Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from August 20, 2008

VIETNAMESE CHILDREN CONFRONTING HIV/AIDS

VIETNAMESE CHILDREN CONFRONTING HIV/AIDS   On a narrow busy lane in District 3 of Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam is a three-story apartment building. For an outsider, it looks like a typical shop/house building, but inside this simple but neat building, we met more than 40 children, aged four months to 15 years - most of them orphans living under the loving care of a few volunteers and Father John Phuong Dinh Toai. They all have been neglected by society and by their own families and they all have one thing in common -- they are all infected with HIV/AIDS.  Few mothers, also infected with this deadly virus and abandoned by their husbands, live here as well and help take care of the children. Natascha Yogachandra, honorary chairperson of Hope is Life Foundation is seen playing with some of the children at the orphanage.  My wife, Debbie, and our daughters, Megan and Natascha, were very fortunate to meet these children and Father Toai during our recent trip to Vietnam (late July 2008) and