By Sara Nerone | Co-Founder and President
Dear Friends,
For many years, so many of you have supported us either annually or monthly with a donation, and again I want to thank you all so much for your continued care and love for our students and your support of us. It’s hard as a small non-profit just to get the work done in Vietnam, but it’s harder to be a great communicator with you all. I know that if I were a donor, I would love to know how my money was spent, or is being spent, and for me that would be in the form of learning about the children or child that I might have given a little piece of betterness to. So today, I’d like to introduce you to just one of our many beautiful students.
This is Lan Lan, an 11 year old who just started the 6th grade in September. We first met Lan Lan back in 2016 at one of our very first summer art and music camps. A quiet, sweet young girl, we noticed she was a bit separate from the big group of kids and seemed not to have any friends her own age, sitting off to the side with what we thought must have been her grandmother. After spending some time getting to know the two, we found out that the elderly woman sitting with her had adopted Lan Lan when she was a baby. Now almost 80, Lan Lan’s adoptive mom is so very happy that Lan Lan passed the exams to move up to the 6th grade, although both are sad that they will be separated as Lan Lan will have to move away to live at the boarding school for ethnic minorities.
Over the summer, Lan Lan participated in our girl’s tutoring program and took classes in Vietnamese, English, math, physics, and chemistry. When I visited with her she told me that the classes were hard, but that she really loved to come and join our classes. She loves the teachers, especially Ms. Chau, our Vietnamese language teacher, and of course she never misses an art class with Ms. Trang and Ms. Lien.
When we first met Lan Lan and her adoptive mom seven years ago, her mom told us that she had brought Lan Lan to the camp because she had heard about our art classes in the village, and she wanted to know if Lan Lan could join. That year she did join us and soon after the shy little girl met her now, best friend, Tien. Tien and Lan Lan have come to art class together ever since.
As the girls grow up, we are following them all the way through high school, providing, reading classes, tutoring, and art classes and giving them creative time, mentorship and freedom to aspire to stay in school as best we can. Despite not only the very poor conditions they live under, but the harsh discrimination they deal with being from an ethnic minority group, and a female, the girls seem to stay strong, happy and determined to work hard. We love every one of them for that.
Thank you again for being a supporter, I hope you enjoyed meeting Lan Lan from afar. Happy Holidays to you all!
Sara
Links:
By Patrick O'Brien | Board Member
By Sara | Co-Founder
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