A Vietnamese woman who was married off to the Republic of Korea died after jumping down the 14th floor of an apartment building in Kyongsan city on February 7, reportedly from failing to adjust to her foreign husband's lifestyle.
Local media reported sources from Korea’s website (http://www.idaegu.co.kr/) and the Vietnamese Embassy in Korea as saying 22-year-old Tran Thi Lan was unable to learn the foreign language or adjust to Korean life, and wanted to return to Viet Nam but by the time her husband bought a ticket for her, it was too late.
Hailing from Cai Rang district in the southern city of Can Tho, Lan reportedly married Ha Jang Su, 36, last September in Ho Chi Minh City in an attempt to “change her life”.
Lan came from a poor single-parent family, and had to quit school as a sixth grader. She was hawking on the streets to support her mom and herself when in July 2007, a match-maker persuaded her mother, Huynh Kim Anh, to let her go to Ho Chi Minh City to seek “opportunities to marry a Korean man”.
There she lived for two months before accepting marriage to the Korean suitor.
After flying to Korea on January 11, Lan phoned her mother one week later, crying and telling her mother she was homesick, and wanted to return home. Her mother calmed her down, and that was the last time she heard Lan’s voice.
Mrs. Kim Anh later phoned to Korea many times, but could not contact her daughter as Lan’s husband always hung up.
The mother has gone to Ho Chi Minh City and asked relevant authorities for an investigation into her daughter’s death.
Around 20,000 Vietnamese women have married Korean men and more are doing so. Many girls in the southern Mekong Delta consider getting married to foreigners as chances to change their lives. But many of them had to divorce and returned home empty handed and in pains.
Last April, a Vietnamese bride named Le Thi Kim Dong died while seeking to escape from her husband’s house. Last August, the body with 18 broken ribs of another Vietnamese named Huynh Mai was found in the basement of her husband’s house eight days after she was killed. This event, which was broadcast on August 9 on Korea’s KBS channel, shocked millions of Koreans.
The Vietnamese Embassy in Korea has set up a hot line to offer advice to Vietnamese brides and to protect them in emergencies.
According to official statistics from the Korean government released on August 25, 2007, of the more than one million foreigners living in the country, 105,000 are married to Korean citizens. More than 64,400 Vietnamese people are living in Korea, mainly as guest workers and wives.
