From time to time her parents went away for religious missions, and she had the opportunity to live with relatives and fellow believers. Wherever she stayed, people treated her with real love and care. However, sometimes she was reprimanded due to her childish spoiled attitude and her tendency to cry continuously during her mother’s absence. She was very afraid of aunt Tu Bu, the next door neighbor, who liked to take a big piece of firewood and knock it loudly on the floor to threaten her whenever she cried too long and nothing else could stop her.

The little girl was rather coy and fearful of pain, thus, until the age of five, she still had not had her earlobes pierced to wear earrings like other girls. One day, when she was staying in the house of uncle and aunt Le Hoai Nam, a nomadic Chinese circus came to perform at Dinh market. The older sisters were busy cooking and did not pay attention to her desire to see the show. When the sound of the circus drums rose so loud and so exciting, the little girl’s craving to see the performance became intense and she insisted the sisters take her to see the circus. They took the opportunity to impose a condition: they would take her there if she agreed to have her ears pierced. She loved to see the circus so much that she accepted their condition. The sisters took action immediately, used a pen to draw a point on each of her earlobes, then rubbed eucalyptus oil over it, and finally pierced her ears with a sewing needle. She was so excited at the prospect of seeing the circus that she forgot the pain. Years later, every time she recalled the sounds of the circus drums, laughter in the audience, the charlatan shouting loud to sell herbal homemade medicines, the performance of Chinese kung-fu, and a breathtaking show including such things as a man lying down with a huge stone block on his chest while another used a big hammer to smash it, the sounds and images still make her feel thrilled and delighted.