My name is Truc, and this is my mother Mai.

My Father fought in the Vietnam-Cambodia conflict in the seventies, in the highlands that had only recently been covered with dioxin and other toxic herbicides during the US-Vietnam war. Because of his exposure my fourteen year old sister Trinh and I were born significantly disabled. Trinh, though she smiles a lot, can barely walk due to skeletal disfigurement and has mental retardation severe enough to keep her out of elementary school.

I am even worse. My smiling face and bright eyes are not enough to distract those who meet me from my skinny, wretched body and mental retardation. Both of us suffer from chronic skin disorders that result in constant peeling and itching.

One day, students from the Danang / Quangnam Fund, Inc came to my home. One of them took my tiny hand as I was cradled by my mother. This student touched me, he saw into me, he looked into my eyes. I smiled in delight and ever-so-slightly tightened my weak grip on his finger. This student saw me for the human I am, and it made me feel alive, despite my condition.

---------
May and her husband support their two children on a handyman's income with little help from the outside. The Danang-Quangnam Fund supports them with about one million Vietnamese Dong per year (about seventy dollars) and Trinh received an operation courtesy of World Vision doctors which enabled her to walk, something she previously could not do. Truc spent three years away from home in a similarly sponsored medical facility to receive three operations himself. These were not so he could walk - these were so he could live.