On behalf of the Executive Committee, it is with considerable pride and honor that I present to you the first hundred day report of our humanitarian site.

Association Compassion is first of all a humanitarian forum where people of goodwill (former schoolmates from high schools in Vietnam) and personalities from various Vietnamese associations (Vietnamese Orphans Support Association, Vietnam Réhabilitation Connection in the U.S. and Médecins du Vietnam, Générations et Peuples Solidaires, Fondation SGL d’aides aux mutilés de guerre and Association de Soutien aux Orphelins du Vietnam in France) bring together their collective experience and expertise to help the disabled and poor in Vietnam.

During these last three months, we have successfully raised funds, the majority of which coming from associations in France that have helped many Vietnamese veterans over the years. I am confident, however, that with time, the circle of donators will expand beyond our immediate family and friends, to include benefactors from many new sources in various countries, in response to the innumerable pending requests for help on our website from the needy.

The most gratifying pride to us all was the recent rapid response from our friends and supporters to the urgent requests from  two severely ill children with cardiac malformations. Without this generosity to help materialize the surgeries this summer at Institut  du Coeur in Saigon, these kids would have had only a slim chance of survival in the next few months. We will keep you informed on their post operative condition in our  Newsletter. This opportunity to bring aid to our less fortunate compatriots also circumstantially generated an interesting and serious ethical debate among us, revolving around the future and social integration of our recipients as one of the children had Down’s syndrome.

No one can be expected to do the impossible. Our task remains challenging and not without pitfalls as we travel together on this long journey of Compassion and Humanity to serve our most indigent and desperate human fellows.

I hope that we will meet more and more compassionate friends along the way who will be willing to dedicate their time, energy and efforts to take up that worthy cause with us.

Sincerely,

Chantal Vothanh