Impressions of poverty

It is not hard to find poverty when you look around Vietnam, as one of our volunteers from Heartroom found when she visited the country this summer.

Exhausted and breathless from hard labour, an old lady wipes sweat from her brow. Around her are boys as young as seven years old working as shepherds in the extreme heat. In other parts of the world these children would be sitting down to lessons in school. This is Nha Trang, a poor city on the south coast of Vietnam. Many of the children here have never even seen a camera before and were very excited to be in a photograph for the first time: ''Wow, they want to take pictures of us. This has never happened to me before. Cool!'' This is how one little boy reacted to my camera.

I had the honour to visit a 14 year old Vietnamese girl and experience what a day in her life was really like. She gets up very early for school after which she must help out with chores, working the family's land. She brings the oxen in and works as a shepherd in the fields. She must help out with cooking and watch over her siblings whilst her parents work. It is amazing to watch a girl whose malnourished body could easily pass for that of an 8 year old. Despite this she is able to run after the oxen and bring them back into the field.

Unfortunately, due to poor transport links and financial constraints it was not possible for me to visit the children of Dak Lak who we are trying to help here at Heartroom. It would have been nice to drop in on the nuns and children and say hello but in a country where poverty is so widespread I feel confident our money will make a great difference to them.

This has been a very special summer for me. I have been to Vietnam several times before to visit family but this summer really stands out from the rest. This visit gave me the opportunity to see another side of Vietnam where poverty and hardship are widespread. This experience has given me a new outlook on life. Next time you are on holiday look away from the tourist trail and you will find another side to the world. Poverty outside of the West is often hidden from us when we visit as tourists but if we just take a few back streets and move away from our hotels we will often find poverty and deprivation beyond our comprehension.

Heartroom has chosen to help the children of Vietnam as we have seen how much in need of help they can be. We hope that you as members or supporters of Heartroom will get the chance to visit Vietnam and see what difference your continued support will make to the children of this country.

Thien Phung
Nha Trang 2006