Les Enfants du Dragon

A first phase of work ends in Cần Giuộc

Marc — Thu, 16 May 2013 07:04:49 +0000

A first phase of work end in Cần Giuộc

15th May 2013: Comissioning of constructions projects in Cần Giuộc, Long An province where we officially handed-over 3 houses to very disabled families. Attending the ceremony: Bà (Ms.) Nguyễn Hồng Mai, deputy of the village (phó chủ tịch UBND huyện Cần Giuộc), 2 representative of Friendship Union of Long An province Organizations (Liên hiệp các tổ chức hữu nghị), Preseident of the local Red Cross (Hội chữ thập đỏ) and his deputies, President of Women Union(Hội phụ nữ), Président of Elderly Club (hội Người cao tuổi) and miscellaneous representitve of local communities of concerned villages. These organizations have given useful gifts to each family recipient of “heart house” (Nha Thuong TÌNH).

This “tour” kept all of us quite busy, since most of the places to visit were on remote area. It sometime required good skilled in motorbike to drive of very narrow dams, but with breath taking rice field landscapes.

We all had a short break for lunch, and went to visit families to whom we provided rain water tanks. This region is already suffering from rise of the sea level due to global warming, therefore salty water comes into fresh water and undeground storage. Rain water collection allow families to keep fresh water to be used for dry season.

Results in Xã Gia Canh

Marc — Mon, 13 May 2013 10:30:20 +0000

An interesting progress

07/05/2013 : Early morning, Marc, Mme Liên and Virginie drive to Xã Gia Canh village, invited by local authorities. Morning programm starts with an official ceremony together with local partners and official representative. This ceremony takes place to thank our NGO for having succesfully implemented its targets within the 3 year plan, because the realizations went even further the initial targets.

Those achievements are totally transparent and copy available on demand to the local autorities. We proudly present details as follow:

- 4 drinking water treatments stations: 15.995€

- together with 2 wells with pumping stations: 5.283€

- sponsor for scholarship, bikes: 4.491€

- 20 houses for disable families: 26.491€

TOTAL is 52.259€

This status to date in only for this village.

We remind that our NGO also support projects in Ho Chi Minh City and in Long An and Sóc Trăng provinces.

All attendees then joined for a friendly lunch, and then visited all recent construction projects:

Drilling of a well in granite rock, for community #5.

3rd drinking water treatment plant for a school of 600 children.

4th drinking water treatment station for a primary school in XGC.

Inside, a 2.000 L tank, outside a 5.000 L one.

19th house.

20th house! In this village, Bà Chi, the grandmother is really happy to know that her grand daughter is having a real house. This 14 year old child (we told her story in a previous post), gave birth last month. She seem relieved but really different than beofre not a child any more. When Marc asked her how she felt, we could feel real worries, fear. Her baby eventually got adopted by a vietnamese family in the North, in exchange of 10 million VND (500 usd) to cover for hospital fees…

From Charenton-le-Pont to Sài Gòn

Marc — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 14:50:42 +0000

From 02 to 06/04/2013 :

Our NGO welcomed a group of young people from French town of Charenton-le-Pont (94 – Val de Marne) lead by M. Sidali Zouak involved in his town as a responsible for “Youth Information center” and head of organisation “Prestige Event’s”. They came to disit children from orphanage ”Truyền Tin” where they offered some gifts for children, and spent 3 mornings with then (playing games, all kind of animations) and on saturday they also brought gifts to children in orphanage ”Minh Tam” (school supplies, tuys, clothes, basic food supplies…). They also demonstrate a famous “Harlem Shake”!…

A big thanks to this friendly group and to the ones who organised those actions.

A French spirulina’s farmer (Var dept) in the Mekong Delta

Marc — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 14:25:21 +0000

28/03/2013 : Marc introduce our spirulina’s farms in Sóc Trăng to M. Jean-Bernard Simian, a famous spirulina’s farmer in the South of France (Spiruline de Provence) who has been genuinely and positively impressed by the quality of our sites and its production. Following its findings, he gave us very good advise to improve some technical points. He has been guided during the journey by Mai Thi, young student from Cần Thơ who is always volunteer to be available to support us, and we take this opportunity to thank her for that! On Sunday, Jean-Bernard went together with Marc in orphanage “Truyền Tin”, then “Minh Tâm” where his family decided to sponsor a 2 year girl.

Jean-Bernard in Hau-Boi farm

Stories and Origami

Marc — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 00:00:55 +0000

Feb 23, 2013 : Mrs Hélène Phung, storyteller from Arts du Récit in Isére, France, came to animate the afternoon of the children of “Truyen Tin”, children a little stressed at the beginning of the narrations cooled themselves slightly to participate actively at the origami workshop. (please refer to the parolesdesole.com as to the storyteller’s blog : http // www. parolesdesole. com/blog . html.

Feb 24,2013 : Hélène pays a visit to the children of the “Minh Tam” Center in a very cool athmosphere, her animation is rythmed by the bloud tone of a gong and the echo of the prayers which are leaking from the pagoda., the space is occupied by incense rising curls,and the flight of Hélène’s paper made birds…

We have learnt this early morning that when SU Co Xuan went to sell their made products down town, there was a fallen from the sky angel in front of the gate (a small boy still with his ombilical cord on), the family is enlarging.

Feb 25, 2013 : Hélène did give her last course of origami at the affecting school (Lop Hoc Tinh Thuong) of Vinh Son, on No Trang Long street.. The public was compsed of about 60 kids mainly from 3 and 5 classes. The osmosis between the artist and the children was perfect.

We thank the three students from the university of pedagogy (Đại học Sư phạm) who accompanied Hélène in any of her moves and provided a translation service of top quality, our thanks goi also to their professors, to Ba Luong Thi Mai Trâm and evidently to Hélène Phung who promised to come back : her mother being Vietnamese, she went to vist her family in North Vietnam.

February 22, 2013 : the belgian NGO « Toboggan » did set up and furnish a house in Saigon to locate for free needy students. This activity had a uniqiue duration of 5 years . Mr Thierry Siaens, representative of this association proposes us to retrieve the whole furniture of the house, be about twenty bunk beds. wooden tables and wardrobes, 2 TV sets, 2 fridges, and some miscellanous items. We did of course accepted as we had to equip with those items the “Minh Tam” household on which we support the renovation works, a non negligible economy for our budget.

We are thankful toward Mr Thierry Sieans and his friend mr Le Hai Trung for their generosity.

Preparation for the snake new year.

Marc — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 02:13:56 +0000

This year, the lunar New Year 2013 (lễ tết nguyên đán) is celebrated on February 10. The dragon gives way to the snake (Năm Qúy Tỵ ou con rắn).

The period before Têt is full of excitement in all Vietnamese families… This period is also an opportunity for us to give gifts to the children and the poor. Thus, on February 1, the day before school holidays, our teams on the field were very active:

- Thuy, Bernard and Pierre-André represented the association for a giveaway of presents to the poor in the city of Saigon,

Liên went to school “Bình Hưng Hòa B” in the Quận Bình Tân district to deliver gifts to the children…

At the same time, Mathilde and Marc toured the orphanages in order to give presents to the orphanages’ children we support here:

“Mái ấm Minh Tâm” – District 12

“Mái ấm Sơn Kỳ” – District 12

“Mái Ấm Truyền Tin” – district de Bình tân

- on the 04/02/2013: Giving gifts to Thu Phương’s family in the presence of Dr Truong Da Luu (pediatric cardiologist at the hospital Nhi Đồng 2 -TPHCM). Thu Phương underwent an open-heart surgery in France and her hosting family from Paris decided to support her education…

- on the 06/02/2013: We responded to the invitation of the Long An Province authorities for the good wish ceremony. First, we visited the offices of Liên hiệp các tổ chức hữu nghị (Union of friendship), then around 11:00 AM, we went to the UBND (our local town hall) where the PCT (Phó Chủ tịch – first deputy mayor): Mr Nguyễn Thanh Nguyên, invited us to his table.

Before taking a few days off, the whole team of volunteers wishes you a Happy New Year and wishes a great success in all of their endeavours.

Start of the cooperation with Long An Province

Marieke — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 02:25:26 +0000

Marc has finalised the formalities for the cooperation with Long An Province and the start of the program. Can Giuoc District is located 25km south of Ho Chi Minh City. Marc will meet the families who will benefit from a house soon. In the beginning of February the construction of 10 tanks of 50m³ will start.

Action of the local branch in Voiron

Marieke — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 02:11:50 +0000

18/1/2013: A short report of the afternoon presentation in the festivity hall of Voiron organised by the mayor for the retired. There were very few people. The cold and sidewalks still full of snow probably kept people away. When the weather is too nice, as during the forum of associations (see the article on the forum), people do not come, they prefer to go out, and when it’s bad, they do not come either… But we are always happy to meet interested people.
Patrick was able to talk about the association with the people present representing the “branch” for about 2 hours. The people enjoyed, according to those who spoke with him at the end of the session. Result: a new membership sales of 5 conical hats.

Animation in Son Ky

Marieke — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 08:56:47 +0000

17/1/2013: Ludovic Albisser, one of the founders of the association Ludolangue, performed a workshop in Son Ky. He wanted to do a training workshop on sign language. Because of language difficulties he changed his original project and created a small video clip.
Ludolangue is a publishing house, whose goal is to provide a link between the world of young people and the world of foreign language teaching.

The association and the press

Marieke — Wed, 16 Jan 2013 03:12:23 +0000

An article about the association was published in 2 magazines “Fous de Food” (Crazy about Food) and “Même pas Mâles” (Not even Man). These magazines have been distributed in the shops in France in the week of 16 January 2013.
We would like to thank Laurence Lallement and her colleagues for this contribution.