By “our”, I am referring to the VIET Fellows program, and in particular the fourteen new fellows that this program was designed around. The class of 2011 will consists of four Involvement fellows (long term) and ten Engagement fellows (short term). In the weeks to come, their work and experiences in Viet Nam will highlight our blogs with thoughts, pictures, and videos. In what I like to call our “service for leaders” mantra, we plan to provide the fellows with a) the experience of contributing to NGOs that work with people with disabilities b) the opportunity to learn about the culture of the country c) the forums to connect with our communities back home.

The program will be challenging and emotional, but enriching nonetheless, to our fellows’ growth. They come from across the country, with a multitude of interests, academic backgrounds, and talents. In them and many other first and second generation Vietnamese-Americans, there exists a compelling need to understand themselves, the family, and the country and culture that perhaps binds it all together. It is our belief at VIET Fellows that this needs to understand the past opens up doors to how we’ll shape our futures. On the doorsteps of this grand adventure, our fellows stop to reflect. Watch and listen to our stories below:

July 18, 2010

Last Wednesday marked the beginning of my week of service with my partner, Vi, at Thi Nghe Orphanage in Saigon.  So far we have worked three days at the center, and I am preparing for our upcoming week.  If the piece below seems at times disjointed and even random, it’s because that is exactly how my thoughts and feelings have been all week   I tried to bring all that I’ve seen together in some coherent unity, but I came to realize that that would belie the wide range of my experience and the uncertainty and often frustration that characterizes these past few days for me.

Snot and Drool

July 15, 2010

Snot and Drool.  That’s what was covering me and my clothes at the end of my second day at Thi Nghe.  It’s not as attractive or catchy as blood, sweat, and tears, of course, but it serves my purposes well.  Vi and I were helping in two different rooms at the facility, both of which were home to children with numerous physical and mental disabilities.  In both rooms, very few of the kids could even talk, and many were completely unresponsive.  At feeding time, I was given a boy whose hands and feet were strapped down to a bunk; I had to just do my best to drop the watery rice into his mouth.  As I was trying to feed him, I realized the reason for the bonds: he would every minute start squirming and banging his limbs on the metal sides, with his face contorted as if he were in great pain.  At the same time, every time I would lower the spoon, he would make what I could tell was a tremendous effort to regain control and I raise his head up to me.  I never found out his name.

This was emblematic of my experiences that day.  I felt overwhelmed by a sense of sorrow and hopelessness.  It looked as if the kids just stayed in those sterile rooms (basic metal bunks with not much else) all day, with the nurses tending to them, but only as if they were just trying to survive day to day.

I struggled with this depressing state all day, but I also grappled with another problem.  I chose the title for this day because I wanted to convey the exhaustion, filthiness, and even disgust I was feeling as the clock ever so slowly ticked towards 5.  At times I felt like this was the worst day in my life, and that I would never ever be able to survive a week and a half of this.  But then I’d also realize how much my discomfort paled in comparison to what was around me.  I can’t say that I had a sudden revelation where I set aside all my problems to help others selflessly.  I spent the day struggling to keep perspective, and constantly chiding myself for feeling sorry for myself.  It’s something I still haven’t come fully to terms with, and I don’t think I will anytime soon.

Playground

July 16, 2010

I have less to say about our third day at Thi Nghe, but that is because much of what I felt the previous stay still held.  But the thing that stood out most to me about Friday was the very first thing we saw that morning.  We came in an hour earlier that the previous day, and this time arrived to see all the kids we had been taking care of the day before out in the playground in the central courtyard.  The change from the previous day was dramatic.  Again, I found myself grappling with perspective, but of a different sort this time.  I was shifting from a perspective of only seeing hopelessness and despair surrounding me to one that saw the joy, love, and even hope that were also present.  My third day was much easier on me, as I thought about that little bit of good we were doing, even if it would only brighten a couple kids’ days in a very small time span, it would be something.

Saigon, Vietnam

Flat is the best word I can use to describe my emotional state before leaving for Vietnam.  Training in San Francisco had excited me about the objectives of the program and I was eager to learn more about Agent Orange/Dioxin in Vietnam.  But at the same time, the usual buzz of exhilaration and anticipation before a big trip was definitely absent.  It’s not that I had very negative feelings about going; it’s just that I was having a hard time summoning some enthusiasm.  VIET2010 marks my fourth trip to Vietnam, and though the ambition inherent in both this project and my expectations for it separates this journey from my previous ones, I could not help feeling that returning again would be unremarkable.

Even after stumbling off the plane and walking out the doors at Tan Son Nhat from regulated A/C into oppressive heat and humidity, I felt inert.  But beginning with the ride into the city, I started reflecting on how this trip was unique.  All my previous visits were with my parents, my mother always leading the charge and leaving me little to worry about in terms of getting by.  I was there merely to lend what help I could, and though I contributed to the day to day tasks, I was not concerned with the bigger picture.  This trip, on my own, instead represents an opportunity to establish at least a minimal level of independent ability and a beginning to playing a part on a larger, more profound scale.

And if this aspect alone was not enough to set this trip apart for me, then the following day would firmly dispel any notions that this was yet another jaunt to Vietnam.  Today, our second day in Saigon, but our first real day of work, we toured, among other sites, Tu Du Hospital and Thi Nghe Orphanage, both home to children afflicted with physical and mental disabilities orphaned because of their circumstances.  As the day progressed, I went from a state of being underwhelmed to suddenly feeling mightily overwhelmed.  I found the morning very emotionally wearing, with glee in picking up and holding a little girl who undoubtedly gets far less TLC than she deserves and yet heartbreak for the severely lacking conditions that are all that scant resources are able to provide to these children.

On the one hand, I was lost in the enormity of the problems that remained ahead of us.  But later, at the end of the day’s debriefing and discussion, as I listened to the group get into animated dialogue about the day’s events, I grew more and more excited in anticipation of the education that lies ahead for us all.  The flatness that had dogged me at the beginning of the trip has since faded.  I now picture VIET2010 in a totally different light: as a truly exceptional journey rife with opportunity for change and betterment, both for me and for those we’ve come to help.  I don’t want to be lured into overconfidence that we can provoke rapid and far-reaching change, but I am highly optimistic that our work is a step in the right direction and will have a positive, lasting impact.