Light Charity Central Highlands
THE WAVES WILL NOT REST, THE SEA WILL NOT BE STILL
Come on, the Central Highlands are all hills and mountains — where is the sea for waves or stillness? Yet in Đăk D’rông, a remote commune of Cư Jut District, Đăk Nông Province, little waves appeared, bobbing along and gradually spreading. They began pushing one another forward, then merged into larger waves that traveled farther. Suddenly, I realized I was standing on a boat gliding across a rolling sea — a vast ocean of love.
In Đăk D’rông, tiny hearts keep beating, pumping through frail bodies blood “blended” from hospital blood banks. Who knows what percentage of the blood in those frail bodies is still their “own,” when the children need transfusions 2–3 times every month, month after month, year after year? Leukemia fills their childhoods with tears.
By some twist of fate, one day the children with leukemia in Đăk D’rông met Tạ Minh Tuấn (TMT), an influential young entrepreneur who inspires thousands of entrepreneurs and young people across Asia. From that moment, TMT breathed new life into the first waves, which swelled into a sea of love surging across all three regions of the country. Light Charity is the lighthouse guiding boats of compassion toward the shores of love.
After the large, high-profile campaigns in industrial zones and densely populated areas in Ho Chi Minh City, Cần Thơ, Đà Nẵng, Hà Nội, Phú Thọ, and elsewhere, where thousands of outfits were sold and thousands of disadvantaged workers could buy good clothing, we in the Central Highlands focused on remote villages. These communities have only a few hundred households, whose annual income barely covers living costs and their children's village schooling, with worn-out clothes and patched schoolbags covered in road dust. If measured by funds raised through clothing sales, we Central Highlands Lighters would not dare compare ourselves with anyone. But if measured by the brightest, most sincere and unpretentious smiles, we are confident we achieved that.
“I have never been so tired from shopping for clothes. There are so many beautiful clothes for just 2 thousand that choosing is exhausting!” said a woman who had just selected a large bag full of good clothes. She added 1 “bonus” burst of hearty laughter.
“I thought, how could I do charity when I am poor? Today I learned that anyone can do it. Who doesn't have 2 thousand? I am so happy, my dears,” an Hmong woman, bent over with her grandchild on her back, told us haltingly because she was not fluent in standard Vietnamese.
Light Charity and the Giấc mơ đôi chân thiên thần Fund returned to the place that inspired them, as gently and simply as when entrepreneur TMT first met the children with leukemia. This time, however, the wave has grown strong enough to touch many hearts that seemed to have turned to stone. Many local people voluntarily contributed clothing, money, vehicles, and their time to help us carry out this program. They added strength to the wave preparing to sweep across the vast Central Highlands, so that more boats of kindness can take shape and carry love to every hamlet and village.
We have felt such joy and happiness at the smiles we received over the past days. We want more torches to be lit across the vast mountains and forests of the Central Highlands. We will not stop! What about you? Are you ready to welcome the Light One wave to your own village? Together, let us build a giant lighthouse to illuminate the sea of love amid the great forests of the Central Highlands!
Đàm Hùng — Central Highlands Lighter
1st Light One Central Highlands
16/8/2018 – 18/8/2018
Reflections on Lighter Đàm Hùng’s Facebook page.