Thanh Xuan Peace Village - Communication

This past week was my first experience at Thanh Xuan Peace Village.  I love the children there but have not yet figured out my place there.  Communication is less of a problem than I thought mostly because many of the children don’t need very much Vietnamese to understand me and I have my fellow UC students to help me ask and respond to questions.  Communication with adults is more difficult, however, and I am worried that that will affect my effective-ness at the organization.

The Peace Village as an organization still seems unsure of our intent and have responded to our help in a very reserved fashion.  Upon our arrival we are put in one room with the children and are just told to play with them, rather than help the teacher or help with chores.  I assumed that we would be having a more active role at the Village than assembling block towers with kids for 3 straight hours, only to leave the room when class was dismissed.  It was quite obvious that even the kids were very very bored, but the teacher made no efforts to do anything, and I didn’t think it was my place to offer to teach her class for her, even if I could ask something similar.  I also found it odd that the teachers would just leave at the end of the day without telling us they were leaving or basically checking-in with us at all.

 We were told that the organization needs much help, but Peter and Irene informed me that when they tried to provide help washing dishes they were criticized and eventually pushed out of the wash line.  Mai and I were also asked, in a not altogether friendly manner, why we were there by a man who lived and worked there.  I was not too sure why we were meeting such barriers at Thanh Xuan, but Gerard gave me an new insight saying that they get many foreign volunteers who are only around for one day or are just not very dedicated in general, so they have come to expect less of us than what we are willing to provide.  I would really like to show them that we are dedicated and there for the kids, but we are only around for three more months so I don’t know if that will be long enough to make a dent in these kids lives.

But, as I stated earlier, the kids seem much more receptive to our presence.  When we arrived on Tuesday for our second day I was pleasantly surprised that many of the kids still remembered my name! And after only meeting me one time.  Very surprising from kids I was told would be unable to learn.  I love playing outside with the kids the most because there I can be more active and do more things than sit and pretend I can understand them.  There is also one little girl who wouldn’t speak for a very long time but after Mai chased her around and we kicked a ball together she opened up and would start talking.  That felt great and totally made the experience worth it. 

I know that I shouldn’t really make any judgments about Thanh Xuan Peace Village now as I have only been there twice.  I am hoping this next week will make me more confident in handling the kids and adults and we can all feel more comfortable in the space.