Friday, November 24, 2017
<p>A Tribute to our Dad, Cao Si Lieu</p><p> What we remember most about our Dad was that he was a very quiet, hard working, caring and loving father. We remember when we were quite young, how he took care of our granddad especially when our granddad was no longer able to care for himself. We were told again and again by our aunties and our Mom that from the time each of the four of us was born, our Dad took care of us from the moment we arrived home from hospital until we were toddlers, i.e. how he fed us, clothed us, and stayed up at night when we were unwell. Our aunties retold many stories about Dad when he was a young man, how he helped his parents and his siblings at each harvest time.</p> <p> Our Dad had many talents and was working as a high school teacher, before he got married to our Mom. Soon after he married Mom, they opened a watch shop selling watches, pens, dog tags, etc and providing services such as engraving and repairing watches and clocks. He later opened a bookshop and then when one of our aunties, Co Cam Nhung, graduated pharmacy school, they opened a pharmacy together. He and our Mom always put their children first and thought of our education, health and safety, planning for our short and long-term future before their own. Our Dad sent us to Saigon in 1972 so we could live with our aunties, go to good schools, get into higher education and in turn have a better chance in our future careers. He and our Mom managed to gradually build up their business from very little money.</p> <p> After 1975, our Dad and Mom had to move to Saigon because of Vietnam civil war, and we lost our childhood home in Tuy Hoa to the communists. Yet, our Dad, still found a way to take care of his family, so we were not banished to the new un-cultivated lands like the majority of middle class families. We, as his children, have been loved and protected by our father throughout our lives and have always been very proud of him and his accomplishments. Despite many challenging and difficult times in his life including twice being imprisoned, our Dad led a non-political life and his spirit was never beaten.</p> <p> Even though we are very sad that he has departed from this life on Earth, we pray that he has now joined his parents (our grandparents) in Heaven, where everything is good and harmonious.</p> <p> He was the living embodiment of all of the following as per each letter of his name:-</p> <p> Caring</p> <p> Adapting</p> <p> Observant</p> <p> Self-sacrificing</p> <p> Improvising</p> <p> Loving</p> <p> Intuitive</p> <p> Empathetic</p> <p> Understanding</p>
