Learning to read and write, even in the mother tongue, is never an easy task for the blind. When it comes to studying a foreign language, the difficulties increase exponentially.

Nguyen Thi Men, a blind Vietnamese girl, will surprise many people when they learn that she is a senior at the Faculty of English Linguistics and Literature (EF), University of Social Sciences and Humanities HCMC (USSH). Although life has never been easy for her, Men has always tried hard to make her university dream come true.

Sad memories

Men was left at the Thi Nghe Center for Orphans and Disabled Children by her mother at the age of eight years old. When she was 14, she was sent to the Blind Association of Ho Chi Minh City (HBA) to learn braille. Men studied well and was moved to a public secondary high school to learn with non-blind friends. Then she spent three years studying at Chu Van An high school.

During the hours off of school, Men sold lottery tickets to earn money for books and her living expenses. Every day, with a cane, a small rain coat and a bottle of water, Men took the bus from the Blind Association in District 1 to other districts to sell the tickets.

When Men began this work, she often got lost on unfamiliar roads. Once she broke her leg in a crash and was sent to the hospital by kind passengers. Like other street lottery sellers, the little girl got used to huddling under the eaves on rainy days and walking under the burning sun to earn a little money. Many times she was robbed of all the lottery tickets and could do nothing but cry.

First taste of failure

Despite many difficulties, Men always tried hard in her studying. However, the high school graduation exam was a real obstacle for her. The first time she took it Men failed the exam, surprising her teacher because she was always a good and hard-working student. Men took the exam again and again, but she still could not pass it.

The sixth time Men failed, she was so discouraged that she thought she had no choice but to be a street lottery ticket seller for her whole life.

Moved by Men’s fondness of learning, her teachers gathered the transcriptions of her grades and sent a request to higher administration so that Men could be exempt from taking the exam. Due to her good study results and her efforts in taking the exam many times, Men got the exemption to graduate from high school.

Realizing the university dream

As soon as Men applied for the In-service Bachelor Program at EF of USSH, she knew that this aim was beyond her ability. She began to train hard for the university entrance exam.
When Men registered for a revision course at Bui Thi Xuan high school, the kind-hearted principle allowed Men to take the course for free.

The course wasn’t designed for blind people, so there was no book in braille. With some books given by the English teacher of the course, Men returned to HBA and used all of her savings to buy a tape recorder. Then she entreated Nguyet, her orientation and mobility training teacher, to read all the lessons in the books for her to record. Since Nguyet cannot speak English, she had to spell every English word in Vietnamese.

Every night, Men received the tape recorder, listened to each small part and patiently converted it into braille. Despite the sleepiness, Men had to finish her lesson and delete the tape so that Nguyet could continue recording the next lesson the following morning.

After studying very hard from February to June, 2009, Men was ready for the entrance exam. Days before the examination, she was informed that braille was not allowed and she had to do the test on a laptop like other students.

The news worried Men terribly. She was afraid that she could not get used to a laptop keyboard in such a short time. She phoned Father Bao Loc, a benevolent priest, to ask for help. Father Bao Loc managed to borrow a laptop form his friend. No sooner had Men had the software for the blind installed on the laptop than the exam came.

Moving forward, with love

There were only four people in Men’s examination room, two supervisors and two special examinees. When the supervisor read the exam for the two examines to type, Men type nervously and made a lot of mistakes in the first twenty minutes. The laptop caused serious trouble for her. In that moment, Men thought that she would fail the exam. She was obsessed with failing other examinations before.

Then she thought about the hard times she had gone through, as well as her loved ones. She thought of Hung, a motorbike taxi driver who has taken her to school for years at a friendly price, only VND 20,000 (about 1USD) per week. She remembered her teachers at Chu Van An high school, who tried their best to help her get the exemption to graduate from high school.

She was also grateful to Nguyet for helping her convert the English lessons into braille. She remembered when Father Bao Loc called her that very morning. He was afraid that Men would only have a bowl of noodles or a load of bread for lunch, as usual, and told her to have lunch at his house. Men was deeply indebted to those people and wanted to do well in the exam to redeem their love.

Men tried to calm down and asked for the time. More than two- thirds of the time was left. Men sighed with relief and continued typing deliberately.

She got 17.5 (out of 30) and was admitted into the K18 Class (2009-2012) of the in-service Bachelor Program at EF of USSH. Although Men still has to sell lottery tickets during the day time and attend class in the evening, she always has good results in her study.

In this last year at university, Men wants to spend more time studying. She has learned to thread beads to make bracelets and key chains. Every day, apart from books, Men comes to class with those hand-made things and earns some money by selling them to her classmates.

Nguyen Van Hau, from Chau Thanh district in the Mekong Delta province of Hau Giang, was poisoned shortly after he had won a big lottery as his partner, Nguyen Thi Ngan (50) was not happy with the small share allotted to her.

Hau, a widower, had been living with Ngan, a divorced woman, as husband and wife for more than a year.

Hau and Ngan both have children who have grown up and have their own families. In order not to disturb them, the two built and cohabited in a cottage in the backyard.

When living together, Ngan often complained that Hau only cared about his kids and was into gambling and drinking.

A month ago, Hau won a lottery of VND100 million (US$4800), but only gave Ngan a little bit of the money and let his children have the rest.

Ngan got mad, fought with him and left the house for several days.

On June 29, Ngan came back with an intention to poison him. She put an anti-insect chemical into a dish of prawns and placed it in the kitchen.

Later, Hau came back home drunk and ate alone. After having a few bites, Hau found a strange taste and went to rest. After 20 minutes, he became dizzy and breathless and started to shout for help from his kids.

After taking him to the hospital, Hau’s children also reported the case to police as they found a strange smell in his dish.

From the investigation, police found the chemical in the food and ordered the arrest of Ngan on July 3. At the station, Ngan admitted she committed the crime as she was at odds with him on money and love.

VietNamNet Bridge – While state employees are jealous of teachers’ long holiday in summer, a lot of teachers are afraid of the holiday because they cannot earn money in summer.
While the colleagues all over the country are spending their time to travel and relax, a lot of teachers are hurrying to look for part time jobs to earn some money which can help them live from hand to mouth in summer.

The teachers in Vietnam can be divided into two groups – the ones working as regular members of the personnel, who receive monthly salaries from the State budget, and the ones working under labor contracts signed with the schools.

Of the latter group’s teachers, the ones who have long term labor contracts with schools are considered lucky workers, because they can get monthly pay from the provincial budget. Meanwhile, the teachers working under short term labor contracts only receive modest salaries paid by schools whose main income comes from tuitions.

As for the teachers, summer holiday means no-money time, because when students stay at home, teachers become temporary unemployed.

The three teachers of the Le Mao Primary School in Nghe An province, who are working under short term labor contracts, get no pay in summer, because the school’s income is not enough to pay them.

Dang Quang Canh, Headmaster of the Le Mao School, said the pay to the three teachers has been sourced from the tuitions collected from students. However, with the modest tuition of 100,000 dong a month, the school does not have any money left after it pays for the basic needs. Since students do not go to school in summer and they do not pay tuitions, teachers have to sit idle during that time.

"We understand the difficult conditions of the teachers, but we have not found any solution to settle the problem,” he said.

The teachers of the Nghi Phu Primary School in Vinh City seem to be luckier than their colleagues at Le Mao, because they still can receive one month pay in summer.

Nguyen Thi Hien, can receive 830,000 dong a month for her work at the Phuc Thanh Secondary School, the sum of money which is just enough to feed her for 10 days. However, Hien even cannot get the modest salary these days, because students do not go to school and they do not pay tuitions.

According to Nguyen Xuan Sinh, Chair of Vinh City’s People’s Committee, said 119 teachers in the city still have not become official members of the personnel to be able to receive salaries from the state budget, even though they have been working for a long time.

Sinh said the city’s authorities can employ no more than 20-30 teachers as official employees a year, which means that it would take some more years to accept all the 119 teachers, during which the city would not sign any long term contracts more. Local schools would recruit teachers to work under short term contracts after considering their financial capability

Students stay off school, teachers go in for trade

Le Na, a teacher of Vinh Tan Primary School said that she receives two million dong a month, which is just enough to pay for milk and clothes for the two children. Meanwhile, the spending on other basic needs depends on the husband’s income. However, since her husband’s income is limited, Na has to fasten her belt in summer, when cannot earn money.

Tran Duy Linh, a teacher of the Dai Son primary school, said he has to undertake extra jobs to earn his living. One of the "extra jobs” of Linh is working as buffalo trader.

Linh calls this his extra job, because he prefers to introduce himself as a teacher. However, in fact, trading buffalo is the main source of income for his family.

Source: Giao duc VN

VietNamNet Bridge – Sending kids to overseas summer camps is believed to be the effective training courses which help improve their knowledge. However, in fact, learning is just a part of the trips.

Going abroad to attend summer camps in summer has become in fashion among well off families in big cities like Hanoi and HCM City. Urban parents all want their children to learn English well, because the foreign language skill is believed to be a big advantage when applying for jobs. Meanwhile, going abroad and communicate with native speakers proves to be the most effective way of learning English.

A lot of overseas courses have been organized by big English centers in Vietnam, such as ILA, Appolo, and the British Council.

Traveling is the main goal of trips

Hong Ha, a parent in Hanoi, said she has got confused with the information about summer courses.

"I cannot imagine that attending overseas training courses is so favored. However, the English centers do not provide detailed information about the advantages of the programs. Therefore, I have made a decision just after considering the service fee and the trip schedule,” she said.

M. Truong, an 8th grader in HCM City, also said that the courses are really not the magic wands which can help improve English skills immediately.

"Most of the time of the trip was spent on sightseeing, communication and traveling,” he said.

"Only those, who are very good at English already, should register the trips. Others would just waste money and gain nothing,” he added.

He also admitted that the course just provided him one more opportunity to travel and learn more about a new country. Meanwhile, those students, who are not good at English and timid, should not attend the courses.

"We have only 2-3 English hours a day,” he said.

The overseas courses have been diversified with different destinations of Singapore, the UK, the US, Australia and Canada. However, there are some common things of the programs. Students can participate in the collective activities in the open air, go sightseeing and learn communication English at some schools.

In general, students have 2-3 English learning hours a day, and the learning lasts 1-4 weeks.

According to Dat Viet, the programs cost 31-87 million dong for each on average, which includes the fees for accommodation, meals, learning and sightseeing. Meanwhile, the costs would be higher for the trips to the UK, US or Canada, about 87-150 million dong.

More playing than learning

In general, English lessons are provided in the morning, while afternoons are reserved for entertainment activities.

Overseas study consultancy firms said that students can stay at guest houses or at the local residents’ houses to learn English. They can also participate in many extracurricular activities, or join English-speaking dramas.

However, parents have said that students attend the overseas courses just to play and entertain themselves instead of learning English.

Phuong Chi, a parent in Tan Binh district in HCM City said she made a wrong decision when sending the daughter to a summer camp in Singapore. The girl then returned to Vietnam just after one week instead of three weeks as initially planned, because she was timid and met difficulties in integrating into the community.

"The students at the age of 7-8 still cannot be independent, and they would not receive necessary knowledge without the instruction of the parents,” Chi said.

Source: Dat Viet