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| [Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note |
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(Please click the blue underlines within the text for additional info)
After my visit to Chong Kneas in March 2005, I posted on TrekEarth a theme named Floating Misery reflecting the miserable status of Vietnamese people living in this floating village over Tonle Sap Great Lake. The serial of pictures and texts came to the attention of some of my co-workers at Alcon Laboratories and other friends at TrekEarth. Then they heard that I am going to return to the same destination. Each of them separately contacted me and asked if I could receive and relay their donations in cash then select the best way to place the help directly into the hands of these human beings…
Following is the list of donations for Chong Kneas poorest families I received before my trip:
+ $100.00 from Quan Vu, TrekEarth friend
+ $100.00 from Johnny Ho, friend of NgocSon
+ $100.00 from Nicoleta Gramada, TrekEarth friend
+ $100.00 from Lien Tong, Alcon
+ $50.00 from Christine Le, TrekEarth friend
+ $50.00 from Loi Duong, Alcon
+ $40.00 from Cuong Le, Alcon
+ $30.00 from DiemLe Nguyen, Alcon
+ $30.00 from Tinh On, Alcon
+ $20.00 from Le Nguyen, Alcon
+ $20.00 from Lilian Nguyen, Alcon
+ $20.00 from Nga Vu, Alcon
On 2-21-2007, I left Houston for China with the amount of $660.00.
While I was in Hue, Phong Nguyen, friend of NgocSon, contacted me asking if he still have time to contribute. I said yes, waiting for 24 hours, and his donation reached me in Vietnam in the amount of $200.00. At this point, Thai Nguyen, my nephew added $40.00 to round up the fund and volunteered to accompany me to Chong Kneas by his own expense.
As I clarified before the trip, I will not include any money of my own into the combined fund and I will not share the credit for this humanitarian work. If I contribute a dollar, I cannot publicize the use of donations, "don't let the left hand know what the right hand does." Instead, I stayed off the charitable donation and declared that 100% of the fund will reach poor people. My "business" is to cover all the behind-the-scene expense (traveling, food, lodging and transportation of rice). However, Mai-Quyen from Canada paypaled me US$100.00 with the condition that she wanted to shoulder some of my burden from my extended trip from Vietnam to Cambodia—not a donation to Chong Kneas recipients.
So, the total amount I accepted to transfer to Chong Kneas is US$900.00 or 3,645,000.00 Cambodian riels.
On behalf of the recipients, thank you, thank you!
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To follow our trip, please refer to this theme. Thanks.
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