Nguyen Thi Kim Hong (centre), besides her Vietnamese mother during their reunion at Hoa Hiep Commune Police Station in Xuyen Moc District, Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province on March 17, 2025. Photo by VTV.
On March 17, thanks to an investigation by the Hoa Hiep Commune Police in Xuyen Moc District, Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province, Charlotte Gabrielle Kim Hong Saltet De Sablet D'estieres, a 27-year-old French national, was able to find her biological mother and family after decades apart.
According to local authorities, Charlotte Gabrielle Kim Hong, whose Vietnamese name is Nguyen Thi Kim Hong, arrived at the Hoa Hiep Police Station on March 17 to seek help in locating her parents. The documents she provided identified her parents as Nguyen Van Tien and Nguyen Trung Hiep, residents of Hoa Hiep Commune. On October 29, 1998, her mother gave birth to twin daughters, Nguyen Thi Kim Hong and Nguyen Thi Kim Loan.
A month later, struggling financially, the couple agreed to let a French family, Saltet De Sablet D'estieres, adopt both girls. After the necessary legal procedures were completed, the French couple took the twins to France. Their Vietnamese name and birthplace, Hoa Hiep, remained on their passports.
According to Hong, her adoptive parents brought her and her sister back to Vietnam once before to look for their birth family, but the attempt was unsuccessful. She and her relatives recently travelled from France to Ba Ria-Vung Tau, hoping to reconnect with their biological parents.
Based on the information provided, the Hoa Hiep police confirmed that Nguyen Trung Hiep had relocated to Xuyen Moc Commune while her husband had passed away years earlier. Authorities then arranged for Hiep and her family to meet Hong at the police station the same afternoon.
The long-awaited reunion was filled with tears of joy and emotion. Overwhelmed by the moment, Hong reassured her mother that her twin sister was doing well in France and wished to see her soon.
Although their time together was brief, as it was Hong's last day in Vietnam, mother and daughter spent precious moments sharing their stories and emotions after nearly three decades apart.
Speaking with the Vietnamnet Newspaper after the reunion, Hiep, now 55, recalled the difficult decision she and her husband had to make in 1998. Facing extreme poverty, they initially planned to give only one child up for adoption. However, after careful consideration, they agreed to let the French couple adopt both girls, believing they would have a better life abroad. At the time, the twins were only one month old.
"It was heartbreaking, but we were struggling so much. We had barely enough food to eat, so we entrusted them to the adoptive parents, hoping our daughters would have a better life," Hiep said tearfully.
She recounted that the French couple took photos of the adoption day before leaving for France and gave her one as a keepsake. The photographs became the key to helping her daughters find their way back home.
A file photo of Hiep and her late husband holding their twin daughters before giving them to the French couple in 1998. Photo by VTV.
After the twins left, Hiep and her husband had another daughter in 2001. Ten years later, her husband fell ill and passed away, prompting her to move back to Xuyen Moc.
"The reunion was completely unexpected. I never thought this day would come," she said. "Seeing my daughters healthy and happy is all I could ask for. I hope they understand and don't resent us for the choices we had to make."
