Dear guys,
As you have already been informed about the rough plan for the upcoming Mid-autumn Festival event held by FHV in HCMC scheduled to take place on October 3rd 2009; FHV members will be divided into small groups to go around the city, giving gifts to less fortunate people and children. These are the areas we are going to cover:
1. Thủ Thiêm Ferry
2. Tao Đàn Park
3. Lê Văn Tám Park
4. Along Nguyễn Thượng Hiền street
The final destination for everyone is Ben Thanh market & 23/9 Park; we will continue walking to Notre Dame, 30/4 Park, and finally, Con Rua Lake. We are planning to enlist the support of 30-40 volunteers. There will be 200 gifts for this charity trip, each consisting of milk and a mooncake, and the total costs amount to 6 million VND (approximately 30,000 VND/ gift). Up to now we have managed to raise 900,000 VND funding and FHV’s management board contributed 700,000 VND, so we need more financial support from all of you. If you guys (or perhaps you can tell your friends and acquaintances about this) want to contribute, you can
* Donate directly at the upcoming FHV’s meetup on September 27th, or
* Donate to the account of Nguyen Thi Khanh Huyen, Vietcombank – 007.1.00.466259.7 (please send her an email at admin@freehugsvietnam.com or contact her at 0942 190 990 after doing so)
We are really looking forward to your support! Let’s coordinate all our efforts to make this event successful, bringing joy and happiness to other people through our meaningful acts!
Tags: FHV, HCMC, Moon Festival
Hi everyone,
We are so glad to inform you that FHV Hanoi has been working excitedly towards our first get-together, and our management board is now complete. FHV Hanoi members are going to have a meeting with management board on September 27, 2009.
Time:
8:30 – 10:30AM, Sunday, September 27, 2009.
Location:
Bach Thao Park, Ba Dinh, Hanoi.
Agenda:
- Introduce management board and FHV Hanoi
- Members’ introduction
- Introduce SEAChange 2009 (as most of our coming activities are towards SEAChange 2009)
- Build charitable and voluntary plans in Hanoi
Please confirm your attendance here by comments or on the meetup page on Facebook [Click].
For more information, please contact:
Nguyen Xuan Thanh
FHV Head Representative in Hanoi
01668894995
thanh.nguyen@freehugsvietnam.com
Thank you very much and hope to see you all there.
Are you young? Are you creative? Do you want to speak out your mind and make changes to your life and your country?
Southeast Asia for Change (SEAforCHANGE) movement is to bring together 1,000,000 Southeast Asian youths between the ages of 15 to 35 to produce a youth report which will be sent to 2000 regional leaders in business, politics and media to help them understand the youth segment and how to lead them.
The climax of this movement is the Youth Engagement Summit (YES) 2009 in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), where 10 global change icons like:
* Bollywood legend Amitabh Bachchan
* Founder of Live Aid Sir Bob Geldof
* Cofounder of Twitter.com Biz Stone
* Marketing director of Facebook Randi Zuckenburg
* AirAsia chief executive officer Datuk Seri Tony Fernandes
* Former World Bank managing director Dr Mamphele Ramphele
* The World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov
* The ultimate survivor of the tragic 1972 Andes airplane crash Nando Parado
will speak to to the youths!
6000 youth representatives from Malaysia, Singapore, Laos, Thailand, Philippines, Vietnam and Brunei are expected to attend the event at the world-class Putrajaya International Convention Centre (PICC). This movement was inspired by the motto “Yes we can” of the US President Barack Obama, initiated by Youth Asia and supported by various organizations, universities and enterprises including WYF (World Youth Foundation), AEISEC, TakingITGlobal, AirAsia, HELP University College, etc. and of course FHV (Free Hugs Vietnam).
That sounds good so far, but to make it really work, SEAChange needs your help!!
Raise your voice
By the time I’m blogging, there are already more than 179 000 youths from all around Southeast Asia participating in this survey. What about you? What about us? What about Vietnamese youths? Don’t be left out!! Raise your voice, tell people what you think should be changed and how you are going to change it.
Simply do it by two steps:
1. Log on to www.YES2009.asia/seachange or www.vietnam.youthsays.com/seachange
2. Answer the survey, and tell anyone aged between 15 to 35 to join too. And your voices will be heard!
By doing so, you and your friends stand a chance to win a FREE trip to meet top global change icons at the Youth Engagement Summit (YES) 2009 on November 16 & 17 in Kuala Lumpur. Rewards include return air flights, full accommodation and delegate passes worth in excess of US$2,500 each. We are also giving away more than 100 scholarships to deserving youth who participate in this historic survey!
Become a youth partner
Youth leaders who run Youth communities or programmes are welcomed to be part of the movement. For more information, please visit: http://www.yes2009.asia/becomepartner.html
*** For youth communities in Vietnam: We need more partners here, so please don’t hesitate to be a part of this historic movement!!
Tags: Change, FHV, freehugsvietnam, SEAChange, Yes2009
Hello FHVers,
It has been a while we haven’t updated our blog. Anway, now we are back, with great news as expected.
Volunteers for HOW selected
This Saturday we had a very exciting interview with our shortlisted candidates for helping HOW. It was a great experience for me (and for you too, I hope), meeting and talking to excellent and enthusiastic volunteers. We would like to take all of the candidates as HOW volunteers, but they don’t have enough budget (just kidding). Our thanks and hugs to all those showed up for the interview. After our best effort to take many things into consideration, here is the final list of FHVers that will go and help HOW this time.
- Lưu Hà Mi: Interpreter
- Trần Cẩm Anh: Interpreter
- Lê Văn Hồng Chân: Interpreter
- Trần Nguyên Bạch Lan:Assistant
Congratulations!
SEAChange – Be an Agent of Change!
Guess what, FHV is now the official youth partner of SEAchange in Viet Nam!!!! The movement is to encourage youth to raise our voices and take part in changing the world around us. Response to SEAChange survey will also give you a chance to win a trip to Kuala Lumpur to attend Youth Engagement Summit this November. There are a lot of updates involving this event coming, so make sure to join us if you haven’t already.
Moon Festival
Regarding the upcoming Moon Festival, FHV members would be splitting into small groups to go around the city, giving gifts to less fortunate people. This seems to be very interesting and absolutely we need more of your help, so please listen on.
FHV in Hanoi – Talents needed
After a long time expecting and preparing ( with a lot of complains also), finally, we have FHVN in Ha Noi! The first members meetup in Hanoi will be held on Sunday, September 27.
And because we are so new, there are still rooms for talents in the management board. Basic requierements are:
- Based in Hanoi
- Young (between 18 and 23 years old)
- Enthusiastic
- Speak English fluently
- Show strong leadership
- Want to do something new
More information will be updated by the Head Representative of FHV in Hanoi in the next few days. In the mean time, peopl who are interested can always send us an email to admin@freehugsvietnam.com!
FHV’s new logo
What do you think about this logo? FHV design team has finished our new logo. As you may know, we have been running volunteer activities for a while without an official logo(!). It is basically finished now, but we want to hear from you, what you like and what you don’t. You can either send your feedback to admin@freehugsvietnam.com or simply leave a comment in the form below. Your opinions and suggestions are invaluable to us.
[poll id="3"]
Tags: FHV, Hanoi, HOW, Logo, Moon Festival, SEAChange, vietnam, Volunteers
Hi guys,
If you are interested in working with very very lovely international volunteers and practice your English, we have good news of a chance for you!
HOW – Helping Orphans Worldwide is a non-profit charity committed to providing hope, health, and security to abused, abandoned, and neglected children living in the most deprived areas of the world. They are coming to Vietnam next month and FHV is very proud to be their partner here.
Here is an overview of HOW’s work at the orphanages in Vietnam:
- Feeding Orphans Worldwide: HOW addresses the nutritional needs of children living in various orphanages throughout Vietnam. HOW identifies needs, purchases food and nutritional supplements, and hand delivers supplies to ensure proper distribution of goods.
- Cu Chi Orphanage Renewal Project: HOW discovered an orphanage in a remote area of Cu Chi, Vietnam, where the children are living in desperate conditions. The ability of local staff to provide even basic needs, such as food and clean water is severely hindered due to a lack of funding and the absence of a proper training program for caregivers. HOW has begun the complex process of renewing this facility. We are developing a program that will address everything from nutrition and hygiene, to providing doctors, therapists and other trained professionals to educate caregivers in order to provide long-term sustainability.
- CHAP (Children’s Healing Arts Program): HOW is committed to enhancing the mental and emotional well-being of these children beyond the basic needs of food and hygiene. Through HOW’s CHAP program, children are able to spend one-on-one time with volunteers, allowing them to express themselves through art, music and dance.
And here are the volunteer opportunities for FHV’s members:
- We need 1 member to work as HOW Director’s assistant from September 21 – October 19. This person must have excellent english language skills and must be able to basically work as her assistant.
- We need 3 more members to work with HOW volunteers as interpreters from September 27 until October 4. It will not be for every single day, but make sure that you will be available during this period.
Any transportation costs incurred by any volunteer will be covered by HOW. HOW will also cover lunch, snacks and beverages for all the volunteers. Moreover, each volunteer will receive a HOW T-shirt and bag to signify their involvement with Team HOW.
Registration will be closed on September 8 and we will have a small interview on September 13 to make sure that you can comfortably work with HOW.
Hope to see you soon!
Sorry guys we have enough participants, see you in another campaign.
Tags: Cu Chi, Exchange, FHV, Orphanages, Volunteer
Yesterday (Sunday, 9th August), FHV had a volunteer trip at Huyen Trang pagoda which shelters around 50 orphans, and wow, we had such a great time! This program called “Nutritious meals for Orphans” is to call for society’s attention to daily life of less fortunate children. The first trip was sponsored by Baomoi.
We had many activities there including cooking, raising a collection of books and stationery, playing with the orphans, and giving each child a small gift. The children were all so lovely and our volunteers were very enthusiastic and friendly. We hope to carry out this program every other week.
Here are some pictures from yesterday. Millions of thanks to our photographer Hung Tran. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: FHV, HCMC, Huyen Trang, Local, Volunteer
We have little to say but it turned out to be a complete surprise, which was very sweet :”>
As one can never say sorry too many times we would like to pay you all one more big apology for the mess we may have caused. It was definitely too bad we had to change the meeting location more than once and at short notice, yet it was even worse that we could not provide all the participants with comfortable seats. That being said, we love you sooo much, a great big free hug to all >:D<
In this meetup we have:
- Introduced ourselves as FHV members and management board.
- Kicked start with the preparation for our next event: the “Nutritious meal for children” charity trip to Huyen Trang Pagoda, 456/35 Huynh Tan Phat, District Nha Be, HCMC (scheduled to take place on August 9th, 2009)
- And, of course, FREE HUGS games and icebreakers to stir up the meeting!
From now on we will be busy, working hard to make sure we will bring the best to those we are to help. Currently we have 3 teams: the game team, the cooking team, and the books & stationery collection team; you will be contacted based on which team you belong to (so those who did not select a team please let us know). Remember that we are not just going for fun, we want to be of help to these disadvantaged children. Thus, careful planning is needed. Come with FHV, they need us, and we need you, in order to be successful!
Bonus: we have bunches of photos on our facebook profile, check it out NOW!!!!
Tags: Meetups
Hi everyone,
Can you believe it? We have had almost 50 new members registered in the last few weeks!!!!!!!
We have to thank you myriad times for your enthusiasm and support, and we are terribly sorry for our late response. There is bunch of work to do, and H1h1 is sweeping all over Vietnam. But well, finally, FHV is going to kick off with our first members meetup this Sunday in Ho Chi Minh City.
Here is detailed information about the meetup:
Time: 3pm – 6pm, Sunday, 26th of July, 2009
Location: Hoa Huong Duong (a bubble tea shop), 339 Nguyen Tri Phuong, Ward 5, District 10, HCMC.
Agenda:
- Introduce Free Hugs Vietnam Organization, Management board, FHV’s vision and mission.
- Members’ introductions.
- Introduce “Nutritious meal for orphans” program which will start at Huyen Trang Pagoda, 456/35 Huynh Tan Phat, Khu pho 7, Nha Be, HCMC on Sunday, 9th of August, 2009.
- Start Books & Stationery Donation program.
- Introduce our partnership program with HOW (Helping Orphanage Worldwide) on September
You can confirm your attendance either by setting your RSVP as “Attending” to our event on Facebook (click here), leaving a comment here or contact:
Quang Luu Ngoc
Vice President – Head Representative of FHV in HCMC
0938107017
quang.luu@freehugsvietnam.com
Notes:
(1) This meetup will be held in English; we are sure that our volunteers are all comfortable with using it. If not, it’s a great chance to practice!
(2) Feel free to bring along your friends who you think might be interested in volunteering and meeting new friends.
(3) And please bring along something that will help us understand you better. I myself am coming with my favorite Michael Jackson’s hat!
Thank you very much, and hope to see you on Sunday!
Tags: Free Hugs, Ho Chi Minh, vietnam, Volunteer
Dear friends,
You possess how many percents of prejudice, how many percents of reservations, and how many percents of laziness each time having to hold out your hands to give and take a hug?
One hug will not make you any 5 kilos slighter, I am more than certain!
One hug, pertaining to all of its implications, will not detract from your perfection in other people’s viewpoint.
One hug is likely to make you blush, yet out of the joy of sharing and loving rather than embarrassment.
Just with the banner “Free Hugs” and all the hugs and hearts willing to reach out to one another, Juan Mann from the “kangaroo kingdom” breathed deep meanings into his own life and everyone else’s
Dear friends, have you ever drifted through a state of loneliness and isolation? Have your hearts ever sunk when facing work obstacles? Have you felt torn apart following the loss of some friend or relative? In such moments, you must have yearned for a tight hug, a sense of pervasive warmth and understanding. Nonetheless, the hectic wheels of life have rendered most of us increasingly reluctant to give our nearest and dearest even one hug.
I am well aware that with the Oriental culture where spiritual values and subtle expressions of human love reign, hugs become somewhat rare and hard found. But dear friends, open up yourselves a little bit! You will miss out on that simple happiness by continually being rigid, shy, lazy, or worried about other people’s subjective evaluations.
I was impressed when reading the lines of Charles Faraone once wandering on the Internet: “Think about friends and relatives in your life. Wanna give them a hug? Don’t procrastinate. Take the initiative!…
We need 4 hugs every day to survive, 4 hugs every day to resume our existence, and 12 hugs every day to be growing up…”.
Starting from the hugs of a lonesome man and traveler on his own homeland Juan Mann, the “Free Hugs” campaign has extended throughout Australia to the America, Korea, Japan, China, … and Vietnam as well. It drew the attention and support not just of the willing-to-share hearts, the forlorn minds in need of consolation, but also of every single individual who dreams about a brighter life – a better future.
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