The reason I make such a point of my name being Vĩ Phu is that everyone’s always calling me Hồ Hải Dương. Hồ Hải Dương isn’t my real name – it’s not even some nickname, or pseudonym, or pen name, or any such thing – it’s actually the name of a complete stranger. I’d never even heard the name (let alone met the man) before, and I certainly never thought that the two of us would become so interconnected. But thirty years ago, for completely unforeseen reasons, I was mistaken for him. What’s worse is that thirty years have passed and nothing has been done to correct this problem. It’s an injustice that I can never be freed from; I have become Hồ Hải Dương for better or for worse. Quite honestly, I haven’t stopped telling people that it’s all a mistake; it’s just that no one has listened. Relaying my plea from this world to the living isn’t an easy thing to do … It’s worse than fabricating a dream or using water to light a fire! Perhaps God has given me this seemingly insurmountable problem as a way to test my patience, or perhaps He is trying to explain something to me, I just don’t know. Actually, come to think of it, understanding God’s plan is something even more difficult. Oh yes, at times He seems to make His message plain, but more often than not He leaves us in a state of confusion, unsure as to what to do. C’est la vie, I suppose. Over here, we find God quite as puzzling as you do …

But I don’t need to talk more about God. I need to talk about me.