10413 Adel Road, Oakton, VA 22124. Phone (703) 938-9606
E-mail: crpcv@crpcv.org. Web site: www.crpcv.org
A non-profit organization (IRS section 501 c-3) – Federal ID No.: 54-1828964

Oakton, Virginia

December 22, 2007

Dear Friends:

We hope this letter finds you in peace and good health.  Your love and support have helped to relieve the suffering of many poor children and their families in Vietnam.  Thank you for your continuing support.

At the beginning of 2007, CRPCV helped provide food and schooling for 220 nursery school students and scholarships for more than 200 elementary and middle-school students.  In early March, I made a trip to Quang Tri Province to visit the children, teachers, and nursery schools we help support. 

Often, I was taken on mopeds to visit nursery schools because the roads were too poor to travel by car.  In the remote areas of Quang Tri, the land is very much like beach sand and is not suitable for any forms of cultivation except growing rice.  The children’s hearts opened through their eyes, and each child’s eyes had a story to tell.  Innocence was still there intact on their baby faces, yet the clouds of joy and sadness, love and fear, strength and vulnerability were floating in the morning sky of their eyes.  My mind was saying, “If I were born 45 years later, I could be one of them” —my grandmother was born in the district of Gio Linh, in Quang Tri.  Every time I said goodbye to the teachers and the children, my heart sang “No coming, no going.  No after, no before.  I hold you close to me.  I release you to be so free.  Because I am in you and you are in me.  Because I am in you and you are in me.”

The recent big typhoon caused great damage to the land and brought much suffering to all of Central Vietnam.  The water of the Fragrance River in Hue rose to 4.5 meter, even higher than it was during the big typhoon in 1999.  Many homes were submerged in the water or blown away by the wind.  Monastic and lay rescue teams have brought blankets, instant noodles and rice to flood victims.  Several CRPCV nursery schools were badly damaged. 

After my return, we decided that we had to do more.  We will expand our programs, allowing us to increase the number of nursery school children supported from 220 to 400.  We will also fund the construction of two new nursery schools: one with 2 classrooms and a toilet in Hai Khe Village and one with 3 classrooms and a toilet in Hai Thanh Village.  To support 400 pre-school children and 200 student-age children and build the two schools, our 2008 costs will be about $45,000, $10,000 more than we raised in 2007.  Additionally, we have been asked in 2008 to begin taking over responsibility for the salaries of the teachers and staff in the CRPCV schools.  (Until now the salaries were paid through funds raised by Plum Village.)  It is only $35 per month per teacher, but with over 30 teachers and other staff, it increases the amount we must raise by at least another $12,000 per year. 

I fervently wish we could support every needy child I saw while I was in Quang Tri.  Even now, months later, my eyes moisten when I think of them.  Please join with us in opening your hearts to the poor children of Vietnam. 

$100 will provide lunch for 20 children for a month. 

$1,200 will provide lunch for 20 children for a year.

$2,500 will build a new classroom for a school. 

$10,000 will build a nursery school complex for 75 children including three classrooms, kitchen, and toilet facilities.

CRPCV is a federally recognized charitable organization – all donations are tax deductible.  Further, 100% of the donation supports poor children and their families in Vietnam.  There is no overhead—all of the administrative time and costs are borne by our limited staff.  Donations can be sent to CRPCV, 10413 Adel Road, Oakton VA 22124. 

We are sending you some drawings from the children in nursery school and some thank-you notes from the older students.  Below are translations from a few of the notes. 

On behalf of the poor children and their parents in Vietnam, we are sending you warmest wishes and deep gratitude this Holiday Season.  May each of your days in 2008 be filled with ease and joy.

Many blessings,

Anh-Huong Nguyen

For The Committee for the Relief of Poor Children in Vietnam

PS: If you would like to receive our reports by email, please give us your email address by sending a note to info@crpcv.org.  Thank you.

Letter from Nguyen Thi Khanh Huong, a third-grade girl: I am very happy to learn from school that I will be receiving a sum of money. This money will be used to buy school supplies and clothes for the new school year. As a way to thank you, I promise to work hard in school and listen to my teachers, parents, and grandparents. Once again, I am so grateful to you for helping children like me who are going through difficult times. I wish you good health.

Letter from Ngo Thanh Hien, a third-grade girl: Thank you for helping me so that I can overcome many difficulties and continue my schooling in the upcoming years. I will try hard to study as a way to thank you for the love and support you have given me.

Letter from Nguyen Huu Linh, a sixth-grade boy: Thank you benefactors for helping me with a large sum of money. Our family is very poor and is going through difficult times. My dad has a mental illness. My mom works in the fields and I am still going to a lovely school. I am very grateful that you have helped our family.

Letter from Nguyen Truyen, an eighth-grade boy: I would like to thank you for helping an orphan like me. With deep gratitude.

Anh-Huong with children of a nursery school in Don Que hamlet, Hai Que village, March 2007.

Children having lunch at a nursery school in Kim Long hamlet, Hai Que village.

Hot lunch is served to children.

Children napping in their classroom after lunch. Trung An hamlet, Hai Khe village.

Lunch is transported by bicycle from the kitchen of a bigger school (in Don Que hamlet) to a smaller one (in Kim Long hamlet).

Bringing food to flood victims.