and school volunteer student teams.
Nay Djrueng is everywhere, from Mid-Autumn Festival nights for poor children to bowls of charity porridge for friends with disabilities in Ngu Hanh Son District (Da Nang), despite his great difficulty in moving around.
As we said goodbye, the determined student with no arms and no legs smiled once more, as if summing up his life: “With faith and determination, you can have everything”.
Anh Duong – Phap Luat Online