Long ago, there lived a poor married couple who had been together for many years but never had children. Life was hard, and one day, during a moment of frustration and sorrow, they argued fiercely. In a burst of anger, the husband struck his wife. Deeply hurt and humiliated, she left home and wandered away. By fate, she later met another man in the highlands, a hunter, and eventually became his wife. Meanwhile, the first husband was overwhelmed by regret. After several days, he set out to search for her. He searched endlessly but failed. Penniless, sick, and exhausted, he became a beggar, drifting from place to place just to survive.
One day, by pure chance, he came begging at the very house where his former wife now lived with her new husband. She immediately recognized him. Seeing him hungry, ragged, and utterly broken, her heart filled with compassion. While her new husband was away, she prepared a meal with rice and wine to help him regain strength. After eating and drinking, the man fell into a deep sleep and could not be awakened no matter how hard she tried. Disaster was near. Dark clouds gathered, rain threatened to fall, and her new husband would soon return. In panic, she carried the sleeping man to a straw pile at the end of the yard and covered him with straw to hide him, hoping to avoid scandal and misunderstanding.
At that moment, the hunter returned home with a civet and asked his wife to go to the market to buy spices so he could prepare a feast for the neighbors. While she was away, he lit the straw pile to roast the animal. The fire suddenly flared out of control, spreading through the straw and burning the hidden man alive. When the wife returned and realized what had happened, she was overcome with grief, feeling as if she herself had killed her former husband. In despair, she jumped into the flames and died. Seeing his wife perish, the hunter, bound by deep love and loyalty, also threw himself into the fire. All three died together on the twenty third day of the twelfth lunar month.
Moved by their faithfulness, love, and sense of moral duty, the Jade Emperor transformed them into the three Kitchen Gods so they could remain together forever. He appointed them as Táo Quân, also known as the Kitchen Kings. Each year, they ascend to Heaven to report on the behavior and household affairs of families in the human world. From this legend comes the long standing Vietnamese tradition of offering carp at the end of the lunar year, symbolizing the Kitchen Gods’ journey to Heaven to deliver their annual report.
Vietnamese customs and traditions are rich reflections of the nation’s spiritual life. Most of these traditions promote gratitude, loyalty, remembrance of ancestors, and human compassion. Although stories like this may not possess high artistic complexity, they carry profound humanistic and educational value, teaching generations about responsibility, love, and moral consequence in everyday life.