CASE STUDY: Volunteering with the Christina Noble Children's Foundation, HCMC

Sarah Warwick recounts her three months experience of working at Christina Noble Children’s Foundation in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

Rise and shine! A typical working weekday at the orphanage started at about 6.30am, when I’d wake in my hostel room in downtown Saigon, and put on my charity T-shirt and board shorts. It might seem early but that’s typical of Vietnam – Saigon is already bustling by this time, filled with hardworking Vietnamese going about their business in the relative cool of the morning. 

Like other volunteers at the orphanage, I lived in one of the cheap hotels in the Pham Ngu Lao tourist district, about a mile from the orphanage. It was easily walkable, although even at between seven and eight in the morning the exertion earned us very sweaty faces.

Breakfast might be a banana or a tub of frozen yoghurt, more likely just a delicious cup of uber-sweet cà phê sữa đá: iced coffee with condensed milk –guaranteed to blow the cobwebs out of your head.

Start of the Day

Arriving by 8am, the small band of volunteers (between 4 and 6 on any given week) would trek up three floors to the office of the volunteer coordinator, where we’d get instructions and check the rota to see where we’d be needed for the day.

For every session – whether morning (8-11am) or afternoon (2-5.30pm) – half the volunteers would help with the babies (under 18 months), while the other would work with the older children (up to nine years old). Lunchtimes were spent out of the 35-degree heat or at the local swimming pool.

Sessions with the babies involved feeding them and then sitting in a playpen with them, cuddling and playing games with them. Sometimes we’d take mats out onto the porch of the building and give them some fresh air. At the end of a session we’d help to give them a bottle and put them in their cots.

Roles and Responsibilities

The older kids, many of whom were disabled, were harder work but generally more rewarding. Every session started with a meal, invariably a gruel-like rice soup that many of the kids had behavioural or digestive issues with. We often ended up wearing it.

We weren’t ever in sole charge of the kids– there were full-time nurses for that – but we had various regular jobs. Nappy changing was a major one, and – in the afternoon – teeth brushing, which was a military operation waged against 30+ screaming children who all loathed the process. For the most part, however, the job was a cushy one: more about cuddling and playing with Lego than actual work.

One afternoon a week we’d run an activity for the children – finger-painting, mask making, clay modelling – and there were occasional excursions for ice cream or to the swimming pool. These were the best times… seeing the kids’ massive grins and knowing we were giving them a little bit of a life.

How Did the Experience Change Me?

In the evenings and at weekends our time was our own for sightseeing, hanging out and making friends. Just like a real job, after a while we didn’t feel warm and fuzzy with the joy of giving every day, it just became run of the mill. It’s not boring, especially when you’re working with children and every day is different, but it’s certainly routine.

Having said that, the longer you spend on a project, the closer your connections to the place and people – I’m still in touch with my volunteer friends a year later.

It wasn’t all wonderful but it was a great experience. Apart from the vomit and stepping on Lego bricks – ouch! – the worst part was certainly leaving. I’d go back again tomorrow.

Read more about Sarah's travels on her website, including meeting orangutans in Sumatra, tubing in Laos and tomb raiding in Cambodia.