Tuesday, June 19, 2007

all for a children's crusade

I sped past markets, rivers and bounced on top of bridges today as my translator driving our motorbike says to me: I would like to do something for these children.

In my journey to learn more about housing microfinance and hopefully provide something of use to Habitat for Humanity, we hopped on a boat to Rach Gia--the main city of Kien Giang province. KG is next to the Cambodian border and is HOT and HUMID.




So today, like yesterday, I interviewed various Khmer families in the Kien Giang province: two different communes. With the help of my fellow public policy intern, the Women's Union, a translator and a motorcycle helmet I got a small glimpse into a world few have access to and are unaware of.







I think we all tend to compare every moment to some experience of the past. The ones I have are minimal and I am taken back to the days I volunteered for Habitat for Humanity in Philadelphia. One 5 PM was visually memorable--children marching back towards Girard Avenue in their ironed uniforms after my day on the construction site. I awaited the end of the day to go to NET, a juvenile detention center to talk to kids about staying in the law's boundaries. There's just something truly inspiring about children living fearlessly in the face of adversity. Yep, I'm hopeful!Today, two children returned from the hospital after being bitten by mosquitos and experiencing symptoms of dengue fever (I think from what they described).

http://www.thanhniennews.com/healthy/?catid=8&newsid=29197

They are due to recover but were sound asleep when I called on the house. Today was a day of joy for the children throughout the hamlet.



Here are some of the lovely ladies that made these housing loans possible in one commune.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

You look nothing like them! Hehehe. Thanks for the blog entry. I was hoping that by using my laptop, I could avoid the Russian language. But, it is not true. The toggles are still in Russian.

CV