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Vietnam service learning Ben Tre – the goodbye to Mekong village

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We have done one more day of Vietnam service learning Ben Tre. This is the fifth day and we will finish our participating on the project to move on the new adventures in Vietnam.

In fact the project is not done today yet. You know, building a toilet is not just for 5 or six days. However, we have many others to learn from the trip. So, we will hand over things for the master builders to help us to build the toilet for the lovely students. Of course, we still try best in mixing cements, providing rocks, making roof.

And also, the Vietnam service learning Ben Tre has come to another part of the process. It need more skills like flatting the walls with cements, like tiling the wall tiles, and other tasks that need skillful master builders. This means we have less things to do. And this makes us some adventures into the local life.

We divide our team into two groups. One group still helps builders in building material supplying, the other come to the village and visit the surrounding. And we change the shift after two hours. Our Vietnam service learning Ben Tre is then with more things to remember.

We walk on the village trails and see how the local use their toilet. This confirms our right decision why we should build a toilet for them at this trip of Vietnam service learning Ben Tre. Their toilets are often just a small box over a canal, and you can imagine how it affects the environment. We see some very poor people collecting tree leaves just to earn 30 cents per day. We see how the local make more money with tropical fruit gardens. And we see many more. On top of those, we are so trilled to visit a local farm where the local bring up some so-called “elephant leg” chicken. We have never seen it before. The chicken is regular but their legs are as big as their heads, making the feeling the leg of elephant on the body of chicken. They say that the chicken bring a lot of money as the rich families in cities want to eat this special kind of chicken which are not popular at all. Nevertheless, that is not the only amazing thing of the day we see. We visit another house and they earn living by bring up huge pythons. The pythons are in the cages with locks but this does not help our skin not to get a goose bump. We see them alive, looking at us as a hello for the strangers.

We finish the project and the visiting. We clean the ground for the tranfering, and we call it a half-way celebration for the toilet. We do really make a celebration. After our speech of handing over the sponsoring money to the principal, their representative, the principal, comes to make some long speech on thanks and gratitude. A student from our group also makes a speech on thanks for letting us to have this great Vietnam service learning Ben Tre. The next are some singing performance from a little girl then from a group from that school. This makes us beautiful feeling as a real celebration of important things. We have more hugs, thanks, playing ball together, and picturing together next to our half-way built toilet.

The saying goodbye is the hardest part of the trip. The students staying around us and many do not want to go home. The school children even run after us and cry when we walk to the boat quay for the boat trip back to homestay. It is a so emotional moment.

On the way back to homestay, we also visit a local house to see how they make business from weaving reeds to make mats for sleeping. In Vietnam it’s hot then these mats are so cool to sleep on (for them, as this is so hard for us).

After dinner we make a walking to the village down town and have some local ice cream. We not only have an ice cream, but also touch more to local lives. We see young people train their kungfu. We see many people rush to night classes. We see free people with their entertainment on special local food. In conclusion, we have a chance to see how the local people in a small town in the middle of Mekong delta Vietnam hang out for their night life.

The amazing part of the night goes on with a visit to a garden to see thousand of fire flights on trees sparkling in the middle of the dark night. We caught one and really enjoy the reason why it sparkles and the knowledge of how it sparkles. We have never done that before and this is much more interesting than any book of describing the fire flights.

In the following day we have saying goodbye to our host and make a departure to Saigon, ending a beautiful Vietnam service learning Ben Tre that we will nenver forget.

Vietnam service learning in Mekong – Build a toilet – First day

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Today we start one of the most exciting days of Vietnam service learning. We participate in a community service program in building a toilet for a local primary school. The school has no toilet and we will help around 60 children to have a place to answer the natural call of their body: just go to pee.

This is really not a big think at Western countries but a real big problem for children at most of schools in rural Vietnam. There is no toilet or toilet is too bad to go to pee. School time in Vietnam is often 3-4 hours and students do not go to pee within this period. This leads to health issues at kidney. And adults does not drink enough water as they keep the habit of drinking little water at their childhood so as they don’t have to have demand to go to toilet at school.

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We have a taxi drive from our characteristic hotel to the bus station to catch a pubic bus to Ben Tre Mekong Vietnam. Getting on public bus is special experience. It is cheap to save cost to our project. It is also a good observation to understand more the local people. The bus drive takes us thru the huge green rice farms of the fertile Mekong rice bowl of Vietnam. After some more great view of rivers, canals, farms, we arrive the local house of Mr. Muoi where we have homestay for our Vietnam service learning experience.

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That’s a little man with small eyes and big smiles. He welcomes us to his house. We look around his house and his big garden, and then arrange every people to beds in the house.

After a lunch of steam rice with fish and pork in claypot cooked with coconut, we walk to the boat quay and cruise along beautiful green canals to the site of Vietnam service learning project. That’s a great boat trip along the river of Mekong and it amazing canals. The view is so beautiful with water coconut ranges aong those canals. We see many local factories of brick production, fish processing or other kinds of factories. On the river, there are many local boats back and forth for their distinctive transportation way. There are also fishing nets, fishing traps, sand badges, and local boats full of local fruits from gardens to market.

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As arriving the community project site of our Vietnam service learning, we have some introduction to the master builders, the teachers and the local people there. We also have a brief on what to do then start to participate in building the toilet immediately. We carry sand from canal to the building site. We load bricks to the right location. We learn to mix cement with sand for a good mortar. We lay bricks with mortar, and build a real toilet.

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There are many local people coming to visit us because they are so surprised about this. There is also a lady with invitation to her house to have some coconut drinks. And we feel quite excited to visit her house with the promised beautiful taste of the fresh coconut right from the trees. After the time at the project, we go along lush gardens of tropical fruits, along trails at villages and visit her house. She asks her brother to pick a lot of coconuts at the garden. We have not only the taste of good coconut, but also the hospitality of the local and the special visit to such an authentic life style of Vietnamese Mekong Delta.

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On the way back, the surprise does not finish. We have low tide then we should have a short walk across gardens to the place our boat can pick us up. The beautiful sun beam makes our walking so adorable. And what is more, we end the walking at a local house where they make pickle lemon for Vietnamese drinking flavor, and we learn one more way of Vietnamese food, as well as interact more with local people.

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That’s a long day but it’s a great day of beginning the service learning experience in Mekong delta Vietnam.