Since 2001, Que Huong Charity Centre in Ho Chi Minh City has received and nurtured over 2,000 orphan and disabled children. Its success is attributed to the great efforts of the Centre’s Director Huynh Tieu Huong who overcame her own misfortunes to build the shelter.
Visiting the Centre, one can’t help being moved when they see the orphaned and paralysed children, who look doltish with their deformities, being taken in and taught to write, sing, dance, work and play. In this great family, all the children live happily with the love of their mother, Huynh Tieu Huong.
Born in 1968, Huynh Tieu Huong suffered a miserable childhood. She doesn’t know her mother and father. At the age of six, she had to earn her own living by selling tea and cigarettes on trains travelling from the South to the Central region, cleaning cars at the Eastern Car Station, working as a waitress in restaurants or even living in gold grounds in Ha Tinh and Nghe An Provinces. For over 20 years, she lived a hard life on the streets and experienced much physical and mental anguish so she always dreamed of a shelter to herself.
With the assistance from private donors and organizations, she established Que Huong Charity Centre to help the dejected children and as she said she would do utmost to do many useful things. Although she established the Centre only six years ago, she has received orphaned and disabled children for 17 years and nurtured them with her own money. Through self teaching she learned English and Chinese and produced some products to earn money.
During a visit to the Centre, Vice State President Truong My Hoa, Honourary Chairwoman of the Vietnam Disabled Children Aid Association, highly appreciated the benevolence of Tieu Huong who is not only dedicated to children in her centre but is also active in many charity activities. Over the years, the Centre presented about 10,000 wheelchairs and 370 bikes to the disabled, 1,200 scholarships to poor students and built 75 houses for families in difficult circumstances.
The Centre was built on an area of 3,800m2 in Di An District, Binh Duong Province , with a total investment capital of 8 billion VND. It consists of comfortable bedrooms, dinning rooms, classrooms, a playground, and rooms for vocational training. It also established workshops producing mineral water and many handicraft and fine arts articles to create jobs for the children and earn money for activities of the Centre. At present the Centre nurtures about 300 children, including 38 children under five months old. Almost all of the children here suffer due to deformities. The Centre has a staff of nurses who grew up in the Centre and volunteer to take care of the children.
Coming here, we were very moved by a wall covered with papers with writings from the children, expressing their gratitude, aspiration for family affection and love for life.
