(VOVworld) - I met her one morning in August, 2014. The weather in Hanoi was chilly because autumn had arrived. She was accompanied by a maid who reminded her whenever she forgot some details. No one can fight aging. She is in her 80s now and her memory has weakened. However, she looks healthy. She takes the bus to go swimming at a sports club in Quan Thanh street every afternoon. She sold her house at 14 Ngo Tram street, which is associated with many of her family’s memories. She is living with a maid in Ton Duc Thang street. She told me: “It’s better to live this way, it’s comfortable and free”.

Madame Pham Thi Thi (second from left)

Madame Pham Thi Thi was born in 1932. Her father, Pham Huu Ninh, was a famous teacher who founded and was the first principal of the private Thang Long school in Hanoi. Many revolutionary activists and intellectuals taught at that school including Vo Nguyen Giap, Phan Anh, Hoang Minh Giam, Bui Ky, Xuan Dieu, Dang Thai Mai, Nguyen Cao Luyen, Le Thi Xuyen, Pham Huy Thong, and Vo Tuan San. He had 5 daughters whose names all start with the letter T: Tram, Truc, Thuc, Thuoc, and Thi just like his wife Tran Thi Thuan, a beauty queen from Nam Dinh province. His wife was also an active student in the revolutionary movement in central Hanoi during the resistance war against the French.

Thuan came to the Voice of Vietnam by coincidence. After Hanoi was liberated, Mr. Le Quy, who was in charge of the Overseas Service and the French section of VOV, was invited to a film screening organized by Hanoi’s young revolutionary activists for national salvation. He met Thuan and asked her about her studies. Thuan told him that she was an alumnus of the French Albert Sarraut school and had finished the first year at the University of Law. Mr. Le Quy invited her to work for the French section at VOV, which was short of personnel at that time. A few days later, she decided to quit her studies and work for VOV at 58 Quan Su street. She became an official announcer on the French program without any formal training or probation unlike today. Yet she has been considered one of the best announcers of the French program.

During the years of the anti-US resistance war, she was present in even the most dangerous places. At the end of 1972 when the US air force used B52 bombers to devastate Hanoi and other northern cities, despite having small kids, she was one of the few people who were on duty in the capital. With a red hand band, she and her colleagues recorded programs every night. She even took her children with her on a VOV mission to Kunming, China, to produce and broadcast radio programs from China while waiting for the Me Tri and Bach Mai transmission stations, which had been destroyed by US bombardments, to be repaired. She recalled: “In the early morning of January 27, 1973, more than 100 members of VOV staff plus a dozen children were present at 58 Quan Su street. Editor-in-chief Tran Lam shook the hand of each of us. Except for the leaders, none of us knew where we were headed. We were just informed that we had to evacuate to a new place to ensure continual transmission. At 5.30AM, 3 buses transported us to the north. The roads were rough. We arrived in Lao Cai, a northern border province, in the late evening and slept there. The next morning, we were informed that the evacuation place was not in Vietnam but in Kunming, the capital of China’s Yunnan province. Kunming is located 1500 meters above sea level and it was a good place to transmit the Voice of Vietnam to all parts of Vietnam and friends worldwide. Broadcasting from Kunming, the quality of VOV’s programs was good and clear. The first piece VOV broadcast from Kunming was the Paris Accord on Vietnam, which was initialed on January 23, 1973, between Special Advisor Le Duc Tho, representing the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and Doctor Henri Kissinger, Security Advisor to the US President. The Paris Accord was officially signed on January 27, 1973. At 22:00 in Hanoi and 23:00 in Beijing, VOV broadcast the contents of this agreement to people in Vietnam and around the world and rebroadcast this program several times. At first we planned to stay in Kunming for 6 months until the Bach Mai and Me Tri stations were repaired. But in reality, these two stations were restored a year later and we left Kunming for home in June, 1974.”  

In the early 1980s, the French section was recruiting reporters and editors. I was among those employed at that time. She was head of the section and was in charge of editing, an important job. Her editing taught me about many things in life. Editing is about respect for the translator and the author and helps them to learn something new.

Although she was born into an educated wealthy family, her life was still difficult. Her husband, journalist Chu Chu, former Head of the News and Current Affairs Department of the Vietnam Television Station, had excellent professional skills and loved his wife and kids. He led a delegation of experts from the Vietnam Radio and Television Commission to work in Laos. After 6 months there, he fell ill and had to return home for treatment at the Vietnam-Soviet Friendship Hospital. He stayed there for quite a long time but the doctors could not diagnose his illness. One morning, she called me in a rush to take her to the hospital. He was dying. He died in her arms yet no one knew what his illness was. He was posthumously presented the title of Martyr. Despite her grief and sadness, she continued to work and live through the difficult period of state subsidy.

After 34 years at VOV, I have never seen her ask for anything for herself but always cared for the work and the training of the younger reporters and editors. On one occasion, I told her about my broken black and white TV set and she said: “Let me ask Mr. Than to fix it.” She took me to the house of Mr. Trinh Ly Than, who was Deputy General Director in charge of technical issues at Vietnam Television. His house was next to VOV’s Audio Center, which was then demolished to construct the 41-43 building of VOV at present. After listening to her, Mr. Than agreed to sign the paper allowing me to buy the necessary parts to fix my TV set. It was difficult to buy things during the period of state subsidy because we needed coupons. It would be difficult for a new reporter like me to have such a privilege. I immediately rushed with the paper signed by Mr. Than to the warehouse of the Vietnam Radio and Television Commission to buy a cathode ray tube to fix my TV set. Our parents were very happy and proud of their son who was a new reporter at VOV and could fix their TV problem.