This weekend I’m taking a break from writing the blog… but don’t despair!

Two things…

Blue Dragon is starting now to help people rebuild their lives as the pandemic recedes; but for many, the crisis is far from over.

For survivors of human trafficking, Mother’s Day holds a significance far beyond breakfast in bed and pictures to pin to the fridge.

What in the world are we going to do?
Look at what everybody’s going through.

– Everyday Life, Coldplay

The loss of jobs and livelihoods in Vietnam is leading to an inevitable rise in exploitation and trafficking.

Bay and Tuan are young adults whose lives were just getting on track when the coronavirus pandemic hit Vietnam. Bay was settling into her first ever job when the pandemic began. She’s a single mother, barely 19, and apart from raising her little boy she also helps her...

We’ve all been in isolation for – how long now? At this point we’re all thinking about the end of lockdown and social distancing. We just want it to be over and for life to get back to normal. But… do we really? Is yesterday’s normal something that we aspire to? Or do...

Trang is naked and terrified in the photo. She is clutching her arms over her nakedness. Deep bruises are evident across her shoulders. Her face is looking up at the camera, her lips gnarled in horror. Her eyes are pleading for mercy. Trang is 24. As the coronavirus...

There’s really only one good thing about a crisis. It shows us who we really are. Do we rise to the occasion, or fall into a heap? Do we keep smiling and working toward better days, or do we give up and expect the worst? For 19 year-old Viet, this global crisis has...

It took Lan more than 4 years to find a chance of escape. In the end, it was the coronavirus that gave her the opportunity to call for help. Trafficked from Vietnam into Hunan province, she was sold to a violent Chinese man who treated her as an object and beat her...

It’s hardly news at all now. The coronavirus, COVID-19, has swept the world. From some murmured concerns in December, this viral infection is now the daily lead story everywhere. People are worried. Over 130,000 are sick. Almost 5,000 have died. In response, the world...

At 6am, Bi stumbles out of bed, washes his face, quickly gets dressed and rushes out of the Blue Dragon shelter on his way to the hospital. Bi first came to us last year, turning up in Hanoi lost and alone. He’s 16 now, and as he tells the story he came to the city to...

In any given week, Blue Dragon receives calls for help from girls and women who may have been trafficked just a few days ago, or maybe have enslaved for several years. Last week, one of the more exceptional cases came to us as a matter of extreme urgency: A woman...

With kids coming and going from the Blue Dragon centre every day, I try my best to get to know everyone so I can call them by name when I see them and make them feel at home. But there’s one group of young people who pass through the centre who I rarely get to know at...

Coming home from dinner on Sunday night, I had a message waiting for me from one of the Blue Dragon staff. He was on his way to meet a young man who had just come out of prison, a former Blue Dragon boy named ‘Hao’ who was caught up in the pedophile rings that ran...