A "strange" incident at the Department of Vietnamese Studies and Vietnamese Language

Le Dai Thang, a classmate of mine from university, works at the Thang Long Imperial Citadel Center. After years of battling kidney failure, he is in a dire situation. According to doctors, Thang's kidneys are completely damaged, and without an urgent kidney transplant, he risks permanent blindness, brain paralysis, and heart failure. In reality, Thang's health is deteriorating, his eyesight is weakening, and he is becoming increasingly difficult to walk. Unfortunately, a kidney transplant requires 700 million dong. In Thang's current circumstances, this is an unimaginable sum. As the son of a concubine, his family is impoverished. Since marrying and falling ill, all of his dowry and the income of the couple has only been enough to cover Thang's dialysis treatments. In their desperate situation, Thang and his wife have tried everything, even selling their precious books that they had painstakingly collected over many years, but the results have been negligible. Desperate, Thang is appealing to his friends for help. Out of sympathy for Thang's situation, my classmates and I pooled our money and created a fan page to call on people to help him.

Student Le Thi Thuy (in white shirt) - a student who has earned the admiration of many for her decision.

Thanks to Facebook, Le Thi Thuy – a final-year student in the Department of Vietnamese Studies and Vietnamese Language – learned about Thang's situation and proactively contacted Pham Xuan Thinh – a fanpage administrator and someone very active in connecting Thang with others. After a few introductory greetings, Thuy immediately presented her intention:

– I read your post and learned that you're raising money for your friend. I've done some research and found out that kidney failure requires surgery for a kidney transplant. Has your friend found an organ donor yet? I could donate to him, and if he needs blood, I can donate blood too.

Thuy's unexpected proposal completely stunned Thinh:

Who are you? Why are you so kind?

– I'm a student in the Vietnamese Studies department. I wanted to do this because I know your friend is a book lover, and I'm a book lover too. I don't have any ulterior motives. I've heard that when a kidney donor is not related by blood, the recipient's chances of survival are higher.

– My dear, you are wonderful. On behalf of my friends, I am extremely grateful to you. This is a big matter, and we will think about it and discuss it further. But right now, I see that you are truly a product of the Faculty of Humanities, and I am proud to have studied there.

– If I haven't done anything yet, don't thank me.

– ...Honestly, I'm a little flustered around you because I wasn't mentally prepared for this situation.

Surprisingly, Thuy made such a momentous decision without hesitation, explaining it with an incredibly simple reason: she wanted to donate a kidney simply because she empathized with the patient's love of books, wanting to help the patient overcome the pain of illness to pursue that love. However, hidden behind Thuy's seemingly insignificant decision was a profound concept of human responsibility. As a Buddhist, for Thuy, helping others or bringing happiness to others was a natural and unquestionable act.

But Thuy couldn't have imagined that her simple and natural words would deeply move Thinh. Unable to sleep, Thinh shared the short conversation between him and Thuy on his fan page, immediately creating a positive effect on social media. From Thanh Hoa, an artist couldn't hide his emotion: "A Bodhisattva's heart. It can only be understood in the Buddhist sense that this female benefactor came to repay a debt of gratitude from a past life." From Saigon, a businesswoman enthusiastically said: "Who says life doesn't have miracles? Thank you, Thuy, the compassionate student I've never met. She offered to donate a kidney to Thang. Thank you so much!" In Hanoi, a former student wistfully confided: "After leaving school, knowledge may fade, and the lectures on specialized subjects may not be very applicable in life, but human kindness will always be abundant, complete, and enduring." Interestingly, since the story of the young schoolgirl's voluntary organ donation spread, support for Thang has progressed daily in many heartwarming and creative ways. Last night, Thang's wife shared with the fanpage administrators: "It's miraculous, everyone! Everything has exceeded our expectations. Thang will definitely be saved. We will do our best not to let everyone's kindness down."

Surely you and I both believe that Thuy's story played a certain role in awakening kindness in each person and in Thang's inevitable journey of recovery. For a simple reason, true love – which often exists in the most ordinary forms – always has the power to transform, support, and connect people, leading them to possibilities they never thought possible before, and continuously making our lives more miraculous and beautiful.