And then there is Miss Thao, who has just got the sweetest spirit and drive. She had a big sore on her foot, the result of a fall from a bike, I think. She was not happy when she had to have it dressed ... poor little thing has been so sick for so much of her life that she gets all upset at the sight of medical paraphernalia.
And then there is Chuot, who is such a beautiful boy, but when he is mad, he can really pitch a fit. Same with Luan, who is so clever and sweet ... when he wants to be. He smucked Chuot this morning and when Chuot went to Xang to stick up for him, there was quite a brouhaha. Luan wouldn't say "xin loi" though .. and kept paying the price from Xang when the adults weren't watching.
And what about Mr Minh and Miss Ti? I am coming to know them ... know half of their names at any rate. The babies are adorable ... little SiSi and Tien, who can apparently fall asleep anywhere.
And one of the sweetiest is Boi Boi, who is a girl. She has grown a lot since I started going ... 6 months old now and pulling herself up and crawling. But she is just a baby girl.
And then there is Manh, who is a little boy. He and his siblings arrived last week and he is just 4 months old. I got to hold him for a very long time today, which is probably why I had such a good time today. He was a little sucky baby today and didn’t want to sleep in his bed. He got his inoculation recently and had a big sore spot on his arm, so I guess he just felt better being cuddled. His mother and brothers had gone off to visit his father in the hospice. So sad.
There was a lot of company today. First there was a group of women from Australia brought there by a woman named Judith, who has been a long-time supporter of Mai Tam. Then there was a group of high school students who were all members of a Korean church group. They were unannounced as there had been a miscommunication somewhere along the way. They came just as the children were having their after-lunch showers and getting ready for their naps. However, the visitors were much more interesting than routines and, honestly, the Korean teenagers were really wonderful with the kids. And it was good they gave the kids all their junk food after lunch rather than before. I was very impressed by the way the boys loved to hold the babies and several of the visitors really engaged the older children. As most of them have been living in Vietnam for several years, I hope they can speak some Vietnamese ... their English was pretty good from what I could tell. Ohhh, multilinguality!
I was especially happy to see Ricky and his aunt, Co Thom, again. She is a retired French teacher and he is a wonderful young man who is just 25. Ricky works for a German company and he speaks some German and French, because of his aunt. They come very Saturday for 4 hours ... 10-2, where I go 8-12, so our shifts overlap. I have to brush up on my French so Thom and I can speak more easily, although she is good at English listening. My French comes out all Spanish now. I am not a polyglot, sad to say.When I left the kids were mostly resting, as they are wont to do of an afternoon. When you consider how many of them are all in such a small area, they really do well. Thu had to go out, so she took me to Ben Thanh where I caught the #34 bus and back to Phu My Hung. I told her she travels incognito.
I think I might have nodded off on the way home. Could’ve happened. It was the heat more than likely. More pics on flickr ... http://www.flickr.com/photos/raven_chick/
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