FRIENDS

OF VSO

All operating expenses paid by the Board of Directors so 100% of your donation goes

to the children.

June 2020 Newsletter

It is June, it is hot, the world seems upside down but there are spots of sunshine and actions that can still make us smile.

Check our June 2020 Newsletter. Mike has done a wonderful job of capturing the core of what we do, well actually what you have done. It will make you smile.

Sometimes too many words spoils the message. So this will be short. When we started our mission 15 years ago we donated to the kids and sisters who were just scratching by. Today we are funding projects that will help them provide for themselves. To be sure, we have not finished our mission. There is still much much to do in health, education, social adjustment and self sufficiency.

For the first time we can now see the seeds starting to flourish.

With your continued help we will tend to that seed

and see it grow.

What a change for just a few weeks ago. The kids are back in school, with new social rules for maintaining health. The sisters are executing the capital projects your donations have funded for farms and an improved living environment. The each of the Sisters has expressed their personal thanks in the June Newsletter.

We continue to marvel at the resilience of the kids and the sisters through this difficult period. It would not be possible unless they knew we were there for them. The Sisters have told me that they and the children hold us in their prayers daily.

On behalf of the entire Board of Directors of FVSO we wish you a safe and secure transition through this difficult period. Please know that the nuns and the children have you in their prayers every day.

Please note the new tab below SHELTERING AT VSO. It has movies, pictures and letters from the kids during these troubled times.

Clyde Lewandowski

Personal Experiences and Reflections of Vinh Son Montagnards Orphanage

Since 1968, when I spent some time in Vietnam, I've had a soft spot in my heart for Vietnamese kids. Of course, in 1968 we soldiers were all kids. Over the years, I've become the unofficial historian for the artillery battalion that I served with. Back then we did what we could to help the kids and connected with the orphanages that were near our headquarters area. In 2002, after doing some research at the National Archives in Washington D.C., I was able to find the name and address of one of the orphanages in Hue that we had supported and began a quest to find it. Unfortunately that orphanage had closed many years ago.

In 2006, I still had not found a connection to an orphanage in Vietnam that felt right, and was fortunate to have been found by Dennis Coyne and Friends of VSO. The trip to the orphanage at Kontum in February 2007 sealed my fate. The kids, the caregivers and sisters are absolutely the most wonderful people I have ever met. Just seeing their happiness brought tears of joy and I was hooked for life.