After spending the morning supporting lessons for children with disabilities, teaching English, and cooking and having lunch together with my colleagues, we headed out for community visits in the afternoon.
The first visit took us to a mother of three children, who are either in kindergarten or school. Two of them receive scholarships from Thien Chi. The mother has not been able to work for the past two years due to a mental health condition that causes severe memory loss. As a result, she needs to go to the hospital several times a year, which leads to high medical costs. The family even had to sell the cow they had received from the government to cover expenses.
As the father works as a daily laborer and cannot work from home, his income is unstable, leaving the family in a very difficult situation. This was one of the few visits that felt especially challenging, as it is hard to see how the family can build a stable income under these conditions.
The second visit, in contrast, was shaped by much more positive energy. We visited a family producing the traditional Vietnamese cake báhn ít, a type of sticky rice cake filled with sweet bean paste. From kneading the dough to shaping, filling, and wrapping it in leaves, we were able to observe every step of the process and of course, we also got to taste it.
Another family is supported by Thien Chi through an innovative chicken farming model. Their chicken coop runs around the vegetable garden, allowing the chickens to move freely while protecting the crops. Thien Chi sees great potential in this system: the chickens are healthier due to constant movement and can be sold at higher prices, while the vegetables, if grown without pesticides, can be marketed as high-quality organic produce.
This would make a big difference for the six-member family, as the mother currently earns at most 120,000 VND per day from selling cashews and running a small roadside stall. Her husband works painting cars, but his income is also not enough to support the entire family. Their oldest daughter, who is in 6th grade, recently participated in a competition organized by a Vietnamese bank with support from Thien Chi. Thanks to her strong motivation, she won and now receives a monthly scholarship.
The final visit of the day was to a family raising chickens, ducks, and goats with support from Thien Chi. The father works as a fisherman at night, while the mother sells the fish at the market in the early morning. Their two younger sons are in 1st and 6th grade, while the oldest son, already 26 years old, helps his father with fishing.
On our way home, we were accompanied by a beautiful sunset, an unexpectedly calm ending to a day full of very different impressions.
