Sidewalk heaters

(Baonghean) -Vinh City is brightly lit at night. But somewhere there are still lives on the sidewalks, in dark corners that need to be warmed.

The city lights up, the traffic is bustling, everyone's face is in a hurry, everyone wants to get home to their family as soon as possible after a busy day of making a living. I followed a group of 10 friends, all of them from the 9X generation, to do a job that they have been quietly doing for many years.

Volunteers came to visit the man staying on Tran Phu street.

Nguyen Trung Hieu - the volunteer group leader - on a dilapidated cart full of pre-arranged lunch boxes. We headed towards Vinh market, where the vendors were getting ready to leave, leaving behind large piles of garbage that were emitting a strong smell. In front of the porch of a high-rise building, a man was lying under a thin blanket. One of the group members walked over to help him up, while another politely offered him a lunch box and a bottle of water.

The man’s eyes, which were filled with sadness, suddenly lit up, he reached out to take the lunch box and did not forget to say thank you. Taking advantage of the short time, I asked him about it and learned that he used to have a house and a family, but for some reason he had divorced his wife many years ago. Now, his children all have houses, and he invited him back several times, but his inferiority complex was so great that he had to accept living in the rain.

Giving rice to the old man taking shelter in front of the porch near Vinh market area.

Across the street, an old man lay with a sack wrapped around him, his head resting on some cardboard. Holding a lunch box and a bottle of water, his skinny hands trembled, his mouth stammered incoherently. “Where is the blanket we gave him the other day?” Nguyen Trung Hieu asked. The old man raised his trembling hands to point, his mouth stammered again, the more he spoke the less anyone understood.

Everyone guessed that in the afternoon he had gone somewhere careless and his new blanket had been stolen. Tonight he would have to wrap his old, weak, and sick body in a thin sack. No one knew where he came from, nor his name. They only knew that he had been here for a long time, wandering around during the day, collecting scraps to make a living, and sleeping at night on the porches of big houses...

We continued upstream towards the Cua Tien River, where the fishermen lived a hard and miserable life. Using the flashlight of our phones to follow the path down to the riverbank, we stood in front of a tiny boat.

Giving rice to an old couple living in a small boat on Cua Tien River.

Some young people called out: “Grandpa and grandma!”, the boat suddenly rocked by the owner’s turning over and then came out tired answers like groans. One of them held 2 portions of rice and stepped onto the bow of the boat, through the light of my phone I saw a skinny old man with a long white beard lift the curtain to support him. I recognized the old man as the character in a report by a colleague, writing about the touching love story of an old couple who collected scrap metal and lived in a small boat.

Not far away, a small thatched hut emitted weak rays of light and coughing sounds. In that hut were two women - one old and one middle-aged. The old woman was mute, only able to mumble a few words, communicating by signs, earning a living by collecting scrap metal. The middle-aged woman, due to unfortunate circumstances, had to leave her family and wander to make a living by picking wild vegetables to sell to restaurants. The two did not know each other, not even knowing each other's names, but they still pooled money to rent a hut together to avoid the sun and rain. And occasionally, they received free meals, which were the kindness of young friends living in Thanh Vinh.

From Vinh market, I continued following the volunteer's footsteps to Vinh station, going down to the bus station area to give out the remaining meals. Within 1 hour, nearly 20 meals were given to homeless and destitute people. Each life is a different situation, the common point between them is that no one wants to talk about their identity and family background, no one wants to open up to strangers.

Two young people in the volunteer group feed rice to a mute old woman living in a small hut.

It is understandable, because they are all sad and bitter stories, of unfortunate fates being tossed around by life's storms and suffering many hardships. Their hearts have been hurt so many times because of the wounds that have become calloused, they do not want and have no need to open up and share with the world. What they need is to earn enough to eat during the day, to have someone give them a meal or a cake when they are hungry, and to have a warm place to lie down at night and not be chased away.

The crowd gradually dissipated, and now the young people returned to their own work. I only had a few quick words with Nguyen Trung Hieu to learn more about the volunteer group of this 26-year-old man. The group has 20 regular members, all of whom are young people, including students and those who already have jobs.

For the past 5 years, Hieu and his friends have been distributing nearly 20 free meals to homeless people every two nights a week. Part of the funding is sponsored by a restaurant, part is raised from philanthropists and the rest is from the friends' business selling consumer goods to make a profit./.

Cong Kien