Marina Chao

“Marina Chao of Greenbelt, Maryland, in addition to Russia, Lithuania, and California, has passed away on May 31, 2026 after a long, hard-fought battle with frontotemporal dementia.

She was born in Irkutsk Russia on May 11, 2026 to her mother Klavdija Psaltir Trepeika and father Vytautas Eduardas Trepeika and grew up with her older sister Rita. She excelled in school and studied medicine at Lithuanian University of Health Sciences in Kaunas, Lithuania. Her father unfortunately passed away during her studies, however she persevered in his honor. She became a family medicine doctor and then specialized in cardiology.

She met Jack Chao in November 1993 and immigrated to the United States in April 1994. They got married on May 22, 1994 in California and settled down in the Bay Area, eventually moving to Maryland in 2006 with their two children. Marina kept in contact with her mother and sister via regular video calls. In the United States she worked as a realtor and as a medical coder while raising her children. When her husband Jack suffered from a subarachnoid hemorrhage in 2012, she was his caregiver and played an instrumental role in his recovery. She helped him relearn how to walk and assisted with prompting his memory to return. Moreover, she did it all while taking care of her children and remaining a pillar of strength for her family.

Marina was a voracious reader. Her favorite books included Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë, and Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. She loved curling up with a book and a warm cup of soymilk in the afternoons, and she especially enjoyed reading romances. She read everything she could get her hands on, and she imbued a love for literature in her children.

Marina also enjoyed going on long walks. She enjoyed beautiful flowers, especially peonies, and grew her own geraniums. She enjoyed spotting bunnies and hummingbirds and always tried to maintain a bird feeder. Before her dementia progressed, she also regularly fed a stray neighborhood cat cans of tuna.

Forever a scientist, Marina read National Geographic and had a subscription for many years. She always wanted to learn about the world around her. When she first developed primary progressive aphasia, she wanted to understand everything about it and read countless articles.

Marina was a beautiful person inside and out - and appropriate dues must be paid to her outer beauty. She was fashionable with a sense of style that was both timelessly chic while also one step ahead of incoming trends. She was the best dressed in every room.

Her name portended that she would love the water. Marina adored the ocean stemming from childhood visits to the Baltic Sea and spanning to family trips to Virginia Beach and Florida. She looked forward to long walks by the beach at sunrise; she was an early riser by nature, and so she never missed the beautiful orange hues smattering across the freshly-awakened sky.

Above all, Marina was more than a mother and a wife. She was a role model and a safe haven. She was kind, she was honest, she was incredibly smart, and she had a way of saying the funniest, most cunning quips - her wit and sense of humor landed at the perfect moments whether she was giving advice or providing comfort. She was the blue in the sky and the sun glimmering on the ocean waves. She was the flame flickering on a candle, she was snow flurries falling on a windowsill - she was everything beautiful and intricate and gone too soon.

Marina is survived by her husband Jack, her son Alexander, and her daughter Natalie. She was the still point of the turning world, and she is forever missed and loved.”