A Ray of Sunshine

 “Father! Which pair of socks should I wear?”  Hoa ignored his child’s question as he occupied himself with making the children’s breakfasts and lunches. 

However, minutes after he heard Huong’s voice sending out from her room: “Dad, I cannot wear my dress.”  It seemed that Hoa could no longer ignore her and was obliged to pause what he was doing and respond to his child’s calls.

Hoa instinctively knew that his wife Lan, was asleep, as she gambled at the Casino very late last night, leaving Hoa to care for the children.

 Lan ceased to take the children to the park near home at the weekends, but often slept instead. Hoa suspected that his wife might have been unfaithful and engaged in an affair, but this suspicion was abandoned after he failed to detect changes to Lan’s dress sense.

 Although he was upset at her, Hoa partially blamed himself for his wife’s decline. He loved his wife dearly and had helped her to find work which consequently caused her to change for the worst.

Don't Be Fooled, Wise Up To Gambling!

I don’t want to work hard

I just want to win

I tried once for luck

A big win and suddenly I’m hooked

 

T.T.P

My Escape From Hell

 On a bright and sunshine filled morning in Spring I stepped onto Australian soil in the city of Melbourne.
I was warmly welcomed by my relatives upon arriving. Kind hospitality for family members is always present at reunions and this was no exception.
The happiness of my family manifested itself through a shared meal. Everybody was happy that I had finally arrived in a country that they genuinely felt was paradise.
 
Following my arrival my relatives introduced me to the beautiful attractions that Melbourne so proudly boasts. The activities I did ranged from mountain climbing to pipi catching at the beach.
 
My family and friends hosted many parties where we all shared stories.  The topics stretched from the unforgotten past to the inconsistent nature of the weather here in Melbourne. Some would suggest that
qualities of all four seasons could be seen in a single day!
 
There were some who had worked extremely hard and had several real-estate properties to show for it. These were often leased for extra income. Others had children who were building successful futures for themselves through professions such as engineering.
 
In stark contrast some others lived in commission housing units as they could not yet afford to purchase a house.
 
Those who were the owners of multiple houses and shops often had to re-sell their properties in order to cope with mounting debts. 
 
Surprised, I asked “Why?”
“Don’t you know? The Casino is a place many go for recreation.”
“Yes that’s true. However when inside those walls do you know how many develop gambling addictions? The gaming floor houses hundreds of tables which attract people from the local community and high rollers too! Their wins and losses range from a few cents
to the millions!”
“Oh really?”
“You really don’t know? Well then, I’ll have to take you in this Sunday. You can watch how everything is played. Don’t worry about being judged as you are a newcomer after all. There is a wide belief that newcomers are lucky.”
 
My friend picked me up at around 3pm and drove us to the Casino.  The place was so extensive that there was no way I could explore the premises all in a day.
 
There were shops and eateries that served many different and appetising cuisines. The Casino was crowded with people, so many I could not imagine ever being able to count them! The sight that met me when entering the gaming floor could never have been conjured by my imagination.
 
The area was buzzing with dazzling lights, roulette tables, card tables and poker machines. There were places for the general public to enjoy and also designated areas for the high-rollers. I felt overwhelmed by the numerous people exchanging dollars into gaming chips and placing
their bets.
 
“Go on. Try your luck and place a bet. People from overseas always win!” my friend exclaimed. “Once I won $3000. I was so happy that I thought it was all a dream.”
 
After that I found some work to earn a sustainable living. I bought a house for my wife and children that I was paying off slowly.
 
However, a friend of mine visited us once to invite us to go to a birthday party and then the Casino afterwards. Half drunk and half sober I agreed to go with a slight hint of greedy anticipation,
 
“Yes let’s go if you want. What have I got to lose?”
On that night my losses outweighed my wins. I gambled until the early hours of the next morning. I was glad that it was a Sunday because I did not have to go to work. From that point I suppose I was enticed by the gambling GHOST and became a frequenter of
the Casino.
 
My wife and children urged me to suppress and fight
the need to gamble, but I went anyway in order to earn money to pay off the debts I had dug. The more I gambled the more I lost.
 
I had no alternative but to borrow money from friends to feed my spiralling addiction. I could not afford to pay the bills and the instalment payments that arrived monthly. Eventually I was forced
to put my house on the market. I was severely depressed and made an attempt on my own life. I was lucky to be saved.
 
After my suicide attempt I awoke on the hospital bed to the company of my family who were weeping and denigrating my actions:
“Were you waiting to die before you returned home, just a corpse and no soul?”
 
Fortunately our good friends persuaded me to break the habit and to start afresh. I finally came to my senses. I realised that I was blind and hence compromised my assets and family by continuing
to gamble.
 
Because of my eagerness and greed to win I failed to
recognise that the Casino does not solely operate for people to win and become rich. The Casino is ultimately a company that holds lots of strategies to lure people into gambling away their savings to
make a profit.
 
That’s right! I was a moth drawn to the flame. Every step I took towards satisfying my addiction was embarking towards the devil who would send me to the fiery depths of hell.
 
I had to avoid the Casino and hope that I could survive living with my family who I had profoundly disappointed.
 
I have made myself a promise and as a result I plan to rebuild my life by working hard to buy another house for my family to livehappily.
 
I write my own story honestly in order for you to realise the dangers of an addiction. I want to encourage my friends who are addicted
to gambling to return to the right track where everybody works hard to earn a successful living.
 
I sincerely hope my story of slipping into an unhealthy cycle of gambling that nearly ended my life can be utilised as proof to deter you from travelling this dangerous route.
 
In addition to this I am an alarm bell that wakens those who still frequent the Casino to return to their homes with this mindset:
 
“Never step foot into the Casino. Your efforts towards redeeming your lives are praiseworthy. Good luck.”
 
H.V.L
 
 

My Failed Shares In A Power Company

 My story begins in the burning heat of summer when Q, my sister-in-law quickly pulled her car up in my driveway.
“It’s so hot. Why are you hiding away from the heat at home? Come on get changed and come with me” Q said.
 
I anticipated the destination we would arrive at. I foresaw an uncomfortable ride sitting in her car as she was a reckless and hot tempered driver. However, on the upside my air conditioner here at home could not generate half as much cold air as Q’s car could,
even on the maximum power setting! I decided to get changed and entered my bedroom. It was as stuffy as the kitchen of a Chinese restaurant.
 
I kept in mind that by leaving the house and seeking refuge from the heat elsewhere I would be saving electrical energy.
 
In effect this would reduce harm to the environment.
I had not yet fastened my seatbelt when Q pressed the acceleration.  She managed to string some words together to make a song.
 
“Where we’re going is so comfortable and cool. You can stay as long as you please. We can go out to eat later on…Bun Bo Hue, Pho, Bun Rieu…you name it!”
 
Her reasons were so enticing that I could not resist going with her. Q teased me about remaining at home to sew clothing to earn a living. She invited me to join her at the more appealing Crown.
 
Q had arrived in Australia after me and had quickly adapted to the lifestyle here. In the past, sewing clothing was a typical source of income for large Vietnamese families who would work collaboratively.
However, when I entered the field of work it seemed like a dying industry.
 
 Upon our arrival I soon identified Crown as a place for great and regular recreation during the summertime. My husband was easygoing in nature and condoned my new heaven of fun.
 
“It’s all right with me as long as you have a place where you can get away from the stresses of working. It’s a good idea for you to get out and about. If you hurt your back while working at the sewing machines all the time it would cost more money than we could
afford. Just remember to not become addicted. After all, it’s just for fun dear!”
 
In return, I promised my husband that I would not get addicted but in my mind I secretly believed that I would win money to bring home.
 
I was so eager to join the group of people who had discovered the wonders of the Casino before me. I soon learnt that frequenters of the casino who won “big” were bestowed names according to what their winnings could purchase such as, “the man who has
enough money to buy lots of estates” and “the woman who travels interstates all the time.”
 
Everyone referred to the successful gamblers
as celebrities in the vicinity of the Casino and it seemed like they were recognised everywhere they went in the place. I wondered if I was lucky and Q brought me back to reality by assuring me that it would be very hard to win enough to pay for a double-story house.
 
She shed some light on my ambitions by saying that one day’s winnings here could amount up to a day’s worth of wages by sewing. Q had been coming to Crown for years and occasionally joked that she was in fact hired by the casino to play for fun.
 
The reality was different from what I had gathered. I conducted my own research and consulted others for advice about winning and conversely how to prepare for losses. Those I sought for assistance advised me that I needed to keep a tally of my winnings and losses, keep an eye on “winning machines” and not try to chase losses if I wasn’t feeling extremely lucky.
 
I never fully understood how to apply these pieces of advice but I simply followed my instinct to gamble continuously until I won. I was soon to discover that most gamblers who felt this “luckiness” in chasing their losses often gambled awayuntil they had nothing left.
 
In my first few days at Crown I felt so lucky because
I had won, although a short while later I lost. Evidently I had not practiced the strategies that I had been taught. I channeled all of my time and money into fuelling my dream of becoming a successful professional gambler. I didn’t care about the losses and now I had started coming to the casino all by myself. It seemed that the extravagant and flashy
lights at crown were too hard to ignore.
 
My husband never had an inkling that his good and caring wife had gambled away all the savings she had personally accumulated for more than a decade. I used to routinely put aside a set amount of money to send to my poor mother in Vietnam.
 
I could no longer afford to do this and my brother covered the amounts sent to my mother instead. I began to get a feel for the consequences of my actions when I woke up early in the morning to hurriedly prepare food for the family then rush to the Casino.
 
I had developed a timeframe that I could spend at Crown without being found out.  I always returned home earlier than my husband would arrive,
regardless of my winnings and losses. I had assumed the role of a fulltime worker for Crown. After all, I was making money for them.
 
Unfortunately it was a one-sided relationship as I seldom received any income in return. I continued to neglect the strategies offered to me.
 
The balance in my account dwindled to nothing and I felt confused. The weak voice of my conscience warned me to stop gambling but my calling to reclaim all I had lost overpowered this.
 
I decided to call Q as I hadn’t heard from her in a while. To my astonishment she too had lost a lot. Q was forced to return to Vietnam to sell her assets and gather enough money to settle her debts. I thought of my own situation and wondered where my husband and I could stay if we lost the house. I had gambled us into the ground.
 
I mustered the courage to tell my husband what had really been going on and he forgave me    wholeheartedly. I felt so fortunate to have someone to support me during my crisis. My beloved husband
always exercised trust with me. Not once did he suppose that his wife had failed him by lying and gambling excessively in that short amount of time. My husband partially accepted the blame for my poor behavior as he failed to stop me in the beginning.
 
It was a tradition for my family and my brother’s family to come to the city and enjoy the fireworks during New Year’s Eve. My brother had separated from Q as she had failed to stop her gambling addiction.
 
Standing on the pier at Docklands I watched the flaring fireworks right next to the twinkling of the lights at Crown. I reflected on my experiences of the past years and asked my husband,
“Dear, I thought I invested shares in an electrical company but to this day I have not received any dividends from the profits.”
 
Diem Xua
 

My Lonley Nights

He slept well with his large and rough hand resting on my chest. I watched him with loving eyes whilst feelings of deep guilt surged inside me.

I never in my wildest imagination guessed that I would become a gambler. I never even knew how to bet money or to play the machines like he did.

 

H.T.L

My Story

 I was born and raised in the quiet countryside of Vietnam.  I was more fortunate than my brothers and sisters because I completed high school.

However society was full of corruption and owing to the fact that my family’s history could be connected to the former government, I failed the university entrance examinations.

I thought that I had found an infallible strategy to acquire money and I was happy as I was able do something useful for my parents, who in return were grateful.

The Endeavours To Alter My Life

I never could understand the reasons that drove me to gamble and how I could excessively immerse myself in the habit.
Over time, I just succumbed to the habit that made me lose my wife and children. Those close to me could never have anticipated this happening to me. I am now going to retell my story and describe how the gaming tables destroyed my life. With the passage of the days, I have never stopped regretting what I did.
 
I was born and grew up in the North of Vietnam. Life was so difficult back then because our country was enduring war. The warfare removed entertainment sources from young people of the day, and they resorted to gambling on the streets as their recreation.
 
I was one of the people who joined those crowds regularly to gamble, I rarely missed a day. Our province lacked community facilities and programs, life was considered dull and looking back, many of us
wasted our teenage years.
 
No longer able to withstand the warfare, my family and I fled Vietnam and took refuge in Hong Kong. Hong Kong was a wealthy city and many international ships made port there.
 
Our lives changed dramatically, and we were sent to the Transit Centre where living conditions were much better than those we had in Vietnam.
 
Gambling in the city was also abundant but I wasn’t interested because I gravitated towards the city life. Back then life was so beautiful for me; I managed to sustain a job and a decent income. I felt empowered and was happy with my life.
 
 After spending seven months in Hong Kong, we travelled to Australia. I was welcomed by the splendid Melbourne season of spring. This was another turning point in my life, and I embraced it wholly. I enjoyed the warm rays of sunshine, and I experienced great
happiness, ready to accept any challenges that may await me.
 
I soon acquired a position in a weaving factory that was owned by an Italian. I found that the work was highly suited to me and I stayed there for three years.
 
This was a chance for me to learn about the
people and customs of this new country. I started my own family and had three children, two boys and one
girl. I felt that my children were so lucky to live in a democratic country where civil freedoms were enshrined in the law and protected.
 
I felt incredibly proud and wanted to honour the
opportunities that Australia provided, promising myself that I would be a respectable citizen by fulfilling my responsibility of being a good father. The purpose of my life was clearly defined at this stage,
and I was continually grateful for it. I was pleased that my children were growing up in a healthy environment with love.
 
However the next sequence of events came unexpectedly. As old Vietnamese proverbs say, it follows that one can never be certain about how to prepare for the effects of an approaching storm.
 
In 1995-1996 the Crown Casino opened. It was an intriguing place and my father in law frequented the gaming floors for entertainment. I used to drive him there and after some time, I joined him. I soon
developed a gaming strategy that involved reducing the betting amount in order not to lose too much but this tended to fail.
 
 I managed to lose both my own and my mother’s savings. One instance that illustrates how the gambling took a hold of me was when I forgot to pick my children up from school. As a result of my

 
negligence, my children waited alone in the schoolyard, I felt so guilty.
 
Owing to the fact that I became obsessed with chasing my increasing losses, I didn’t remember the date of my child’s birthday party. I dare say I developed a mental illness and I wasn’t eating or sleeping well.
 
In the end, when I had depleted our entire savings, I
was forced to go to court that sentenced me to a Community Based Order. Afterwards I landed myself in prison for four months as my gambling did not cease and I continued to commit crimes to feed
my addiction.
 
After my ordeal with the courts and prison, I received support from the Gambler’s Help Program. However my gambling habit did not extinguish, it just continued to start and stop repeatedly.
 
I suffered immensely and even thought of suicide in order to reduce harming my loved ones. I entered into an exclusion agreement, which was designed to keep me away from the Casino’s vicinity.
I
failed miserably in upholding this agreement and people’s trust in me deteriorated. I felt that I was a failure and could shed no light for other gamblers as I believed there was no hope of changing my ways.
 
I was desperate and due to losing my family as a result of all this, I had no-one to turn to. Living by myself, I often thought of my once beautiful life in the past, and never in my wildest imagination
could have predicted the consequences.  I wept because my foolish behaviour had destroyed everything I held dear.
 
All evidence of the life I had created for myself in Australia had disappeared and I had nothing. I confined myself to a four walled prison cell and decided that I had no direction for my life; my only hope lay in prayer, prayer that my future would take a turn for the better.
 
It was so difficult for me to regain the determination to want to redeem myself, but it was the thought of my children’s futures that motivated me. Gambling had changed me drastically and caused me to think irrationally. I thought that the mental problems of gambling addicts arose from the desire for a big win and nothing more.
 
I learnt that in order for one to avoid becoming an obsessive gambler when spending time in the casinos, time limits must be adhered by and that only a little money should be taken.
 
I made a vow that I would steer away from the casino at all costs and that I would change to better myself, in order to become a formidable citizen in society.
 
The sorrow caused by my gambling gradually receded
into the past. The nightmares I endured are now a distant memory, and the lesson I learnt from the dreadful gambling reverberates in my mind. I had to fight the desperation in order to prevent the loss
of my family and the feelings of loneliness and establish a clear direction for my life.
 
My gambling habit has come under control, and it is gradually weakening. I have now found a balance in my life and I live healthily and think positively. I have even begun exercising, and every morning I go for a brisk walk around my block feeling happy and
energised.
 
I look back on the diaries entries I had penned and they reminded me of the sorrow in the past, the nightmare I was living, it all reminds me of how fortunate I am now and deters me from ever
wandering down that terrible pathway again.
C.L