Elvis 20 days and 20 nights

The 2021 VnExpress Marathon (VM) Hanoi Midnight, the second edition, will commence on Nov. 21. The Super Early Bird stage starts from Feb 14 to Mar 3 with ticket prices ranging from VND270,000 ($11.76) to VND810,000 ($35.28).

Ticket	Super Early Bird	Early Bird	Regular	Late
5 km	270,000	325,000	430,000	540,000
10 km	540,000	700,000	865,000	1,080,000
21 km	650,000	810,000	1,025,000	1,295,000
42 km	810,000	975,000	1,190,000	1,405,000

Interested runners can register here .

Runners test the course of VnExpress Marathon Hanoi Midnight on the evening of October 7, 2020. Photo by VnExpress/Giang Huy.

The race this year offers discount of up to 28 percent for groups of over 100 people, 20 percent for groups of 50-100 people 20 percent, 15 percent for groups of 30-49, and 10 percent for groups of 10-29.

Organized by VnExpress and Hanoi People’s Committee, VM Hanoi Midnight is one of the first night runs in Vietnam. The first edition last year attracted around 5,500 participants.

The race spread sporting spirit, offering runners the opportunity to explore the beauty of Hanoi at night. The course runs from Dong Kinh Nghia Thuc Square by the Hoan Kiem Lake, across iconic spots like Hanoi Opera, St. Joseph’s Cathedral, Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, and the West Lake.

When Hoang Anh was cruising around flower gardens in Hanoi’s Tay Ho District at around midnight one day, he saw two boys in warm clothes and a middle-aged man sitting around a fire and decided to approach them.

At first glance the man looked like their father. But noticing that the boys seem tired, Anh and a friend decided to walk over and say hello.

“Can we sit here and talk to you guys?” he asked, and they looked up at him with suspicion.

Sitting down next to the fire, Anh looked at the two boys and said: “It is such a chilly night. Do you guys need any help?”

Two homeless boys sitting by a fire in a park in Tay Ho District, Hanoi, on January 21, 2021. Photo courtesy of Hoang Anh.

The boys, one skinny and the other chubby, remained silent while the man abruptly stood up, said he was taking his dog for a walk, and left.

Anh tried to make friends with the children and introduced himself.

“We belong to the Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation, which helps homeless children. I can help you guys find accommodation and a place to play football and get health checks. It is unsafe for you to be out this late at night since there are many bad people on the streets.”

He told them about some of the situations he had seen and warned them of the dangers lurking on the streets, and showed some pictures of the street children he had helped.

After seeing there were some kids they knew in the pictures and his friendly way of speaking, the boys gradually lowered their guard and opened up.

The skinny one said his identification papers had been stolen when he was sleeping in the garden a few days ago. Now he could not find a job, but still did not want to go back to his hometown. The other, who was 14 years old, said he was from the northern Bac Kan Province and his father was in prison.

Anh said: “I can help you guys find a safe place to sleep tonight. If you don’t like it, I can bring you back here.”

But they had been living on the street for long, and their survival instincts possibly kicked in, and they refused his offer immediately.

He then gave them some money to find a place to sleep and his contact information and told them to meet him at the same place the next morning.

The chubby boy turned up the next morning, and Anh took him to the foundation. He can decide to stay there with other similar children if he likes it or go and live with a foster family.

Four members of the street outreach team scouting around the capital’s My Dinh Bus Station on January 16, 2021. Photo by VnExpress/Phan Duong.

Anh, 27, is the captain of the street outreach team at the Hanoi-based charity that has been assisting children in crises since 2003.

The team goes out into the streets every night to look for destitute children under bridges and in parks, bus stations and other places.

It has seven members and a large support staff. In addition to its main task of finding homeless children, the team also helps children living at the charity’s boarding houses and organizes physical activities and health checks for them.

The team members also take street children back to their homes.

The main aim is to ensure destitute children are not dragged into committing crimes and are safe from bad influences.

Earlier that night Anh and his colleague had gone to four Internet cafes in nearby My Dinh in Nam Tu Liem District to look for children and told the owners to let them know if they come across children who need assistance.

Here they gave a jacket to a boy who had run away from home in another province.

“Many homeless children from other provinces show up around the My Dinh area, especially during summer and around Lunar New Year,” Anh says.

“They are easy prey for pedophiles and job brokers. Since they have just arrived in the capital and have a little money and tend go to Internet cafes to play games.

“We always try to reach the children before they encounter bad people.”

After three years as a member of the street outreach team, Doan Cong thinks he is doing a “meaningful” job.

One day late at night in August he and his colleague Minh Hai spotted two children sitting at a bus stop near the My Dinh bus station and a middle-aged man hovering over them.

Since the children looked tired and wore stained, tattered clothes, Cong decided they were not familiar with the city. He parked his vehicle and approached them.

He found out that the boys, aged 15 and 17, had left their hometown in Ha Giang Province and worked for half a month in Hanoi before their employer closed down due to the Covid-19 outbreak.

Both had used up their wages of VND400,000 ($17.30) while searching for new jobs, but had not been lucky.

After roaming the streets for three days, they ended up at the bus station.

They looked at the man and whispered to Cong: “He told us he would give us each VND100,000 if we touch his genitals. We refused, but he was insistent and is waiting for us to change our minds.”

Cong and Hai took the boys to an Internet shop, got them food and told them to spend the night there. The next morning Cong returned, reassured that their families had promised to pick them up after he had informed them.

He gave the pair some money and his contact information in case they needed help.

The young social workers have had to confront dubious people to protect homeless children. Two months ago Anh had to fight off two pedophiles who were asking three boys to go home and sleep with them.

Minh Hai, who has been on the team for two years, shares a story from last winter. One night, on a curb behind the My Dinh bus station, he saw a boy with a backpack and a cap who looked he had little strength left. He got off his motorbike and slowly walked up to the boy.

He asked him: “You look tired. Have you had dinner?”

The boy looked scared, and his eyes kept darting around.

After he walked behind him for around two kilometers, the boy became less scared of him. Hai gave him a box of sticky rice and the boy gulped it down.

After eating he revealed that he had been lured into a debt collection gang about a month ago. He was instructed to work out to look strong and go collect debts.

He managed to escape from that gang, but was now afraid its members would catch with him and mete out punishment. He also did not know where to go or who to ask for help.

Doan Cong helps out a homeless kid under a bridge near the My Dinh Stadium, Hanoi. Photo courtesy of Blue Dragon.

On average, the street outreach team helps around 100 children each year. Many of the children have returned to their families or have been put in school. Many of them now work at restaurants or hotels, in tourism and others.

About 10 percent of Blue Dragon’s workers were themselves children rescued by the charity. Having been there before, now they help children who are in a similar situation.

Anh says: “I think my job is like that of a filter: kids we rescue have the ability to rebuild their lives, but if we do not, they are easily caught up in bad situations.”

Recently the two boys from Ha Giang called Cong to say they had returned home and work in the fields with their parents, and are waiting until they are old enough to get proper works.

The team members say there are always children being pushed out into the streets for various reasons, and there are many traps awaiting them. That is why the team has been out on the streets for the last 17 years.

Blue Dragon has helped 607 street children reunite with their families, rescued 1,000 trafficked kids and helped 5,259 children go to school or get jobs.

Doctors at Cho Ray Hospital are becoming sick of the sight of a 69-year-old German national who keeps returning despite there being nothing wrong with him.

Norbert Michael Pils was hospitalized last May with deep vein thrombosis and oedema in the legs.

He was operated on and cared for by doctors at the hospital – all for free because he couldn’t afford the fee – before being discharged.

Pils was taken to a hotel where he had previously stayed, only to be turned away by the hotel staff, presumably due to an outstanding bill.

And so began his persistent returns.

Pils has shown up at Cho Ray, a major hospital in Saigon, seven times in the past three months as he has nowhere else to go.

On one occasion he stayed at the hospital for 10 days, and he is currently “a resident” in the Emergency Unit.

He has also refused to follow the hospital’s advice and contact the German embassy or consulate for help.

The German’s actions are proving to be a real burden for doctors at Cho Ray, who are already overloaded.

And Pils’s case is not the exception. There have been dozens of incidents involving foreign patients refusing to cooperate with doctors at the hospital.

On August 27, American national Walter Samuel was hospitalized after suffering from a stomachache and heavy diarrhea after fainting on the side of a road. When nurses tried to take a blood sample, he started screaming and kicked up a huge fuss.

Since 2016, Cho Ray Hospital has spent more than VND700 million ($30,800) on treating foreign patients who cannot afford the service charges.

Hospital staff have been forced to seek help from local authorities and foreign consulates numerous times because Vietnam does not have a policy on financial aid for foreign patients.

A Vietnamese teacher has dedicated the last 20 years of her career towards working with hearing impaired children at a school in Ho Chi Minh City so that her students might have a better chance at successfully integrating into society.

Lam Thi Minh Chau’s career has been rooted in one goal: helping the hundreds of hearing-impaired students she’s worked with at Hi Vong (Hope) School develop the soft skills necessary for social interaction.

And what does she say is the secret to her success?  One little word: Patience.

Learning from students

It’s surprising that Chau was never formally trained to teach deaf children.

“I studied kindergarten education for regular children without disabilities but my first students after graduation were hearing impaired,” Chau said.

“When I was appointed to this job, I was both happy and worried.”

Chau’s first days on the job were not easy.

The then-24-year-old teacher clumsily tried to communicate with the children without knowing sign language and, even to this day, recalls the feelings of confusion and despair she felt during her first days on the job.

Her inability to communicate remained a huge obstacle, and many of her students were completely unable to communicate with her.  All she could do was stare hopelessly at her students for those first few days.

But things quickly began to change.  Understanding that communication was crucial for helping the children, Chau began to learn sign language.

Her inspiration was drawing parallels between her situation and that of her students: while they struggled to integrate into society, she struggled to integrate in their world.

Even though she was supported by her colleagues, it was her students who often stepped in to offer help.

They’d help her learn sign language, instruct her, and let her into their community.

Beyond knowledge

Teaching students to communicate, write, and do math, are just a few of Chau’s responsibilities.

“The most difficult thing about teaching the deaf children is understanding what they want to say,” she shared.

Before she teaches them to communicate like her, she must learn to communicate like them.

Not being professionally trained to teach disadvantaged children, Chau has come across many struggles, especially in helping develop her students’ limited hearing abilities.

“The greatest motivation for me is seeing a child’s development,” said the young teacher explaining that in many cases the students travel long distances just to be able to study at quality schools for the deaf.

One of such students is Le Tran Duy Luan, 6, whose condition has significantly improved since he started attending Chau’s classes.

“Our child became much more responsive.  He began to understand us and his friend.  He’s definitely developed beyond our expectations,” Luan’s mother said.

Even though Chau prides herself on seeing the children improve, she hopes that one day they will be able to learn at a regular school, where she believes as a brighter future awaits.

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Regardless of numerous challenges, the administration of President Bill Clinton reached a historic landmark in lifting the commercial embargo against Vietnam in 1994 and normalizing diplomatic relations with the Southeast Asian country in 1995.

>> 20 years of Vietnam-U.S. diplomatic ties – P1: Untold stories behind normalization >> 20 years of Vietnam-U.S. diplomatic ties – P2: Massacres by Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge >> 20 years of Vietnam-U.S. diplomatic ties – P3: Hostility from Washington

A month after the normalization, Vietnam opened an embassy in Washington, D.C.

The then-ambassador of Vietnam to the U.S., Le Van Bang, recalled that he was honored to have many meetings with senior leaders during his first days of returning to Hanoi.

“Back in Hanoi, I often spent whole days writing reports on my job and the situation in the U.S.

“But then-Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet even told me to drop by his office in the evening to further discuss the affairs.

“Once, he told me to come at 8:00 pm, or an hour earlier if it rained,” former Ambassador Bang said.

Former Trade Minister Le Van Triet recounted the period before the normalization with the U.S., “Our nation was under renovation then, but the embargo by the U.S. was still in effect.

“It was very difficult.

“How could we have reached success if the U.S. had kept isolating Vietnam?”

Senior Vietnamese leaders then consulted many intellectuals, including officials of the former Saigon regime, to find an escape from the U.S. embargo.

Then-PM Kiet once visited Doctor Nguyen Van Hao, the former deputy prime minister of the U.S.-backed Republic of Vietnam who was living in France, to seek his advice.

In Washington, President Clinton selected the POW/MIA issue as the top condition for normalization with Vietnam.

U.S. assets worth US$200 million were left in Saigon after 1975, and when Vietnam was reunified, they were well resolved.

U.S. Secretary of State Warren Christopher speaks at a ceremony to open the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi.

The Clinton administration opened numerous important doors for Vietnam to head toward normalization.

In 1993, a series of major American corporations such as Bank of America, Philip Morris, Vatico, IBM and Caterpillar opened representative offices in Vietnam.

In October the same year, Phan Van Khai, who was then deputy prime minister of Vietnam, flew to the U.S. and met Secretary of State Warren Christopher, and Washington announced it would not consider Hanoi its foe anymore.

Three months later, on February 3, 1994, Ambassador Bang, who was in New York, received a phone call from the U.S. Department of State asking him to return to Washington, D.C., for there would be “an important piece of news for you and your nation.”

Ambassador Bang said he felt the normalization was near.

At 5:00 pm, the ambassador was at the house of Virginia Foote – then president of the U.S.-Vietnam Trade Council – to watch the official announcement of the U.S. president on the lifting of the embargo.

The American friends shook hands in congratulations, but Ambassador Bang just shed tears.

The Vietnamese diplomat recalled the advice of former President Le Duc Anh before he left for work in the U.S., “I know you may encounter challenges from our Vietnamese people living in the U.S.

“If they scold or insult you, just hang on and listen to them honestly because they are also of our Vietnamese origin.”

Then-United Nations General Secretary Boutros Boutros-Ghali invited Vietnam to take part in a conference on trade promotion and helped create a chance for the Vietnamese delegation to meet their U.S. partners.

Vietnam’s then-Trade Minister Le Van Triet met his U.S. counterpart Ron Brown thanks to the chance.

On July 11, 1995, President Clinton officially announced the normalization of diplomatic relations with Vietnam, and Hanoi opened its embassy in Washington, D.C., on August 5 the same year.

The embassy building was the one owned by the South Vietnam regime before 1975.

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