The Unplanned Plan

Trusting my gut over the years has been challenging, it usually defies logic, and very often refuses to conform to what would seem to be normal and rational, but it has always chosen the best paths for me, even if I can’t see it at the time. I need to say this first, because I am still amazed how a continuing chain of gut decisions along with dozens of “coincidences” had lead me Monday morning to sit at the hotel lobby internet next to Karen Leonard.

I had a strong feeling to come to Vietnam, to fly to Da Nang, to come to Hoi An, even a strong feeling to choose this hotel. I wanted to volunteer in this town, no particular reason why, just gut feelings. I spent last week researching what opportunities are around. Anxious to start I give myself a deadline of Monday to begin volunteer work. I had decided upon an orphanage outside of town. The conditions are a bit uneasy, and a bit outside my comfort zone. Children and babies half naked at least 2 dozen of them lying on the floors on bamboo mats crying. If I choose to do it, working here will probably mean that I might as well throw the crayons out the window. It would make me sad not to use any of my art experience or the folders of projects I’ve been lugging around with me. But still, it was a place that needed help, and I felt strongly about working in Hoi An, and to begin on Monday. So if the universe wanted me to do something different, than it better intervene.

Before setting off for my first day at the Hoi An orphange, I hop online to I check emails. Yep, one from mom and one from CNN Breaking News. Karen was sitting 3 computers down from me and I can’t help but notice her and her Australian accent, as she is typing and answering at least a half dozen cell phone calls in under 5 minutes, how and why does she have a cell phone anyway? I listen to her conversations…”yes love, right right… no worries” hangs up, another call…”yes, ok, the meeting last night went well” hangs up, another call “yes, yes I’ll be there in 5”… “oh hello, don’t worry…if anyone says anything just plead ignorant”…

Hmmm, I highly doubt this woman is a tourist. She’s got something going on, and she is the first English speaking person I’m interested in talking with since I’ve gotten here, I interrupt without even thinking.

Polite introductory conversation takes place. Yes, she lives here and she is from Australia. And I tell her that I am an artist from America looking to volunteer, perhaps she can point me in a direction. Then the typing stops, Karen stops, it seems even the motorbikes outside stopped (which is impossible) when I had said the word artist. Karen now looks at me and smiles with excitement as she begins the story, ”you see, we have just opened up a new school for the poor disadvantaged children living in the town, 8-20 years old, mostly street kids and illiterate, since they have to work on the street they can not attend school, so we have opened the school to teach them when they are not working. But if you could see their faces when we give them coloring books and crayons, they would love an art class. They’ve never had any opportunity for anything creative, and we have no idea where to start, but maybe you can show us something? If you have no problem with 3 on a motorbike, I can take you right now to the school and show you around, can you come right now?”

With Karen's first sentence I knew that THIS is where I needed to be, and this is what I will be doing. It all made sense, that I chose this town, this date, and how I chose this hotel because the taxi got lost and stopped here for directions, and that the power went out early in the morning so I checked emails at a time I don’t normally check, it just all made sense. But I have a feeling I better hold on tight, and no, I don’t mean to the motorbike. Because it is from this point that I will begin to live the lives of the street children and poor families of Hoi An, and I recommend you come along for the ride.

Within 20 minutes the tour had begun, a REAL tour, a tour of the other side of the river in Hoi An. Karen has been working in Vietnam for 6 years and runs her own organization, LIFESTART, which has different programs that range from helping troubled teens to assisting families to build new homes. Running on good will, all of the money raised goes directly towards programs. She has no desire for staff, payrolls, or becoming a large organization. Her only interest is working day and night directly with the families and children who are in need the most. She’ll take any funds and volunteers she can get, but is not focused on how to get it. She is organized, smart, compassionate, fair, loved and respected. I have never met anyone making more of an effective, genuine impact in my life.

The days continue as I meet family after family, kid after kid, and eat noodle bowl after noodle bowl and I see where each of these kids (if they have a place to live) live…boats and bamboo mats held up with sticks…walls and ceilings of plastic bags, shared by 5-10 more people, all living along the river, which is used for drinking, washing, dumping, everything. It is polluted and infested with disease.

Mental tornadoes are taking place early mornings and late nights when I am alone under my mosquito net. I am up at 4am staring at the walls, speechless, replaying scenes and interactions from the day…how Tam’s family fed me a lunch of pork fried rice and springs rolls, when they have not enough money for rice for themselves, or how 6 year old Thuan doesn’t know his own name because no one ever acknowledged him, or the pregnant woman lying next to the river.

The memory of each person I meet becomes branded into my brain, or more appropriately, my heart. I cannot explain it, but I am being touched so deeply that I feel so beautifully alive, yet so painfully heartbroken, all at the same time.

The language barriers, the unfamiliarity of being in another country, unresolved issues from home, my hygiene (that’s right, I said my hygiene), everything is taking a step back, this new world is becoming so much that there is no room in my head for anything else. Today I sit and try to remember what a typical day would be like at ECRI, would the girls be walking up at 9am for coffee, what is Tim’s lunch special for the day? How many metal sunflowers has Sandy welded in her studio? How are my plants? My dog? What is it like to get dressed up, and go out to the salsa clubs, and how does it feel to dance? To play the violin, the comfort of mashed potatoes, to drive my own car, and pay a toll, or to be cold? The small details of my life at “home” continue to slip away as if they never even existed.

---

---