It’s been a week already since our arrival and we feel like we have learn so much from our hosts ! Each day, two of our volunteers are in charge of telling their experiences and impressions on the Vietnamese culture. Once again, you’ll find below the stories of some of them, as well as some pictures. Every now and then, we will try to send you an update on our activities, our experiences and our impressions on the Vietnamese culture. Day 4 : Charlotte & Léa We started the day with a huge noodles soup to fuel us before starting our work at the construction site. We have learnt how to make concrete with cement sand and water ; it was a quite exhaustive task. We put the first bricks of the toilet house and started to fix them all. How satisfying it was ! After a big lunch and a small nap, we welcomed the children of the village for their first lesson. We were able to teach the 15 dynamic and attentive kids the essentials of the French language : the alphabet, how to introduce themselves, the numbers… We also sang a nursery rhyme together. Following the class, we offered them all to go to the river with us to freshen up but we discovered that the girls here, by tradition, are not allowed to bathe and do not know how to swim. In the water, the boys were initially quite hesitant to play with the female volunteers but they understood rapidly that they could play with us like they were doing with the males. While we were playing, we had the chance to observe buffaloes crossing the river, a few meters away from us. Two new Vietnamese volunteers have joined us. They are students from Hanoi and they participate to the same manual works and activities as us. For diner, we had the chance to taste a salad made out of banana flower and green mango. It was delicious ! Day 5 : Julie & Mathilde R. Yesterday we woke up at 7:00 and started working at 8:00 as usual. We almost finished the evacuation area created for the toilets and continued building the walls of the actual toilets. It was very satisfying because at the end Nam told us that we were very efficient and that we will be able to completely finish the two toilets in the two different families by the end of our stay. Then, we had lunch where we decided that we will divide in four different teams to teach the children. We thought that it would be easier for them to concentrate and to learn if we were less people around them. The first team was composed of Lisa, Mathilde Kolb, Anais, Pauline and Iris. They started with a review of the first class and then taught them new numbers and some animals. In the meantime, the rest of the group rested as the days are very exhausting here. After the lesson, the children took us to fishing. We both caught one fish, it was a great moment as now the children were the ones teaching us a part of their culture. As it was very hot we then went to the river and played with the children. When we got back home, some of us did their laundry and others helped in the kitchen. It was a very joyful diner as we met a French couple, Sophie and Xavier, from Pays-Basques that were hosted by our God Parents (this is how we call our hosts here: Bô’ and Me). They were with their Vietnamese driver and guide and, as it is in the tradition, we drank shots of the local alcohol with them. After everyone bounded and chatted a little, thanks to the arrival of the French couple, the villagers performed a great show composed of fivetraditional dances. The dances represent the everyday life of the villagers of Buoc: the dance of joy, the dance of rice fields, the dance of the fertile woman, the dance of bamboos and finally the dance of the Mong. The dance of the Mong represents the cooperation, the mixing of ethnises (in Vietnam, there are 50 different ethnises with different languages and traditions). We all danced together and sang French and Vietnamese songs. It was a very strong intercultural moment. There is a French game we play every night before going to sleep called the Loup-Garou. We invited Sophie, Xavier, their driver, their guide, and Binh and Hai (our fellow Vietnamese volunteers) to play with us. It was very funny as we had to traduce in three different languages: French, English and Vietnamese. Of course, the game was less strategic than usual but it was a great pleasure to play all together and everyone participated as much as they could. Finally, we all went to bed very happy with everything we had the chance to see/do/achieve during just one day. We are all so glad to be here. Day 6 : Agathe & Mathilde K. Even though we slept one hour more than usually, we difficultly woke up at 8 am after a short night’s sleep due to our late werewolf games and aches! For our 6th day, we were divided into three different groups of 6 volunteers to work on the construction site. Some of us had to find stones in the village to build the ground of the septic tank, while others were in charge of constructing the walls for the toilets and to finish the ones for the septic tank. Personally, we were both in charge of the cement for the ground of the septic tank and the walls. Depending on the use of the cement its composition differed which made it a quite meticulous task. Since there is no cement mixer, we had to use shovels to put cement and sand in separated buckets. We learnt that cement is extremely expensive in Vietnam, therefore, to save as much as possible they would mix it with sand. Then, we needed to add water and mix cement, sand and water all together. We found that it was the most exhausting task we had to do so far because of the heat and muscular effort it suggested. We came back home at 12 and Bó cooked us a delicious and comforting meal. As soon as we finished our meal, children from the village came to play with us, which showed their affection to us and touched us. We began the third French course of the week at 3pm, 15 of them attended this class. We started by doing revisions of numbers until 20, of farm animals and basic dialogue such as “Bonjour, je m’appelle, je vais bien…”. Then we taught them new animals, family members as well as politeness expressions. They paid a lot of attention to the class and showed us how motivated they were by participating orally. We felt encouraged even though we had to overcome several difficulties related to children's level difference (some of them already knew numbers from 1 to 10), and their age (the oldest is 18 whereas the youngest is 5). At the end of the lesson, we played a quiz game to revise numbers and animals that had been seen in class. They really enjoyed it as we gave them a candy for each good answer! Then, to reward them, we went swimming in the river and we played water games. It permitted us to protect ourselves from the heat and to cool. We stayed approximately 1h30 and then we came home to shower and have dinner with our hosts. Some of the little boys stayed late in the evening to play Mikado with us and we were really impressed by their skills as they all have the concern to do it right and they remained fastidious for the rules. Despite the tiredness, the kids always succeed to keep us motivated and revitalized!! Day 7 : Lou & Pauline Already one week that we have been here ... The atmosphere is really restful we feel more and more like home. Bô and Me (our ‘godfather’ and ‘godmother’) are kind to us and the children are sweet. We have created strong links with them in only few days. Five French lessons have been taught and the children make progresses really fast. Moreover, the toilet construction in the first house is expected to be done by Sunday. This morning we did not work on the toilet construction but we helped Bô building a peer in bamboo in order to fish. First, we transported the bamboos that Bô has cut from the forest to the pond. We had to carry them during 5 to 10 minutes under the sun and they were very heavy. Each team did three rounds to transport them, it was exhausting. Then, we helped Bô to build the peer directly from the pond. It was interesting to see how he managed to build the peer only with bamboo and iron wire. At the end of the morning, Bô thanks us for our help and he told us that now he considers the group as his children. It makes us really glad and proud. Due to our work, we were all sweaty, therefore we went to the river and jumped in the water with all our clothes like the local people use to do. In the afternoon, before the French lesson we played several games with the kids. At the end of the afternoon, there was a storm and the children ran to their home. The power came out and we played card games waiting for the end of the storm. After the dinner, Nam invited us to hunt frogs in the rice fields like the local people use to do when it is raining. It was really dark and we went bare foot. It was really funny as Nam tried to scare us with spirit stories. We caught only three frogs by hands because some villagers went before us. However it was still a fun and memorable experience. Thank you for reading and see you very soon, The DVS!
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