Visiting Hacau Homeless Shelter (orphanage)

Today I visited the Hacau orphange in order to donate the clothing I had brought from Canada. (The other volunteers must have thought I was a bit of a princess with all that luggage...). One of the staff of VPV gave me a ride on the back of his motorbike (a scooter really). That was an experience in and of itself. It wasn't at all scary. Although there don't seem to be any real rules of the road here, the way the traffic flows and people drive seems to be fairly safe and make sense. The essential rule to follow is that the big trucks and buses rule the road, next come the cars, then the scooters and motorbikes, follwed by the bicycles, and lastly the pedestrians. As long as you give priority to the larger vehicles you are ok, you can dodge in and out of traffic and drive the wrong way on a one way street.

The orphanage itself was very nice. A large courtyard, a bookshelf full of books for the children, and fairly nice bedrooms (about eight children to a room). Most of the children were out when I arrived as they were attending a soccer camp there were about 10 older children playing games with some volunteers. There are no babies at this orphanage the youngest child being around 3 or 4 years old (so I am not sure what they will do with all the baby clothes I brought but oh well...). I spoke with some volunteers there. They were part of a workcamp, around 20 volunteers were at the orphanage (for about 30 children). These volunteers seemed to be very frustrated about their placement as there didn't seem to be much for them do.

After the orphanage we went to the other volunteer dorms in Hanoi (which houses the workcamp volunteers). I met a few volunteers there that seemed to be voicing the same concerns as us. Are being useful here? Is our contribution really of service? Can it be better?

 Before returning to Peace House we also went to the Morninstar caring center. This was a very large building with at least 4 floors. The facilties were very nice, they had a pool and a speech therapy room. I met two americans there who were providing training for the teachers about autism. What a contrast with the Phuc Tue center!

Here are a few pictures of Hacau.

Children's bookshelf

Dining room

Courtyard

balcony/hallway to children's bedrooms, the bedrooms open directly to this outside balcony

Children's bedroom

courtyard with volunteers playing with children