Rehab For Women Leaving Prison In Hanoi

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The journey from non-believer to believer is seldom instantaneous. What starts as a planted seed needs constant attention, watering, care and sustenance, until the person accepts Christ. As Christians, we must be able to serve in all those capacities – wherever God directs. We might never know until we get to heaven the results of our efforts. 


In Hanoi, Vietnam, our hearts were moved in 2015, when we were blessed with the opportunity to visit the Aquila Rehab Center. Run by Pastor Nam Quoc Trung (an ex-addict who found salvation and freedom from his addictions), he takes in drug addicts and women coming out of prison, and gives them hope. Started in 2009, his center now can house 60 men and 30 women, and is the only rehab center in Vietnam for women.


We met many of these young women and heard their stories. Women coming out of prison have an especially difficult time, as families generally shun them, not accepting them back after being on drugs, engaging in prostitution and having done prison time. After getting them off the addiction, the next very big problem is to get them jobs so they don’t have to go back to their old life. Pastor Truong said one area that he needed help with was teaching them some basic marketable skills, and English was one of the subjects that they were interested in. This was exciting and the type of development project we feel called to do.


We engaged with the masters program at California State University at Fullerton and had one group of students develop a curriculum specific for this population. Working with Pastor Truong and another non-profit TongueOut (www.tongueout.org), we funded their hiring of local teachers who could use the curriculum and teach simple conversational English to the women. This enabled them to have some additional skills and be more marketable.


After the first class graduated, another nonprofit purchased a car for the 10 women to share as Uber drivers. With their English this helped them serve the growing tourist industry in Hanoi. And the gig economy was an excellent re-entry point into the workforce.

New School In Quang Nam Province

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The existing school was one room and not weatherproof.

Only an estimated 20,000 people live in the district of Nam Tra My, part of the Quang Nam province in Vietnam. It is located the South Central Highlands in an area known for the production of Saigon Cinnamon.

We partnered with #TongueOut, who is building a 5 classroom school in a secluded village in this remote district. Their new school building replaces a one-room school that has been serving the local children. We provided school supplies including: clothes, helmets , footwear, backpacks, pencils, and books to help them kick off the opening of the school in September of 2015.

New Five-Room School Under Construction By Villagers

Education in the villages is mainly limited to K-5. After 5th grade, the village children would have to go to a middle school that is located in a larger town. This would mean the children would need room and board along with the education. This not only is a hardship financially, it also impacts the family by not having the children around to help the family out with agricultural tasks. Attending high school requires the children to go even to a school farther away. The end result: few villagers are educated beyond 5th grade.

Villager helping carry materials to construction site

Our goal in villages like this is to work with the local church and other groups to help the children receive a solid elementary education. Then, with this foundation, we can develop strategies to assist the families to send their children for middle and high school education. Because of the low population density, it is not practical to have middle and high schools in each village. This means that a solution to giving continued education is to support the family and village while the students are at the school. We must also consider how to handle the village after their children, with high school educations, may not return to the village. We realize that we cannot do this alone, that something like this requires God’s wisdom.

Long-term, we hope to see established a strong and vibrant Christian community with a network of village churches, where our Christian brothers and sisters can help each other and reach out to even more remote villages. Our ultimate job is to help them help each other.

New School Completed!