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Published: July 22nd 2004
Hello all of you avid Team 1 followers,
Abbie here, today team 1 have completed their project phase (at last!!!!!) and we are all preparing to move onto the next phase of our challenge gradually moving up the country to the small town of Dalat where we will be commencing our acclimatisation trek in the rainforest.
In the mean time let me fill you in on what has happened over the last few eventful hours. Havng finished all of the work we were required to do at the shelter (and more!) we have finally been given our reward. When first meeting the managers of the shelter we were promised that on our last day we would spend a morning with the children to just have fun. Last night we prepared by gathering together all of the gifts we had brought from home and sending scouts out to buy a range of other toys for the children, and I have to say we exceeded ourselves. We left early with the intention of arriving at the shelter early to prepare ourselves and decide finally what we were doing. However, turning round the corner on the approach to the shelter we could hear a cheer from about 20 children obviously exstatic about our visit. Before we had time for any preparation in any way whatsoever we were being hugged, grabbed and stared at, very overwhelming but it showed us how much we were appreciated. Straight away we were singing the national festival song that we had been taught, clapping and had a very entertaining and somewhat confusing game of head, shoulders, knees and toes but they soon got the hang of it. As soon as our cameras came out of the bags and into our hands they were grabbed and played with, very very amusing but you could see the terrified looks on some of the digital camera owners faces, eventually we got them back. We had three hours with the children playing games, face painting, dancing and learning some english with numerous over the top hand movements. We were fed throughout with fruits and we handed out some sweets that we bought. In the final half hour we brought down the bag loads of presents that had been bought for the shelter and the children loved them. We had skittles, balls, stickers, paints, badminton and lots more. We had pots of bubbles which appeared to go down very well, at one point we were completley surrounded with a foam of falling bubbles. We had final group pictures and then said our farewells to the children and the shelter with many hugs. It was truly an amazing experience and the whole point of that phase was to give something back to the country and clearly we achieved our goal.
After leaving we decided to have a group lunch, we discovered that very near to the shelter was the famous soup cafe "Pho Binh" (Peace Soup) which was the head quarters of the Viet Cong and was where the attack on the embassy was planned. On first catching sight of the cafe we all wanted to turn and run, we would never have picked it to eat at from just a glance. We arrived sat down, still questioning whether this was the right place. We ordered very good noodle soup! Then the waitress passed around a newspaper clipping with an article about the revoloution and the owner of the cafe. Suddenly my end of the table see Alice having pictures taken with an old man, which was nice but quite random ("Is he Ho Chi Minh?!" exclaimed Ambika) , then it was explained that he was the revoloutionary who was running the conspiracy at the time, he was caught and still sticks by his view and he is a national legend. We all had pictures and he showed us his articles and post cards from all over the world. He had photo albums and a book that everyone could sign. He was so proud and I think that all of us felt that it was really touching to see someone who is a hero still running his little soup cafe and so proud of what he has achieved.
From there we returned to our hotel, we have the afternoon free to pack, get sorted for the next few days and say our farewells to Saigon.
All the best
Abbie, Vietnam Team 1
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Lorraine
Tears to my eyes....
Abs I am sitting here at work with tears running down my face - can you make it funny next time I can't cope with tear jerkers but I am happy that you all really enjoyed it. Take care of having your photo taken with old men that say they are a national hero. Men will do just about anything to get their hands on a bunch of 17 year olds. I would have punched him on the nose if I had been there. I bet Sal didn't have her picture done she's scared of anyone in fancy dress - did I ever tell you about the time she hit Father Christmas, just a mad old odd looking man that wanted her to sit on his lap........best not to go near anyone of the male persuasion over the age of ten...all my love to you and the gang x