Three weeks on the roads of Vietnam visiting and meeting people deeply into the countryside gave me an opportunity to know Vietnam in ways I could never imagined.

The last leg of the journey was the southern region. It took us 6 hours by car and ferry to cross the Mekong River and reach the town of Phung Hiep. Fr. V.V. Nam was waiting for us there and brought us by boat to a very poor village by the Mekong Delta where he has been working in the parish church for many years.

Early morning Fr. Nam led us to a place by the national road where poor families of migrant people were living. Although during the journey we saw a lot of poverty, the situation of those people was extreme. After the entrance there was a bed, a room, on a wet soil and behind it something like a narrow kitchen with some cook pots. There was no door in the back only the dirty canal. Cooking, washing, the shower and toilet were done in that space over the canal. Similar "houses" were lining along, between the road and the canal.

Fr. Nam explained: "I would like to present the people living here some tin roofs, so that they can defend themselves against the rain". Fr. Nam is an old acquaintance of Japa Vietnam. We only stayed there for a while, but the trust built through the years shows that through him assistance from Japan, although limited, has answered the needs of the poorest and has helped them to continue their fight for self-support.