Thuy Nguyen

Goodbye

I left the orphanage this morning. Last night we had a farewell ice cream party. Each kid gave me a present to take back home - lots of stuffed animals. There were so many I didn't have any place to put them and in the end I had to ask them to pick out 1 or 2 to give to me and take the rest back. I didn't know how to express the emotions I felt when I left. This place has become like a home to me. The kids asked me when I leave who will come to take my place and I said I didn't know. It seems so unfair to come into their lives and then leave so abruptly but I guess they are used to having transitory relationships. They made me pinky swear to come back again next year. I'll try my best to make that happen.

The Saturday night before I left I witnessed one of the kids getting beaten with a stick in front of the other children. I had to walk away so they would not see me crying. But I wasn't fast enough and some of the kids noticed the tears in my eyes. The next day they came up to me and said they felt sorry for me because I was sad. Vu, the kid who got the beating came up to me and starting making faces at me until I had to laugh. Once again I was humbled by the resilience of these orphans. Any normal child would be sulking and rightfully so- I get angry whenever someone so much as says a negative word towards me and here was this kid who had just gotten punished for no good reason and he was trying to make me happy. They were really surprised to see someone show that kind of emotion. They were used to these situations, all the nuns were used to it as well. In fact its so normal for them that they begin to rationalize it- they tell me its ok, that they are used to corporal punishment and it wasn't a big deal to them. You forget how easy it is for things to become mundane. These beatings just become part of their routine and they learn to avoid it as often as possible and pretend it doesn't happen. Such a wonderful place with such a dark secret - Things get covered up, the kids go to school and tell their friends that they fell off their bike or they tripped over a chair. Visitors come and they put on their best clothes and smiling faces and everyone thinks that these kids are so blessed to have such a happy situation and no one really knows the real story.

Even after three months I am still astonished by their ability to just keep going. These kids are truly the most beautiful people I have ever met.

Guest

This week there is another volunteer from the States that will be staying at Thien Binh orphanage. She is a kindergarten teacher and a grad student at University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She is interested in making contact with orphanages here and doing a little research on her dissertation which includes setting up a program for college students in the States who are pursuing teaching degrees to come volunteer and get a little experience in Vietnam. SHe hopes that this program will give these future teachers more cultural awareness in working with ESL (English Second Language) students.

This week will be my last at Thien Binh and I am feeling more than a little sad that things are coming to an end. At the same time I am excited to see that there are so many other people who are interested and willing to come spend time at the orphanage. I think that it is extremely important to take advantage of these opportunities because it has been so valuable and enlightening for me to have spent time with these children in this amazing place. I have discovered that the orphans here really want for nothing more than a little affection and love. Every week there are people who come and bring the kids treats and gifts but it seems that they are happiest when someone comes and donates a little of their time just to hang out with them. This lesson seems so obvious and yet it wasn't clear to me until I came to stay at Thien Binh.

Bangkok, Thailand

So, I have been in Bangkok for the last few days. I came here with Sister Malee, another nun, and two of the older girls living at Thien Binh. The purpose of the trip is to bring the two girls over to Bangkok to stay for a few months and go to school. They will be living with a friend of Sister Malee's and study her profession - hair cutting.

The two girls are named My and Thao. My is 19 years old and was adopted by Sister Malee when she was very young. She is from one of the mountainous tribes in Vietnam. Her relationship with Sister Malee is difficult to understand. Sister has very high expectations of her and is extremely hard on her. My tells me that she has thought about running away many times but then she realizes that she has no where to go. Her parents left her when she was a kid and she has no relatives or even friends outside of Thien Binh. She is one of the strongest people I have ever met but the constant verbal abuse that she endures would wear anyone down. She doesn't dare take a step without permission from Sister Malee - I am not exaggerating. Yet, Sister Malee claims to love My dearly and in fact she has taken care of her for many years. My does not want to become a hairstylist. She likes stitching - especially the patterns on the robes that priests wear. My plans to become a nun.

Thao is the daughter of a couple who have a close relationship with Thien Binh. They often donate money to the orphanage. Their family is from the middle region of Vietnam. Last year they moved to Saigon because Thao had a pregnancy out of wedlock and the family did not want anyone they knew to find out about it. Thao was sent to live at Thien Binh until she gave birth and then she was allowed to return home. Her daughter Thu is now almost one year old and lives at Thien Binh. Thao made a promise to herself that she will take her daughter back before she reaches the age of two. Thao wants to learn a profession, any profession, so she can return home and take care of her daughter.

Both of the girls are very nervous about being here because they speak neither Thai nor English and have also never been away from Thien Binh for any extended amount of time. This morning we dropped the girls off at their new home. The plan is for them to stay there for 6 months but I don't know if they will be able to stick it out for that long. They are both extremely homesick already and it was hard for me to part with them.

The past few days we have spent doing a little sightseeing of Thailand. Last Saturday I looked across the Mekong river into Laos, hung out with the Archbishop of Thailand, and visited one of the oldest temples in the country. By Sunday we were back in Bangkok. On Friday I will fly back to Saigon and resume teaching at Thien Binh. Its funny that whenever I leave Thien Binh, even for a day or two, and then return it feels like I am coming home. I am anxious to get back.

field trip

Yesterday I went on a field trip with the kids to the amusement park (suoi tien)...we had to take two full buses to get there. There was a small delay in the morning because one of the buses broke down but we eventually got there at 9:30. First we watched circus acts, then we had lunch. After lunch we went swimming in the waterpark area and walked through the haunted house. On the way back the kids all fell asleep on the bus because they were so tired from running around non stop. It was so much fun that no one wanted to leave.

*Special thanks to Voice of Love Foundation and parents for funding the trip :)

can't sleep

I have become particularly close with one of the girls. Her name is Sang and she is 17. She has lived at Thien Binh for 4 years and has not been home to visit her family during that time. Her parents are still alive and she has four siblings. She misses her family and wants to go home but will not be allowed to until she has finished her schooling. Then, she can return home to get a job and help support her family. Sang works in the kitchen; she is responsible for chores like cooking and cleaning for the two head nuns. She looked particularly sad today so I asked her what was wrong. She said she had just gotten a beating from Soeur Malee for not finishing all her chores in time. Then, she pulled up her pant leg and I saw that the back of her left calf was covered in purplish- blue bruises. I didn't know what to say...

Soeur Malee was in a particularly bad mood as was evident from the aforementioned event. Visitors arrived around ten this morning to give the kids treats. This happens two or three times a week. Today the kids forgot to thank the visitors and started getting up to go play before they were given permission. Soeur Malee yelled at them so much that the guests cringed and intervened before she could go on.

In my first observations I noticed that the kids were amazingly well-behaved. Now I know why, if you so much as turned your head during prayer, you would be slapped. Getting beat with a stick was not anything out of the ordinary and the yelling was constant. The kids
are resilient, by that afternoon Sang was smiling and joking around with me. I asked her if she harbored any hatred for Soeur Malee- She denied it and told me she was used to it.

Being a supposedly unbiased outsider everyone is eager to confide in me. Opinions which would never be expressed to the head nuns for fear of being yelled at or worse asked to leave. One of the older nuns who was lived there for a while disagrees strongly with the head nuns' disciplinary tactics. She also thinks that more money should be spent on food and less on school supplies.

Where do you draw the line between being culturally sensitive and acting on gut instinct? My gut tells me that this is beyond tough love, in the States beating a kid with a stick would be considered child abuse. In Vietnam its slightly old fashioned but still pretty common. Negative reinforcement is the rule and positive rewards the exception. These thoughts have been running through my head- I can't sleep.

family

Thien Binh is set apart from other orphanages I have visited by the familial relationships found between the caretakers and the kids. There are two head nuns in charge of the place- Mother Superior and Soeur Malee. The kids call these nuns "grandmother"; mother superior is ba noi and soeur malee is ba ngoai. The generation of kids before them called the two nuns "mother". The first generation consisted of about 15 people. They are now grown up and have families. The interesting part is a good portion of them still live in Thien Binh. Some left and moved to other places eventually returning and some never left at all. They have separate houses built on land within the compound and they have jobs in the orphanage. For example, Co Suong is in charge of the cattle and Ong Tomas does handiwork around the compound.
I asked if any of the kids ever got adopted and discovered much to my surprise that even if families wanted to adopt the children they would not be allowed to go. The nuns view these kids as their own and treat them as such. School is the number one priority to them and every child must complete grade 12. Once they have finished schooling they are free to leave. However, most of them seem to stick around. If they want to get married or find jobs elsewhere the nuns will help them make arrangements.
This system seems to have worked well for the first generation of kids but size of the orphanage is now ten times larger than it was beforehand. Things have changed drastically. A twelve year old boy that I had a conversation with has lived there for ten years. He told me that in the past, life was a lot more fun. It was less crowded and all the nuns were more easygoing. Now because there are so many kids they are always getting yelled at for being too noisy and when one kid gets punished they all do. And they also had a lot less prayer time.

attack of the killer ants

Last night it poured which resulted in an infestation of ants in my room. There were literally thousands of ants everywhere- floor, bed, desk, cupboard. In case anyone ever experiences this problem the solution is to light a piece of paper and wave the flame around near the ants. The heat will kill them and then they can be swept out of the room. That was the most eventful thing that was happened in the past couple of weeks.
Days here are long and peaceful. I spend most of my free time talking to the kids; they are all very willing to confide in me. Most of the kids there are orphans but there are some whose parents are still alive but are too poor to take care of them. During the summer the kids with families get to go home for 1 week. It seems that these kids have a harder time than the orphans because they get homesick. The kids are amazing. They are so ready to be loved and they really look up to me. They are really interested in hearing about life in America. They idolize it as some sort of paradise where everyone is rich. Its hard to convince them otherwise.
This week i am trying to help the nuns set up an internet connection. Last year they got a donation of ten computers but no one really knows how to use them so they just sit there collecting dust. Looks like I might become the English teacher/ computer skills teacher pretty soon.

Imagine

Imagine a three year old kneeling quietly in church for over an hour. Imagine going to mass at 5 every morning and praying twice a day for an hour and a half each. Imagine leaving the gates of your home only two or three times a year. Imagine beautiful fruit trees and adorable little children everywhere. Imagine afternoon quiet so intense you can practically hear the grass grow. This is Thien Bien Orphanage. I have never seen anything like it. It is the most peaceful, structured environment i have ever lived in. The nuns are very strict with the orphans - these kids are better trained than an army. They all take part in keeping the place running. Thien Binh keeps cows, pigs, and goats. Most of the vegetables eaten are grown on the land and whatever is leftover is sold at the market. Occassionally they get donations from locals and visitors who have some connection with the orphanage. Sometimes food is scarce and sometimes it is plentiful; it all depends on the amount of donations and the crop yield. The kids are amazing and really easy to get to know. I am going to be there english language teacher.
Here is my daily schedule:
4 am - wake up and go to prayer
5- mass
7:30- breakfast
8- play with the toddlers
9-11- teach english classes for 6, 7, 8, grades
11:30 - lunch
afternoon - chores (cut vegetables, help cook dinner, feed the farm animals, laundry, etc.)
3:30- english class for the nuns in training
5- evening prayers
7- dinner
8:30 - bedtime

First Thoughts

Upon arriving in Saigon the first thing i noticed was the unbearable heat. Saigon is a crowded, lively city. The roads are filled with bicycles, thousands of mopeds, and a few cars. The streets are lined with vendors selling food almost 24 hours a day. The city starts running at 3 am, people are up eating breakfast at 4 and on their way to work by 5. At 5 am it is approximately 85 degrees fahrenheit and by noon it's well over a hundred. The culture shock i experience was beyond what i ever expected. Being Vietnamese I thought I had a good grasp of the Vietnamese lifestyle- I was wrong. The people, the language, the culture is completely different. Like many cities in third world countries there is a huge class disparity. Alongside large wealthy houses you find slums where people live without running water and little electricity. There are hundreds of beggars on the streets and everywhere you go little kids swarm, selling lottery tickets to make a few bucks. They look at me and they know i am american, the way i look, the way i dress, not to mention my accent when i speak. The first few days were really hard because I couldn't understand what people were saying, the Southern accent is very thick. During the first few days i spent visiting family, or rather meeting family for the first time. When i met my great grandmother she was not particularly surprised or excited to see me, apparently she has so many grandchildren and great grandchildren to keep track of all of them. All of her kids have left and now live in countries all around the world, she doesn't keep in touch with most of them. Almost everyone I meet here has family that has gone overseas. In the past week or so i've collected multiple letters that people want me bring to america. Often they have tried to write to family or close friends that have moved but have not heard replies from for years. One woman told me that her childhood best friend moved to the States and they lost contact because she didn't want to write letters that made her friend worry about her. In the States you start a new lifestyle and shouldn't be burdened with the past. That's how it is.