Nguyễn Thị Vui, age 88, beloved wife, mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother was called home by her Heavenly Father peacefully while surrounded by many of her children and grandchildren on Thursday, May 9, 2019.
Born July 3, 1930 in Tang Điền, in northern Việtnam, Vui was an only child. At the tender age of 8, she lost her father to the seas during a typhoon season. The rest of her childhood was spent with her mother and maternal grandmother. Her mother worked hard to make ends meet so Vui spent a great deal of time with her grandmother. Together, the pair would walk miles upon miles to attend mass every day, and Vui learned prayers that she would eventually take with her throughout the rest of her life.
Her simple yet strong faith in God and her gentle demeanor is what attracted her to Lê Đức Tiêm. He was a dapper young man, and they married in 1944. After the Geneva Accords in 1954, Vui and Tiêm took their children and fled south. Her firstborn son was drafted in the Vietnam war and died on the battlefield. After the fall of Saigon, like so many others, Vui and Tiêm bravely allowed their five remaining children to secretly escape the communist regime in the dark of night via boats. Vui and Tiêm stayed behind so that, if seized, their children would have a place to call home.
In 1993, her lifelong partner suffered asthma attacks and died of lung complications. As his dutiful widow, she stayed until Tiêm’s three-year anniversary of his death, then reunited with her children in America.
In Louisiana, she was a nanny for many years, tenderly caring for each of her newest newborn grandbabies. Vui’s joy was in caring for her growing family. She sang to, prayed for, and talked with children; passing on sayings, quotes, and life lessons that she herself learned from her own grandmother so many years ago.
In her new community, Vui was an active member of several prayer groups and charitable organizations and continued to attend Mass daily at Anê Lê Thị Thành Catholic Church.
Vui celebrated her 80th birthday with all of her living children and grandchildren, including her son who flew in from Germany and often visited. Shortly after, she showed signs of Alzheimer’s. At the age of 85, needing more care, she moved to Texas. During her last years, she received loving care from her many children and grandchildren. A faithful Catholic all throughout her life, she moved on to the next life with unceasing prayers on her lips until her last breath.
She was preceded in death by her parents, Mr. & Mrs. Nguyễn văn Điện (1928, 1974), her son Lê Chấn Hùng (1974), and her husband Lê Đức Tiêm (1993).
She is survived by daughters and their husbands: Lê Thị Kim Cúc and Trần Văn Khải, Lê Thị Xuân and Nguyễn Văn Bốn, Lê Thị Tuyết Ngọc and Đinh Viết Khâm, Lê Thị Thúy Dung and Nguyễn Văn Nam, Lê Thị Thúy Loan and Nguyễn Văn Lâm, Lê Thị Thúy Phượng and Phạm Thanh Toàn; and her son and his wife Lê Phú Cường and Nguyễn Lê Kim Liên; her firstborn grandson and his wife Lê Ly Việt Quốc and Stefanie Kurka; and her Godchildren: Nguyễn Văn Lễ, Nguyễn Văn Kỉnh, Trần Văn Toán, and Trần Thị Lan; and twenty-eight grandchildren, and thirty-five great-grandchildren.
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