Rice ~ Guest blog by Graeme, CEF's Australian manager

It’s harvest time in central Viet Nam and the heads of the rice plants are bent over in the paddy fields heavy with their grains. 

Once harvested the rice has to be thoroughly dried. What better place than a hot black road surface?

And it needs to be regularly turned over too. Feet are a good way of doing this.

And if the whole road is taken up with drying rice it’s fine to ride over it.

In Hoi An you’ll find rice paddies between houses, shops and hotels. 

And even the dead get a rice view.

Rice has an important place in the hearts of the Vietnamese. You can call the family to lunch by calling, ‘An com!’ ‘Eat rice.’ Many of the families CEF helps count on a good harvest to feed themselves.  If they have no land, they have to pay for land rental and fertilisers. If the harvest is poor then the debt is paid off the following year, with rice. Hopefully that year is a good one enabling them to make the repayment.

About one of CEF's tertiary students ~ Guest blog by CEF's Ms Kim Chi which was written with pride

February 2016

CEF helps girls to be a woman with choices, but we also help a few boys who come from extremely poor families or who are orphans. There is a boy who we at CEF considered worthwhile to give aid to. It was unbelievable to us that he passed the university entrance exams, as he had struggled to complete high school, but he did. Since he passed university and started his studies to become a History teacher, he has made much progress with his studies as well as in his life.

He used to be a very shy and quiet boy but now he is more sociable and thoughtful. His grandparents are very poor, and have to work really hard to help contribute to his personal costs while at university. Therefore, he has found a part-time job to pay for some of his personal costs. He works as a guard to looking after bikes for an internet shop and sometimes works in a food store at night to get a free dinner in exchange for his work. Although he works hard doing part time work, he still got good university results especially in the subjects which he is passionate about; history and geography.

I am very proud of him and want to say how he is a good example of doing what he is passionate about. If our tertiary students choose careers and therefore university courses that they are passionate about, they will success.

In addition, the tertiary students gradually learn not to depend on their families much. They gradually face the challenges in their lives, grow up and stop don’t blaming their challenges and poverty on their destiny.

2014

Creative Expression - Art Day at CEF ~ Guest blog by Ms Ngoc

Linda DeWolf from Go Philanthropic explaining the color wheel

One of the mandalas in progress

 CEF's annual ‘Creative Expression’ or 'Art Day', (Art Day is the name we usually call this event with the families) happens with the help of Linda Kay, an artist from the States who also is from Go Philanthropic, our US partner organization. For CEF, it is amazing to see the children spend time together in order to create, draw, make cards or boxes and learn more about art.

The CEF children who are local and live near Hoi An were asked to join in on the Art day and they were really interested to take part on this creative day. Some of them came very early and drew or colored in pictures while they were waiting for the others.

Another mandala in progress

 On this Art Day, the children were able to make boxes with a choice of 4 different shapes and then decorate them with a large choice of materials (glitter, ink stamps with many cute images, crayons, wet coloring pencils, some pretty patterned paper and ribbons) to help them design and create. Then after that they colored in beautiful mandalas. It surprised us that the children concentrated so much on these activities of making boxes and coloring in. They each wanted to make the most gorgeous ones in order to present them to their mothers and friends because it was near International Women’s Day.

After 2 hours of activities, we decided on the two most marvelous boxes and colored mandalas and gave them small prizes. We also gave small gifts of art materials to each student to encourage their creativity and show our respect for their hard work during the session.

Kim Chi explaining  how to make small decorative gift boxes

One of the boxes being decorated

One of the boxes being decorated

 Among the children, there is a girl dreaming of being an artist in the future. She loves art and from my perspective she certainly has the potential to be an artist because her art work is always well thought through, with meaning, as well as being very pretty.

I think all the children really love these activities as they said they wished to join it next year at CEF.

Below are some of the decorated gift boxes that were made

CEF's Literacy Encouragement Program

Children’s Education Foundation believes in the importance of literacy and therefore we created a simple system to encourage the CEF sponsored children, as well as children in their communities to read books much more.

We deliver books to the children in Da Nang when we visit them, we have a library at CEF, and we create book boxes which go to homes and pagodas where children can borrow books.

About delivering books to the CEF children in Da Nang
When we go to Da Nang to see the children we take a good selection of books with us. They return them on the next time visit and borrow more.

About books in the bookcase at CEF
The local CEF sponsored children know there are books at CEF in our book cupboard and that they are welcome to borrow them whenever they want. It always brings a smile to my face to see them so excited when going through the book cupboard which is full of a huge selection of books and then struggling to decide which ones they will borrow on that visit.

About the books in the book boxes
For the communities further afield we create book boxes which we fill with many books and make sure there is a good variety for children of all ages. We take and leave these boxes to some of the children’s homes and to pagodas enabling children from the surrounding communities to come and borrow books. One person is responsible for the books.

Most of the funds that have been donated for books have come from supporters of ‘Journeys of the Heart’. We are most grateful for this support as it has enabled us to encourage children from many communities to read a wide variety of books, and start to develop a love and passion for reading.

Book shopping for our 'Book Boxes to Share' ~ Guest blog by Ms Kim Chi

 Kim Chi book shopping

Ngoc book shopping

I was very excited to do book shopping recently with Ngoc. I haven’t done book shopping for over six months, as I was on maternity leave. There were many new books at the shop so we had the choice of a wonderful variety of books but also had to choose thoughtfully too. 

These books were for putting into book boxes to go to a pagoda in Thang Binh. In this community there are quite a lot of primary, secondary and high students. We chose many books for the primary school girls this time. I really liked the set of books which teaches primary students how to be safe at home, at school, and out of home as well. For example the information in the books includes how to use a gas stove safely and how to rescue yourself from drowning. Some of books teach children how to be disciplined and how to respect others. It’s not only good for primary students, but also good for all age groups, including us, the staff too, although we are adults. 

 The books in book boxes

Thuy explaining to the nun about care of the books and the process of signing out books

The nun with the news books in the book boxes

Kim Chi with one of the books

Kim Chi with some of the books they bought

Most of the books we chose are thin books with some pictures to show through the pictures what they are talking about and to get the children more interested in the subject. We hope the children can enjoy reading and learning more from these books.

Note: We are very grateful for the donations we receive to buy books as the books are able to be shared by many making these donations very valuable. Thanks so much Victoria for your donation allowing us to buy many books to share.

Vietnamese New Year and auspicious flowers

In Vietnam some colors are considered auspicious and help to bring good luck and good fortune to the families who decorate their homes with these colors at Tet, or New Year. One of the simple ways to bring these benefits to their homes is by adding plants and flowers that are one of these colors or related shades: yellow and red, orange, pink, crimson, mauve or purple.

Below are some of the lovely flowers and plants that are popular at Tet.

Tet Food Parcels

Every Tet CEF gives the poorest of our families Tet Food Parcels which include basic food supplies such as rice, soy sauce and Vietnamese tea plus some Tet treats such as watermelon seeds, crystalized ginger and coconut candy.
As they can't easily feed themselves on a daily basis, enjoying festive food or Tet treats is just not feasible for them. These foods and treats enable them to share Tet with family, friends and neighbors which is very important as this is considered the most important celebration of the year and how one starts the year influences the remainder of the year. These treats make the families feel they are not as desperately poor as they normally feel. We love being able to help them enjoy Tet and it would not be possible without the generous donations of donors and sponsors.

About Tet and what it means to many with video clip that expresses it beautifully ~Guest blog by CEF staff Ms Ngoc

This Tet video clip, although an advertisement, expresses how most Vietnamese families want to welcome Tet in with their closest family members. That is what our CEF children want too.Their parents may not be at home during Tet because they need to work to earn money and some of our children have to help their parents a lot over Tet and don't get to celebrate.

Our gifts of Tet Food Parcels are not big but for the poor, they are very valuable at Tet.  Normally, Vietnamese children will have new clothes, and are full of delicious food at Tet while our CEF children's situations are one of struggle so they do not have anything. Therefore, if they receive our gift of a food parcel, I am sure that they will be overjoyed.

Last year, although it rained heavily and was cold, all the families come to Hoi An to receive gifts regardless of how far they had to travel. We hope with your help we can raise more funds to be able to give this simple, yet meaningful gift.

Below is a link to a song that expresses beautifully the importance of Tet. It is in Vietnamese and below is an explanation.

This is a very touching video clip. The little girl is waiting for the phone call from her father who lives far from home. She is very happy to hearing the phone ring. However, she is mute so she cannot answer the call. After knowing that her father cannot return home at Tet because he is too busy at work, she is very sad. When she receives gifts and lucky money from her family members she is very excited and run to her room to talk online with her father. She said that she had a lot of gifts but she prefers having her father at home. She says she has saved a lot of lucky money so he does not need to work hard, and please return home because she misses him. It is really moving. Then the father decides to return home because he loves his daughter a lot and wants to welcome the new year with his family. (Written by CEF staff Ngoc)

Donations for Tet Food Parcels can be made on PayPal. If you are an American or Canadian please use this website: www.cef-vietnam-usa.org and if Australian or from New Zealand or anywhere else please use: www.ChildrensEducationFoundation.org.au  Banking details are on each site as well. Thank you so much!