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Poor offer courtesy services in Ho Chi Minh City alley

Poor offer courtesy services in Ho Chi Minh City alley

Tuesday, January 20, 2015, 21:08 GMT+7

“Free alley” is the name given to alley #96 on Phan Dinh Phung Street in Ward 2 of Phu Nhuan District in Ho Chi Minh City, where passers-by are given free services such as complimentary medicine cabinets for first aid, a gratis iced tea water tank, bike repair for nothing, and meals on the house.

>> An audio version of the story is available here

This is also the address that gives free coffins for the burial of poor people.

The free services are offered by poor people who frequent the area and do simple jobs such as a taxi motorbike driver, a cigarette seller, a food seller, a housekeeper, an inn assistant, and even an unemployed man.

On one morning late last year, an open meeting was held at the top of the alley with six people sitting around an old plastic table.

Under the sunlight and noisy sounds of vehicles and horns hooting, the ‘delegates’ of the ‘open meeting’ discussed how to raise funds and prepare meals for the following year.

‘Medicine for charity, please don’t break me’

The ‘delegates’ are poor workers such as Ut, who drives a motorbike taxi and mends punctures; Kien, who is unemployed; Quyen, who sells cigarettes; Trang, a housekeeper; Hanh, who sells rolled rice pancakes; and Phuong, an assistant at an inn.

Ut wore a pair of slippers with the cuffs of his trousers crumpled. Trang put on a wrinkled elastic suit.

“We meet to discuss plans for distributing free rice and meals in 2015. Each of us is assigned a concrete job to raise funds, where to deliver food, what dishes to cook next year.

“We plan to offer more meals in 2015,” said Ut, who is the volunteer of the free services of the alley and presided over the meeting.

When the meeting was about to end, a female lottery vendor came up and begged for some headache medicine.

She said her name is Loan, 75, and she suffers from the scorching sunlight walking along streets. A man had bought her lottery tickets and showed her the address for complimentary medicine.

Loan comes from the central province of Quang Ngai and lives in a rented house with dozens of other vendors.

She said she and other vendors rent it only to sleep, at VND4,000 (20 U.S. cents) per night.

The two medicine cabinets are hung on the wall of a house at the top of the alley. The front side of the cabinets has witty words that mean ‘Medicine for charity, please don’t break me’.

The cabinets have been hung there since 2012.

Nguyen Van Phuc, a motorbike taxi driver waiting for guests at the alley, said, “This busy street has had many accidents. We prepared this to give victims first aid to stop the bleeding before going to a hospital.”

The three main sponsors of the medicine cabinets are Ut and Ba, both motorbike taxi drivers; and Hanh, who sells rolled rice pancakes, Phuc added.

“The medicine cabinets are available 24 hours a day. I am here to repair bikes. At 6:00 pm, I give the keys to the cabinets to Hanh. At 3:00 am the following morning, Hanh passes the keys to a couple who distributes ice. From 5:15 am I am here already,” Ut said about the spell of duty.

Besides the free medicine, those people in favor of doing charity also prepare gratis iced tea for all passers-by to quench their thirst.

“I put the iced tea tank here two years ago because I know many vendors need it.

“It costs me VND20,000 [US$1] a day to help 200 people relieve their thirst.

“I am poor. I can only help through that. But I am happy with it,” Ut said, adding he and his wife cook 30-40 liters of water a day to fuel the tank.

“The rich can help others with money. We are poor and help others with our preparations,” said Kien, 50.

Their private lives

Most of the charitable people are living in rented rooms in Ho Chi Minh City.

Kien had a family but his business failed and his wife took his only child to go to Nha Trang, in the central region, 11 years ago. He almost went crazy then.

He has joined a team to cook rice meals on the house for the poor over several recent years.

Ut has been unable to afford a house in the city even though he is in his 50s. He and his wife have rented a small room in Phu Nhuan for months after leaving his younger brother’s place in Hoc Mon District.

Trang, who is a hired worker to do menial tasks at home for VND20,000-30,000 ($1-1.5) an hour, lives in an eight square meter rented room.

Phuc, a motorbike taxi driver for 30 years, and 12 others live in a rented room of 2.5m by 12m.

In 2014, the charity loving group was able to offer free meals to 200-300 persons a day, two days a month.

Ut has also helped offer free burial services, including coffins, to poor people for the past 10 years.

All this is not fiction, but fact.

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