LookAtVietnam – Teachers and students are back in school, even though formidable floods have taken away their homes, clothing and books.

As she finished, she began weeping.

Hearing her mother’s words, Thuy impored, “Mama, I want to continue learning. I will study hard; I just need to go to school.”

Thuy’s words moved everyone else to tears. Loan, the teacher, advised Thuy’s mother that her daughter needed to go to school, despite her difficulties. Loan promised that she would help so that Thuy could continue studying.

Loan first gave some of her own clothing to Thuy.

“It was so lucky that my clothes fit Thuy. I came to her home right after I heard that her house collapsed. The damages are terrible,” Loan commented.

She then gave 100,000 dong to Thuy so that the student could purchase pens and books.

Nothing left in Kon Tum schools

Tuoi Tre reporters went to Kon H’ra Chot Village in Kon Tum province and saw with their own eyes that nothing is left.

“I tried to rescue fowl and pigs drowning as the water level rose. When I returned home to get my clothes and books, the house was deep underwater. Everything is gone,” said Y Lac, a student in Kon H’ra Chot Village

Y Lac has returned to school anyway, as have one hundred other students. Many more unlucky students still have to stay at home because they do not have clothes or books.

Headmaster of Le Loi Primary School in Kon Tum City, Nguyen Thi Ngoc, related how a lot of students burst into tears when they returned to school, and teachers could not hold back their tears when greeting their students.

Ngoc said that the teachers collected money, books and cooking to help students resume their studies. Many went directly to students’ homes to provide books and clothing as well as to persuade them to return to school.

“Our money is only enough for some books and textbooks,” Ngoc admitted.

Teacher rescues books, headmaster dirties hands

In Quang Nam province, students returned to school on October 7. The Duy Phuoc kindergarten was still full of mud. Tables and chairs for students were put in the school yard, while up to ten people were repairing classrooms that had lost their roofs in the typhoon.

Students of Duy Phuoc Kindergarten were lucky, because they still had books even though the school had been underwater.

Vo Thi Suong, a Duy Phuoc teacher, and her husband ran to the school to save the students’ textbooks during the typhoon. Afterwards, only a collapsed building remained.

Pham Thi Mai, the school’s headmaster, was seen with his sleeves rolled up, washing the muddy sleeping mats for the students’ afternoon nap. He reported that presently the students had to eat and sleep in the same places.

According to Thai Van Dong, Director of Quang Ngai Education and Training Department, some 7,000 students of 14 primary and secondary schools still could not return to school as of October 7 because many classrooms were still buried in mud and roofless.

In the Thua Thien-Hue city area, the roads are still slick with mud.

Thuan Hoa Primary School Headmaster Ngo Cuoc detailed how the houses of most of the school’s 268 students were heavily inundated by the flooding, while 2/3 of the teachers have homes in flood-stricken areas.

Dang Thi Trinh, a 5A class student of Thuan Hoa Primary School noted that “I could not leave home several days ago because of how deep the mud was.”

“I can go to school today because a machine has removed the mud,” Trinh exclaimed.

VietNamNet/TT