How do the children end up at the Orphanage?

Most of the disabled children at Hoi An Orphanage are either abandoned at the hospital or left in the market place at a young age. Many of the children have some family, perhaps even a parent, but are surrendered to the Orphanage when difficult circumstances and lack of support, dictate that they can no longer be cared for at home. A lot of the children come to the Orphanage when one parent dies and the remaining parent is disabled or must go to work long hours so cannot look after the child.

The following is an introduction to some of the children currently living at Hoi An Orphanage.

Khanh (pronounced Can)

Khanh was born on 30th September 1993 and came to the Orphanage on 22nd May 2000. He is 14 years old and has cerebral palsy. Khanh came to the live at the Orphanage with his older brother and sister, who are not disabled, when their parents both died of illness within a short space of each other. The 3 children are all extremely handsome, but unlike his older siblings, who are very shy, Khanh is outgoing, sociable and a great entertainer.

Khanh cannot speak but has no trouble communicating and has adapted an expressive sign language for himself. He likes Hip-Hop, break dancing and any kind of social activity, primarily ones that get him out of the Orphanage. He has made good progress in physiotherapy and school over the years that we have been working with him, but in 2007 seems to have hit a plateau educationally.

He was the inspiration for the founding of the Kianh Foundation when, on our first trip to the Orphanage in March 2001, he was the one child with disability, amongst the many, who had not withdrawn into himself due to a lack of stimulation and care from the outside world. As a result of the language barrier, his name was originally understood to be “Kianh”; this is how the charity’s name was chosen.

Van May (pronounced Van My)

Van May was born on 15th May 1993. At the time of writing, he is 14 years old. Van May has been at the Orphanage since he was a baby and has no known family. He has Cerebral Palsy and moderate learning difficulties.

He is an extremely determined boy. He is constantly striving to achieve and learn, to do what he sees everybody else can do, and to overcome his physical disabilities. Unfortunately, his efforts are frequently hindered by his severe body spasms.

Although he cannot speak, he is very communicative and lets you know what he wants, what he likes and what he does not like. He likes doing puzzles and at the moment, he particularly likes playing with the Doctor’s set and playing tea-parties. He has a communication book which he enjoys using. He knows a few colours and can count to three. Van May can feed himself, although it takes a long time.

Tuoi (pronounced Two-ee)

Tuoi is 16 years old and has lived at the Orphanage since he was a baby. He was born in a minority hill tribe that believed that when a new mother dies, whilst still breast feeding her baby, her new-born baby must be buried alongside her. His mother died shortly after child-birth, and he was therefore buried alive.

Somehow he was rescued from this predicament and came to the Orphanage. He was churlish child, often in trouble; now he is becoming a friendly young man with a strong character. Tuoi is a gifted footballer and probably the most streetwise young man at the Orphanage.

Hien and Hau (pronounced He-in and How)

Hien (left) and Hau are very cheeky and charming 7 year old twin brothers. They came to live at the Orphanage when they were 3 years old, after their father died and their mother, who is extremely poor, found it hard to look after them and their older sister.

Hien had a cleft lip and a cleft palette which would also be operated on free of charge if he lived at the Orphanage. (There is no equivalent of the UK National Health Service in Vietnam, but some assistance is given to children classified as orphans). The boys' mother and sister cycle many miles to visit them every couple of months.

Hau attends local school outside of the Orphanage, where he is among the top pupils after spending time in our pre-school programme. Hien has some mild learning difficulties and speech problems so is still participating in our special education class, where he is making good progress.

Tri (pronounced Tree)

As mentioned above, most of the Orphanage’s disabled children are either abandoned at the hospital or left in the market place at a young age. However, some families do try hard to look after their disabled child at home, but find the lack of outside support difficult. If one parent dies, it is almost impossible to look after the child who must remain at home whilst the parent goes out to work.

Tri was one such boy who came to live at the Orphanage in December 2003, aged 10 years old. It is particularly hard for these children, who remain constantly homesick. However, Tri does now have opportunities he would never have had at home. 4 years ago, he could only walk on his hands and feet, and he could not read or write. Following physiotherapy, he can now walk long distances, and is doing well in our special education classroom.

Khanh Ly (pronounced Can Lee)

Khanh Ly is 14 years old. She was put out with rubbish by her family. The people who found her took her to the local Old People’s Shelter in Hoi An, and she lived there for many years, in a small room. It took the Kianh Foundation 2 years of hard bureaucratic work to arrange for her to be moved to Hoi An Orphanage.

Initially upon arriving at the Orphanage in October 2003, she was very scared; she had not been outside for years, and had never seen other children. Now she is doing very well and has doubled in size. She has a syndrome, part of which is similar to albinism, which makes her skin very white. All of the Orphanage children think she is very beautiful because of her white skin, which is prized in Vietnam. She is physically and intellectually disabled and cannot speak. However, she is a very loving and tactile child.

Tuan (pronounced Tung, with a rising accent)

Tuan was born on August 10th, 1996. At time of writing, he is 11 years old and has been at the Orphanage since June 2005. Tuan has a mother, father, and younger brother (not disabled) who love him but realise that his disability means that he needs more specialist care than they can give him. Tuan’s family visit him often and he goes home in the holidays. He has severe physical disability caused by Cerebral Palsy, but no mental disability whatsoever. He is extremely intelligent, and also extremely stubborn!

Tuan had had no education when he first came to the Orphanage. He has quickly learned to read and is good at maths. He has an excellent memory and is amazing at memory games and unbeaten at Connect 4! He has picked up a good bit of English since being at the Orphanage, and is now having formal English lessons. We hope that soon we will be in a position to help Tuan to use a computer.

Minh Hien (pronounced Min Hee-yen)

Minh Hien was born on December 26th, 2003. She is 3 1/2 years old and has been at the Orphanage since January 15th, 2004. She has no known family. Minh Hien has a slight cleft palette which we arranged surgery for, when she was 2 years old. Other than this, we have still been unable to diagnose her primary disability.

Minh Hien was a very unresponsive child when she first came to the Orphanage and had absolutely no interaction with, or interest in, her environment. She has blossomed over the last 2 years and is thriving with the stimulation of the playroom. She has a short attention span for direct learning, but is very interested in doing whatever her schoolmates might be doing. She is a great mimic, with a keen sense of humour. She is learning to walk and talk, and uses a small vocabulary.

Phuoc (A tricky one for English speakers! Pronounced Fuuc, with a rising accent)

Phuoc was born on April 15th, 1997, and at time of writing is 10 years old. Like Tuan, he has not been abandoned by his family, but they have special permission to use the facilities provided for by the Kianh Foundation at Hoi An Orphanage as a care centre for him. He returns home in the holidays. He has been at the Orphanage for a year and a half, since March 2006.

Phuoc is extremely inquisitive and eager to learn. He has physical disabilities caused by Cerebral Palsy, but is now learning to walk using a walking frame. He can speak, although not very clearly. He has little, or possibly no, intellectual disability. He is bright, mischievous and full of energy. He cannot hold a pen well but is learning to read and spell using special educational tools in the classroom, and is practicing using a pen and pencils with colouring and dot-to-dot books. He is a master at Connect 4, dominoes, and any similar kind of games. He learns new numbers, words, ways of doing things quickly, but he cannot learn his colours; we suspect he is colour-blind.

Some new arrivals in 2007

Khoa (pronounced Kwa)

Khoa is 6 years old and has only been at the Orphanage since April 2007. He was brought here by his family, who live in extreme poverty and don’t know how to best care for him.

He spent his first fortnight in great distress but has now settled right in and is lapping up the learning opportunities around him. He is speaking more and more, learning to walk with a walking frame (and recently took his first steps alone), has learnt to feed himself using a special orthopaedic spoon and is quickly learning colours, counting and doing puzzles.

Duy (pronounced Yee)

At time of writing, Duy is 1 1/2 year’s old and has been at the Orphanage since March 2007. He has Downs Syndrome, and some possibly-related complications, as he is not yet starting to verbalise.

He loves going into the school room to play, and to partake of the snacks! He also enjoys scooting around in a baby walker and has just started learning to do some basic puzzles and games, such as threading wooding beads onto a string.

Phong (pronounced Fom) – also known as Binh

Phong is 3 years old and has been at the Orphanage since April 2007.

He has extreme hydrocephalus, with water taking up over a third of his brain. We are investigating the possibility of shunt surgery for him. In such extreme cases of the disease, there would usually be severe brain damage, yet despite this, Phong is bright, interactive and extremely intelligent.

Phong’s body has little muscle tone and the main thing he can do physically is to raise his left hand. Nevertheless, he uses this to good effect and can point towards his groin to let you know he wants to go to the toilet, point to his mouth to let you know he is hungry or going to eat, point where he wants to go and at what he wants to play with. He is currently mastering putting coloured, wooden rings on their sticks. He has just started to quietly say a few words.

Yen (pronounced Ian)

Yen is 7 years old and has only been at the Orphanage since June 2007. For the first 2 weeks, she was greatly distressed at being parted from her family, who had obviously cared for her well. She has just started to calm down and open up to us, and to begin to enjoy the new opportunities available to her.

Yen has very low muscle tone due to Cerebral Palsy. She seems to have no intellectual disability, and can speak, although she is very softly spoken, so you must listen carefully. She gets upset if someone does not hear her calling out to go to the toilet.

At the moment, Yen is just getting used to her new environment and beginning to acquaint her self with the toys/resources around her. We feel confident that this little girl is going to make fast progress.