TRADITIONAL NEWYEAR FOR DISADVANTAGED CHILDREN AND FAMILY AT BUOC VILLAGE

Name: TRADITIONAL NEWYEAR FOR DISADVANTAGED CHILDREN AND FAMILY AT BUOC VILLAGE
Start: 2027-01-23
End: 2027-01-31
Location: Hoa Binh, Vietnam

Code: f17a7551-5f22-11f1-a632-fa163ef8d720 Copied

Vietnam Culture Children Social work Culture Group +2 Fixed dates

About the project

📝 Detailed information

🏢 About the local organisation

The association is called Solidarité Jeunesse Vietnam (SJV).

💼 What the programme involves

Vietnamese Lunar New Year, more commonly known by its shortened name Tết, is the most important and
traditional holiday and festival in Vietnam. It is the Vietnamese New Year derived from the Chinese New Year
based on the Lunar calendar, a lunisolar calendar. The name Tết Nguyên Đán is Sino-Vietnamese for Feast of
the First Morning, derived from the Kanji characters 節元旦.
Tết takes place from the first day of the first month of the Lunar calendar (in 2027, it will be from 06 Feb to 16
Feb). Many Vietnamese prepare for Tết by cooking special holiday foods and decorating their houses. There
are a lot of customs practiced during Tết, like visiting a person's house on the first day of the new year,
ancestral worshipping, wishing New Year's greetings, giving lucky money to children and elderly people, and
opening a shop.
Tết is also an occasion for pilgrims and family reunions. During Tết, Vietnamese visit their relatives and
temples, forgetting about the troubles of the past year and hoping for a better upcoming year. They consider
Tết to be the first day of spring and the festival is often called Hội xuân (spring festival).
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In Vietnam, to celebrate Tết is to “ăn Tết”, literally meaning "Tết eating", showing the importance of food in its
celebration. Some of the food is also eaten year-round, while other dishes are only eaten during Tết. Also,
some of the food is vegetarian since it is believed to be good luck to eat vegetarian on Tết. Some traditional
food on Tết are:
“Bánh chưng” (Chung cake) and “bánh dầy”: essentially tightly packed sticky rice with meat or bean fillings
wrapped in banana leaves. Bánh chưng (rectangular) and bánh giầy (circular) are symbolically connected with
Tết and are essential in any Tết celebration. Preparation is time-consuming, and can take days to cook. The
story of their origins and their connection with Tết is often recounted to children while cooking them

Volunteers will be joining in on making banh chung (traditional square sticky rice cakes), which
is quite a time-consuming process. The boiling time alone takes about 8-10 hours. Additionally,
there will be various activities with the children in the village, such as playing soccer and other
games
Please be ready and flexible for any changes due to weather and local condition and let’s work
on what we can do the best!
< Tentative Schedule >
Morning Afternoon Evening
23/01 Arrival Welcome party
24/01 Orientation Home visit Free
25/01 Volunteering work Free
26/01 Volunteering work Free
27/01 Volunteering work Free
28/01 Volunteering work
29/01 Visit Local Market Free Free

30/01 Giving Cake to Local people Farewell party
31/01 Departure

🏠 Accommodation on site

Volunteers will stay in a traditional bamboo house in the BUOC-village, western toilets and bathrooms are
available. Internet is very weak around this area.
Wi-Fi is available in home stay . For phone, you can buy a Sim-card for your mobile phone with around
190,000 VND (US$4,5) and inform your family of your mobile phone number. ( recommend you buy a sim
card name Viettel )

🍲 Food

The host family will provide meals for volunteers. Vietnamese food consists of many varieties and flavors, but if
you have any special dietary needs please inform us in advance.

📍 About the location

BUOC-village is a small village of Thai-people (an ethnic group came from southern of China) with
very pure landscape. As you can see on the above map, this area is placed by only green color and a
lot of mountain. Because of this natural condition, Thai-people here rely mainly on agriculture. In
the past, the village was located adjacent to streams and people in the village used water of the
stream for gardening. During the rainy season water from the mountain goes down through the
streams and washes everything away, making it very dangerous to live close to the stream. For this
reason, the government has helped residents here to move to higher lands, and build permanent &
traditional houses with wood. 10 years have passed since the new BUOC-village was reconstructed
in 2002. Currently, firm houses, concrete roads, electricity have become the basic-living-condition of
every villager. Although the stream is very beautiful, it might be dangerous in flood season. Despite
the good aspects of new infrastructure, villagers still lack a lot of education and understanding about
modern society. Therefore, volunteers’ activities here would be very helpful to local people and vice
versa they will have a chance to get to know more about a distinctive culture in Vietnam.

🎒 Leisure activities

⚠️ Requirements

Special conditions and responsibilities
Be able to do manual work. Willing to work and stay in remote area.
⚫ Strong inter-personal skills, and experience in working with a wide variety of people, cultural sensitivity.
⚫ Commitment to volunteerism
⚫ High motivation and come ready to live as the locals do (basic accommodations, local food). Be ready to face
many difficulties such as language barriers, culture differences, low budgets, etc.
⚫ Be patient and sympathetic with the children

⚫ Follow the rules of the village

🤝 Meeting point

The meeting point will be confirmed after the volunteer's registration.

ℹ️ Additional information

The volunteers need to have their own travel assurance and medical assurance. Before you go to your workcamp,
you need to make sure you got adequate insurance coverage.
Diarrhea is a frequent problem during a travel. Even when in good conditions, it is not always possible to avoid it.
Ask advices and the correct medications to your pharmacy.

In BUOC-village there are four seasons: spring, summer, autumn, and winter. But it is possible to divide the climate
into two main seasons: the rainy season from May to September (it’s hot, heavy rain), and the dry season is from
October to April (it is cold, little rainfall). Please bring clothes according to the season, which should be

comfortable clothes, warm clothes, Rain coat

A mosquito spray

Basic pharmacy kit

Small gifts from your country

Protective measures against mosquito repellent and sun cream to protect your skin from sun light.
Electricity adaptor to charge your electricity equipment’s. In Vietnam the Electricity Voltage is 220V (A.C)

Period: 2 23/01/2027 -31/01/2027

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