Drowning in sorrow
Published: 31/05/2011 05:00
Guo Liangcai’s voice never stopped quavering. “I don’t know how I will handle the truth,” he told Thanh Nien Weekly over the phone last Tuesday. The 40-year-old Chinese businessman spoke Vietnamese with an accent, and the pain in his voice was palpable. It had been three days since his life changed in an instant - the elation of celebrating his son’s third birthday turn into an unimaginable tragedy of having to bury his wife, son, five-year-old daughter, his mother-in-law, his sister-in-law, his brother-in-law, his brother-in-law’s wife and their two children. And that was not all. Leaving behind a distraught father-in-law, Guo Liangcai returned to the southern province of Binh Duong to take the bodies of two brothers and two friends back to China. Guo said he could barely remember what exactly happened last Friday. “It was just a nightmare too horrible to remember.” The nightmare is all too real. The owner of a business that makes rice cookers and one who had made profitable real estate investments, Guo had organized an elaborate celebration of his son’s third birthday on a double-decker boat used as a floating restaurant at the Din Ky Tourism Area in Binh Duong Province on Friday evening. At around 7 p.m., just 100 meters away from the wharf it had just left in pouring rain and strong winds, the boat capsized with 28 people on board and sank in the Saigon River in Binh Duong, around 19 miles (30 kilometers) northwest of Ho Chi Minh City. Sixteen people died, and Guo was one of the 12 who managed to swim to safety. The last body, that of a nine-year-old boy, was found Monday. The boat captain, who did not have a proper operating license, and two other boat company staff have been detained pending investigations into the accident. The vessel, which can carry up to 75 people, was salvaged Tuesday by hundreds of soldiers and police. RELATED NEWS Binh Duong authorities have suspended the unlicensed port managed by Din Ky, a local tourism firm, in Binh Nham Commune. The tragedy has shocked the nation and generated widespread concern about the safety of many tourist boats operating in the country. Lam, a 51-year-old owner of a ceramics company in Binh Duong, had attended many parties on the boat. He said, “I don’t know how he [Guo] will come to grips with his tragedy in the future.” Guo, however, seems aware of what lies ahead. He said he had to face a new life, no matter how harsh it would be. “I miss my wife, my children, my brothers, and my friends. I know the rest of my life will be too tough without them.” “But my friends have been standing by me and I’m grateful,” Guo said, adding, “I have to continue to live anyway.”
Reported by An Dien |
Provide by Vietnam Travel
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