Tet is a time when people long to return home - to their families, the year-end reunion dinner, familiar laughter, and the sacred moment of New Year’s Eve. But this Tet is more special than ever. In faraway Tanzania, Do Hong Thanh and Tong Truong Giang are among the Viettel Software engineers welcoming the New Year not around a family dinner table, but at the Viettel Money e-wallet project office, surrounded by numbers and the operational pressures of an international market.
Do Hong Thanh, a Business Solutions Specialist at the Specialized Technology Center, shared that this is not his first time celebrating Tet away from home. Perhaps that is why he no longer feels the same sense of uncertainty and longing as he did the first time. Yet behind that calmness lies resilience forged through experience.
“The thing I worry about most is making sure that customers do not lose money and that the e-wallet company does not suffer any financial losses. Whenever we deploy a change or handle an incident involving money, I always carefully confirm everything with our local market colleagues to make sure that every impact is accurate.”
At the frontline of a financial system, the pressure does not simply come from long working hours, but from every transaction involving real value. A small mistake can affect the trust of an entire market. That is why every action must be carefully verified, and every decision must be thoroughly considered.
For Tong Truong Giang, this is his first Tet away from home. He shared that, so far, he has not felt particularly emotional. Perhaps it is because work has consumed all his attention. From morning until late at night, the entire team has been caught up in a heavy workload with limited resources. And when an incident directly affects customers, they do not simply send emails or make phone calls — they come straight to the office.
On some days, the office is packed with people, conversations become increasingly urgent, and concerned looks from customers add pressure to both the customer service team and the project team. Engineers like Giang do not simply focus on their assigned responsibilities; everyone has to step in and help resolve issues, even when the tasks fall outside their original areas of expertise.
“This is the first time I’ve been away from home during Tet… Perhaps I’ll truly feel it when the 29th day of the lunar month arrives.”
Perhaps it will be at the moment of New Year’s Eve, when fireworks light up the sky in Vietnam and his phone fills with Tet greetings from his family, that the emotions will finally come rushing back. But for now, what Giang sees most clearly is not homesickness, but responsibility.
It is the responsibility he carries for the multimillion-dollar project he is working on, for the thousands and tens of thousands of e-wallet users in Tanzania, and for the team standing alongside him on the frontline. And perhaps the moment that makes him realize the true meaning of this work is not when the system returns to smooth operation, but when he hears a simple “thank you” from customers, partners, and local colleagues who have worked together to overcome the pressure.
Tet in Tanzania has no peach blossoms by the doorway and no abundant year-end reunion feast. But that does not make the holiday any less meaningful. From another perspective, it is still a fulfilling Tet - a Tet in which responsibility is not interrupted by geographical distance, and presence is measured not simply by being physically together, but by working together to keep everything running smoothly.
Some springs are welcomed with laughter shared among family. Others are remembered through a project halfway around the world from home. But wherever we are, as long as love remains connected and responsibility remains fulfilled, Tet, in its own way, will always be a complete and meaningful celebration.