How volunteering in Vietnam’s education system adds value to your life.

My name is Lingyan Tu, and I am a college student from China. Just like other students all over the world, I enjoy Marvel movies, rock music, road trips, dating… Anyway, the things that make me live in the moment. In some ways, you could say our young generation is selfish and stupid. But joining Better Life Vietnam (BLV) totally and utterly changed me. I received the invitation email to volunteer with BLV on my birthday, and it turns out that this was the best birthday gift I’ve ever received in the last 21 years.

At first, it was my sociological class that inspired me to find social work to do. As I am too young to apply for a UN volunteer position, the UN online volunteering became the most ideal choice for me. After searching for information, I decided to apply to join BLV as an online volunteer. So here I am!

Being part of the social media promotion team means that I perform tasks on some mainstream social media platforms such as Instagram, Twitter and Facebook to raise the popularity of the organization and the Coeurs de Papier project. I enjoyed this kind of work and had plenty of time after class, so I took the initiative to do these tasks daily. Soon I was promoted to become one of the captains in our team, which was truly an awesome experience and I really appreciated this precious opportunity.

Volunteering with BLV in the past 6 months has shaped me into a more responsible and sympathetic person. I became more experienced in promoting a charity through social media, and I feel more connected with others - this gives me a more well- rounded personality. In addition, our team lead Sidhant was very professional and super nice to us at the same time. He guided me a lot in my volunteer work, and I am so happy that we became friends. Thank you Sidhant!

Just like our team motto says, “once a BLVer, forever a BLVer!” I am going to miss you guys and continue to stand by BLV!