It's all about people

Before moving to Vietnam in 2002, I was a school teacher for 4 years and also worked in an Australian charity for 6 months. Blue Dragon Children's Foundation has now been running for about 10 years. So all up, I have a fair bit of time working in service roles. 

The more experience I gain, the more I understand that systems don't help people. People help people.

We're always looking for ways to boost productivity, enhance performance, and duplicate models. But in the end, our world is full of people, and if you want to impact their lives then it all comes down to YOU. It's not about what kind of a system you set up, or what kind of model you develop.It's about you.

Charities succeed or fail depending on their people. I imagine businesses would say exactly the same. You can have all the slick marketing that money can buy, but if your salespeople or customer service staff are rude or incompetent, then chances are you're going to fail.

In creating Blue Dragon, all I ever wanted to do was help a few kids who were having a rough time and had nobody else to care for them. That was the whole vision in the beginning, and it's not very different now. Even with over 1500 girls and boys in the Blue Dragon family, it's still all about caring and lending a hand.

Today my team in Hanoi had a beautiful insight to how we have impacted on the life of one of our boys - who I'll call "Hao".

One of Blue Dragon's Outreach workers met young Hao, now aged 14, on the streets of the city early this year.  He's now in school and living in the Blue Dragon Shelter.

Unbeknownst to us, Hao's school teacher this week asked him to write a story about someone who has helped him, or someone he has helped. Below is a translation of what he wrote. I'm very proud of him for writing this, and pleased that he had the confidence to share his story.

When I was 12 years old, my father died in an accident. After that my mother was very sick. I quit school and came to Hanoi to work so that I could earn money to send home so that my mum will have medicine. 

Before leaving for Hanoi, I fell into my mother's arms and cried.

When I first came to Hanoi, the city was completely new to me. There were too many people. I walked the streets and eventually found a job in a pho shop. I earned just a little money there. But I needed more money for my mother's medicine, so I also worked in many different jobs. In the morning, I sold posters and I worked at the pho shop in the afternoon. At night, I worked in a snail restaurant. 

I didn't dare to rent a room to sleep but I lived on a small ledge under a bridge. When it rained, and was cold, and the wind was strong, I thought a lot about my mother. But my hardships gave me more motivation to continue to try my best. 

Eventually I couldn't continue to work for the pho shop any more because the owner treated me so badly. I left the shop in the dark of night and found work in a car and motorbike washing business for 3 months. But because I was too small I had to stop working there. 

On the night I left the car washing job, I was stopped on the street by 2 older boys. They attacked and robbed me. I was very sad, thinking that I am too poor to be robbed, and yet still there is someone to rob me. I accepted that as my fate, but I missed my mother, my grand parents and my little brother. 

I was lucky to meet some brothers and sisters from Blue Dragon. Blue helps me to have a good home and good food. Every month I save some money from my allowance to bring to my mother at the end of the year. That makes me feel very happy. My mum is very happy as well. 

Now I am getting older, I feel that the difficulties I have been through have made me grow and become more mature. I have helped my mother a lot. And I am very happy.

After 10 years of working with Hanoi's street kids, Hao's story tells me that Blue Dragon is still doing something right. And as long as there's another girl or boy out there who needs some help, we're here to stay.

A week of loss and hope

The past week at Blue Dragon was an emotional roller coaster, with some wonderful highs and some terrible lows. Such is the nature of our work.

We were very sad to lose one of the Blue Dragon girls, 19 year old Nguyen Thi Hai Yen. Yen has been with Blue Dragon since 2006, as she suffered from an auto-immune condition called lupus. Although Yen has been independent of our financial support since the start of this year, she remained good friends with us all and was still a part of the family.

Perhaps the hardest part of being at Blue Dragon is attending funerals. Over the past 10 years I have been to many, and all have been full of young people mourning the loss of a mate. Bringing comfort to children bereft is gut-wrenchingly difficult, and it doesn't get easier. Yen's younger brothers and sisters are badly torn by their loss; having lost their mother some years ago, the loss of their big sister will be a pain they carry for a long time.

Yen's funeral was held on Thursday, the same day as Vietnam's Full Moon Festival. And so we had the awkward task of accompanying kids and staff to Yen's funeral and then organising a major party for almost 100 children at Dragon House a few hours later.

The party was a great success, with food and singing and games. We were incredibly fortunate to have support from some local businesses to provide the kids with gifts and moon cakes: Soft Water, ILA and ANZ Bank Vietnam all contributed to make sure the children were well taken care of. Even some of the teens who had earlier attended Yen's funeral joined the party, and it was nice to see them able to put their worries behind them for a short time.

The week finished with another significant development in the fight against human trafficking in Vietnam: a court case of three traffickers in Yen Bai province. Blue Dragon found and rescued one of their victims from China back in April; she had been kept against her will in a brothel for about a year, but was finally able to make a call for help and so we went to bring her home. Her return to Vietnam meant the police could take her statement, and so they swiftly arrested her traffickers. Another trafficking ring broken.

This case was important for several reasons. For Blue Dragon, it was the first time our lawyers have represented a trafficking survivor in court, and we were very pleased with the outcome: substantial financial compensation for the young woman, and hefty prison sentences for each of the traffickers.

But the case itself was rather special. Normally, major cases such as this are heard in provincial capitals, which are often quite far from the villages most impacted by the trafficking. This time, the judiciary arranged for a circuit court to be held, which meant that the whole process took place in Van Chan district - nearby the homes of the traffickers and their victims. Over 200 people turned up to watch the case, despite torrential rain. This was a big deal for the local people, and no doubt will be the talk of the town for a long while to come. Any would-be traffickers in this area now have cause to rethink their actions.

These events of the past week are a reminder of the importance of Blue Dragon's work in Vietnam: not only for the broader issues, such as the fight against human trafficking, but also for the impact we are having on the lives of children and their families.

Normality

Before I left Australia to live in Vietnam, I was a huge fan of the X-files. I wasn't so much into the sci-fi aspect of the series as the tension between 'the man' and society.

One scene I sometimes think about involved the characters, Mulder and Scully, racing through the desert at night towards Area 51. Mulder had received a call of dubious origin, with scant information, but here they were traveling across the country on a whim. Exasperated, Scully says:


Don't you ever want to stop? Get out of the damn car and live something approaching a normal life?

Mulder's reply: "But Scully, this is normal." 

The scene makes me laugh because I can understand how vastly different people's ideas of normality can be. I'm someone who has cheerfully chosen to abandon the 'normal' life, with all of its comforts and constraints. I've followed a path without a 9 to 5 grind, and mortgages and summer holidays and superannuation plans and visits to the mall; to me, all of that is strange now.

And yet, ironically, my life's work is helping young people to find their own way to normality. Blue Dragon's mission is to find the kids who are out on their own: abandoned, sold, or homeless. There are very few kids we meet who anyone would identify as having 'normal' lives, by any definition.

This reality hit me this week during a meeting in a cafe without about 15 of the Blue Dragon teens. During the summer months we organised a Career Orientation program to help our youth think about the sorts of jobs they might want to pursue in the future. The gathering at the cafe was a wrap-up meeting to debrief and acknowledge the great progress that the kids had made. They'd all stuck with the program from beginning to end, and some had even taken the opportunity to start new jobs or join training programs.

I sat at the back of the room looking at the kids. Nearly all of them had experienced abandonment by their families and severe neglect. Many had spent time living on the streets. Some had been through the  worst forms of exploitation imaginable. Every one had a heart-rending story that they could tell.

But just looking at them, they seemed... well, totally normal. A stranger coming into the room would have seen a group of typical teenagers. During the meeting, some sat and listened quietly. Some raised their hands or interrupted enthusiastically. Some used the opportunity to flirt with a girl or boy who had caught their eye. Absolutely normal behaviour.

One of them, "Nam," has had a particularly harrowing life, and he's only 14 years old. Kicked out of home following his mother's death several years ago, Nam came to Hanoi and fell into a cycle of exploitation and crime. When he wasn't being used by the gangs, he slept with an empty stomach on concrete benches in public parks and waited for someone to come by and find him - police or another gang, it didn't matter to him. But one day he got lucky and it was a Blue Dragon Outreach Worker who found him.

When he first came to Dragon House, Nam was skinny and dirty, with long greasy hair and clothes that hadn't been washed in weeks. His fingernails were crusted black with dirt. And yet, just a week later, he was transformed. He'd had a hair cut, bought all new clothes, and polished himself all over. He even stood differently and started looking people in the eye. The change took place in just days; suddenly, he looked and behaved like any other teenager in Hanoi.

It occurred to me that a common characteristic of the Blue Dragon kids is the craving for normality. They don't want to stand out from the crowd any more; they want to blend in. They want to present themselves to the world as being the same as anyone else, no different. They want to be normal. 

And so I see that I have left a 'normal' life to help others find one.

I wonder if, in future years, some of them will follow a path like my own, and abandon that same normality they now pursue. I wonder if they too will make choices which seem alien to others, and find their own way through life.

Maybe they will. But for now, it's normality that they want, and normality that they need.

Younger, more destructive

Hieu* first came to Blue Dragon 3 years ago, aged 12.

He had run away from an unhappy home in the countryside. Both of his parents had died and he was being raised by uncles who resented him. Everything Hieu did seemed to turn out bad. Nobody believed in him, so he gave them what they expected. He stole from them, dropped out of school, and eventually left to live on the streets of Hanoi.

Once in the big city, Hieu drifted. He met Blue Dragon's Outreach Workers one night, and spent some time in our emergency accommodation before we helped him contact his family again. But it didn't work out. Shortly after, Hieu was arrested and sent to reform school for a series of petty thefts.

Despite that, we believed in Hieu. He was a good kid. His theft was not from people, but of unused items in a public park. Even though he was doing the wrong thing, he was careful that he didn't hurt anybody.

Hieu spent 18 months in the reform school, and we stayed in as close contact as we could. When he was released, he visited us briefly, but then vanished.

We learned later that Hieu had been caught up with some extremely unsavoury characters: a group of adults here in Hanoi who were exploiting street boys. The moment we offered Hieu a way out, he accepted immediately. He's been with us ever since.

Hieu's story is not unusual. Lots of the Blue Dragon boys have similar stories.This is why, during May and June, we appealed for donations to expand our crisis work.

But Hieu's story is far from over at the moment he accepts our help. Far, far from over.

Hieu, and the many children like him who we meet, have a long road ahead to recover. Some never do.

From what I have seen, there are 3 noticeable phases that the kids go through shortly after they come in to live at Blue Dragon.

First, they become younger. Physically, they change. Years drop away from their faces. It's an extraordinary thing to see. A month or two after Hieu moved in to the Blue Dragon shelter, he looked a couple of years younger than his actual age. And psychologically the kids go through a transformation. These street-wise, hard-living tough guys start to laugh, play with toys, and in so many ways start behaving like children half their age.It's not unusual to spot them sitting on the floor of our drop-in centre cuddling soft toys.

This can take weeks or months. But it doesn't last.

Next, the kids start reflecting on what they've been through. They wonder about who they are. Being at Blue is great - but why aren't they with their families? The love and care they receive from our staff becomes a painful contrast with what they should have from their own relatives.

The kids go through a period of self-destruction. They test us meticulously. Will we still care for them if they steal this bicycle? Will we kick them out when we catch them carrying a knife? How will we react when they don't come home for a few nights? Will we notice the swear words they have carved into their arm with a razor?

Sometimes their behaviour becomes dangerous. Sometimes they start to cut themselves and burn their own skin with cigarettes. They get into destructive relationships and won't listen to anyone - until it all falls apart.

Just how long this phase lasts, and how bad it gets, depends largely on the children themselves. Blue Dragon's role through this can be to guide, discipline, and counsel; and as a last resort, we may assign one staff member to simply be the 'anchor' who keeps up the relationship with the child while they go wild. At times I have served as the anchor for a couple of kids, but mostly this is a job for our younger local staff who have great relationships with the kids and really know how to 'get through' to them.

Being the anchor for a child who is going through this phase can mean meeting up at cafes, or on the street; it can mean staying in touch over Facebook or by phone. It takes a little creativity, a very thick skin, and a truck load of patience.

When kids get to the end of this phase of self-destruction, that's when their lives have finally turned a corner. The third and (hopefully) final phase is one of stability. But it's not always a straight-line progression - sometimes kids will lapse back into self destruction for a little while - and it also doesn't mean the kids grow angel wings. Some do. Some don't. But that's not the point. Rather, the goal is that they work out for themselves who they are, and feel comfortable with their identity.

That's where Hieu is at the moment. He's just coming out of his phase of self destruction. He's an incredibly bright kid, with a strong sense of empathy. He's finding it difficult to accept that he has no loving family outside of Blue Dragon, and I suspect he will always struggle with that. Hieu is a deep thinker.

I wish I could say that the kids have fairy tale endings when they meet Blue Dragon. They don't. For many, their first meeting with us is only the start of a long and difficult road. But that road to self acceptance and understanding is worth going down, and we are proud of the many fine young people who have walked that road with us.


* Nope, that's not his real name, and identifying information has been changed.

Street kids have family, too

On Sunday morning, almost 100 adults - aged from the mid 20s through to the early 80s - gathered on the rooftop of Dragon House.

These are the parents, grandparents, uncles, aunties, and foster parents of Blue Dragon kids in Hanoi. It's often forgotten, and sometimes overlooked, but street kids have families too.

When Blue Dragon was starting out, back in early 2003, our biggest mistake was in failing to connect with the families. We met kids on the streets, and we worked directly with them. We certainly had some success, but there was always something missing, and it took us some time to work out what that was.

Our first lesson was that we could be far more effective if we had the support of the children's families. And so we began including them in discussions and decisions, which was often hard to do because they tended to live outside of the city while their children had migrated in to Hanoi. Our volunteers and staff spent a lot of time taking public buses out to rural villages.

And then came our second lesson. We were more effective still if we supported the children's parents - and not the other way around. To answer the question "How can we help this child?" we had to respond with another question altogether: "What does this child's family need?"

Of course, it's rarely so simple. We currently work with hundreds of children in Hanoi, and yet only 100 family members joined in today's meeting. Not all families want to be involved. Some are very open about not wanting their children. Occasionally we meet families who ask the police to take their kids to reform school - a kind of 2-year detention camp - just to take them off their hands.

Even in those cases, though, family is important. With care and effort, we are often able to reunite children with their families, and encourage parents to understand their children's needs. For those kids who simply cannot be reunited with their family, we have long term shelters where they can live while they study or find jobs. In a very real way, Blue Dragon becomes their family.

Family members enjoying a game - grown ups can have fun, too!

Families are important, but for some Blue Dragon kids families represent an unattainable dream. We'll continue working closely with family members whenever we can, and we'll be there for those who just don't have a loving family to care for them.

Trauma

Saturday morning started with a phone call.

An 18 year old Vietnamese girl had crossed the border from China, handed over by Chinese authorities who found her bleeding and screaming for help on the streets. The girl, "Thuy," was frantic and in great pain, but her story was not immediately clear. By now we've been able to piece most of it together.

In October 2011, Thuy was lured from her home by a friend offering her a well paying job in China. Aged 16, Thuy believed she had been offered a great opportunity. She would sell clothes in a shop not far from the border, earn a great income, and easily be able to visit her home in northern Vietnam from time to time.

But once across the border, there was no clothes shop. Instead, Thuy was taken inland and sold to a brothel. We don't yet know much about where she was, or exactly what happened; but Thuy was now a sex slave, unable to escape or call for help.

A few nights ago, however, Thuy took a chance. It was 4am, and she believed she could make a run for it. She took to the streets, running blindly, but within minutes was tackled by 3 of the Chinese brothel keepers. They attacked her with knives and then, as far as we can tell, stuffed some kind of drug into her wounds, and left her. Presumably they thought she would soon be dead.

Some locals witnessed this and called the police, who promptly got her to a hospital.

Yesterday Thuy was handed over to the Vietnamese police. She is in a very fragile state now, and we're just starting to put the pieces together to work out where he family is. It seems her mother has long been gone, so we are trying to find her father.

Safe in the border area, Thuy awaits reunion with her family

Thuy is much calmer now, and staying in the care of Blue Dragon. In coming days we'll assist her to make a statement to the police, go out to her home town to locate her family, and take her to hospital to treat her wounds. We can do all that pretty easily. But the hard part will be what cannot be seen: dealing with the extraordinary psychological trauma that this teenager is now facing.

The life of Phi Quang Huy

Today's news from Blue Dragon is very sad: Last night, Phi Quang Huy passed away at home, aged 25. 

Huy and his family have been a part of Blue Dragon since 2009. Both Huy and his brother Kien were born with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, a genetic condition that left them both permanently wheelchair bound after its onset around the age of 10. 

Huy's mother and older sister have devoted their lives to caring for Huy and his brother every moment of every day: but sadly, Huy's passing has been only a matter of time. The typical life expectancy of anyone with DMD is just 25 years. 

Despite his severe disability, Huy made the most of life, in ways that inspired many. He studied English and wrote poetry as a hobby; in 2011 his reading of his poem, "Wonderful Mother," at the Blue Dragon Tet Awards left the packed room in tears. 

Knowing that he had received much help throughout his life, Huy decided that he wanted to help others. In recent years he established libraries for people with disabilities; sitting in his wheelchair, with a friend helping him access email and the internet, Huy organised the library to give opportunities to other house-bound teens. His efforts attracted the local media, and Huy became something of a celebrity in disability circles: 

http://dantri.com.vn/nhip-song-tre/vong-uoc-cua-chang-trai-go-may-tinh-bang-dua-532286.htm

http://www.tienphong.vn/Gioi-Tre/Nhip-Song/547835/Tu-sach-Vong-Uoc-chap-canh-uoc-mo-tpov.html

Huy's passing means our world has lost a great young man who cared for others and inspired many. But it is his life that should be remembered, and the great lesson he has taught us: That no matter what obstacles we face in life, we can still care for those around us. 

I'll finish with Huy's poem - both in Vietnamese and in English. The words of this wonderful young guy deserve to live on forever. 

Người mẹ vĩ đại  Có tôi trên đời nhờ công ơn của mẹ, Tuổi thơ tôi trải muôn vàn giông tố, Vẫn lênh đênh giữa biển đời xuôi ngược. Cha mất đi khi tuổi còn thơ dại. Đã kịp đâu hưởng thụ và cảm nhận, Thế nào là tình cha khi chỉ còn lại mẹ. Hỏi thế gian tìm đâu, công bằng hạnh phúc? Cướp đi người cha, cướp luôn cả gia tài. Nhọc nhằn công sức cha và mẹ, Xây lên từ những giọt mồ hôi, và nước mắt, Suốt tháng năm tuổi trẻ của hai người, Phút chốc biến tan lại trở về bàn tay trắng. Cha sinh thành, mẹ nuôi dưỡng đến bây giờ, Nếm trải cuộc đời bằng tuổi đời ngắn ngủi. Hai mươi năm đã bao lần mắc cạn, Tôi sống trưởng thành một tay mẹ chèo lái, Đã thành nhân cũng là bàn tay mẹ, Dẫu tôi trên chuyến tàu còn chưa cập bến. Luôn khắc ghi công ơn người lái tàu vĩ đại, Người mẹ thân yêu mà con hằng kính phục. Con xin dành tặng mẹ ngàn lời cảm tạ, Đã dành cho con những gì đẹp nhất. Tiếc nuối làm chi một cuộc đời như thế, Mẹ kính yêu con yêu người hơn tất cả. Wonderful mother I was brought into the world by the will of my mother My childhood experienced lots of ups and downs And still ebbs and flows in the sea of life. My father passed away when I was still small I did not have any chance to experience and feel, What is a father’s love, as only my mother remained. I wonder where in the world is justice and happiness, When my father, and all we owned were taken away All the  effort my parents had built up From their tears and sweat During the many years of their life, All of it has gone  in a minute and leave nothing as in the beginning My parents gave me birth but only my mother raised me until now I have been experiencing life only for a short time, For 20 years I have faced many challenges Becoming mature thanks to my mother Everything I have become is because of my mother Though I am still in the boat that hasn't reached the shore I always appreciate the effort of my great captain My dear mother who I admire My appreciation thousands of times I show for my mother Who has given me all the best What an admirable life My dear respected mother, I love you more than anything.