Aspirations and dreams…!
In your life, what is your dream, and your passion too? Let me tell you a story about Nguyễn Ngọc Ký – a story that is probably familiar to you. A boy who had lost his arms and who longed and yearned to go to school. He went to school but the other children mocked him, and the teacher would not take him into her class. He was very sad, yet every day he persevered, striving on, holding firm to the end.
Every day he practised writing with his feet. At first it was very hard and his letters were still scrawled. After a time of longing, of waiting and persevering like this, one day the teacher saw what he was capable of and took him into the class; his friends shared in his joy too, staying by him day after day and helping him. The dream he had always cherished was to become a teacher. Through all those years, his dream came true. He is now a teacher, a teacher of many achievements, known to all with admiration and respect. Through persevering in pursuit of his dream, Nguyễn Ngọc Ký made it happen.
And you, what about you? What is your dream, and are you striving every day to reach that dream…?
As for me, I am an ordinary girl — not perfect, not beautiful, not accomplished like so many others. My dream is as simple as I am: to open a centre caring for children who have been abandoned, for orphans and children with disabilities. That dream took shape and made its way into me without my even noticing, and the important thing is that I must try with all my ability to fulfil my dream, my longing. I want to nurture the children's dreams and to give them a happy life like everyone else. Alongside that, my passion is writing, composing the ideas that come to me whenever I have free time. Since I was small I have had a thick notebook of poems written by my own hand. Reading them again, my poems seem a little mad, without rhyme or metre, but quite simply that is who I am, and I want to put the life around me into poetry. The verses I write will be my comfort and my friend whenever I am sad.
To fulfil my own dream, I tell myself I must strive and persevere every day. A step late is better than never… While I am in the full vigour of youth, studying, playing, loving and… other things. I am a girl like any other; I have loved before, I have been through sad love stories that were never returned. Unrequited love is love too, and that innocent, pure schoolyard love helped me understand what I must do. Living in this world I need no riches, no wealth, no gain, no glory, and I ask for no honours or fame like a beauty queen or a singer or an artist. What I always care about are the less fortunate lives with no home, no roof, no father, no mother, no one to love them. I have lived as my own self, wearing no one else's "armour" and putting on no "shell" of a coward. I have come to realise that wonders do not happen by chance; it is we ourselves who create them.
In the days when I lived in Duy Tân, I met an old man with a gaunt face who always seemed sad, whom everyone shunned, looked down on and despised. He sat in a corner by the roadside, his clothes filthy and torn, a few tins and a chipped bowl set out in front of him. He sat there with a thin, frail body ravaged by hunger. His wish was simply to hope that people would notice him and give him a bite to eat to get through the day. Every day I passed by I saw him and I always noticed. I always kept a little money in my pocket. At midday after school I would stop at the little shop by the road, near where he sat, to buy him bread. That became a joy in my day; a happiness I cannot describe crept into my heart, a feeling of ease and peace in my soul. Because I know that in giving we receive. Some time later, I no longer saw him. And I moved my lodgings up to Trần Phú so as to be near the church and go to Mass every day.
I often take part in volunteer activities, such as visiting the elderly at Diệu Viên Pagoda, organising the Mid-Autumn Festival, Children's Day and Christmas for the orphans at the Sơn Ca
Orphanage; running charity programmes at the Tân Hương, Hồng Phúc, 1 tháng 3 and Hồng Lĩnh orphanages… It is precisely those trips that gave me the drive and the will to strive as I do today. I no longer complain about my lot, because I am luckier and happier than so many others. I must share that happiness and that good fortune with other people. I grew up through those times. It was I who changed myself to fit into the world, and not my circumstances that changed to fit my character. I know I have made a wonder of my own life.
In life there are the rich, and they may have loftier dreams; there are those who do not have as much as others, and they dream too — they dream for their own lives, and no one can forbid anyone their dream. For circumstances cannot decide your success or the full fulfilment of your dream. It is the life you have, together with your effort, your striving and your sacrifice, that will make your dream always smile upon you.
I am the same; I am fulfilling my dream. I am not clever or quick-witted, I am clumsy, I am not accomplished, I am not smooth with words, but I have a dream. I hope to be myself, to live sincerely, to live joyfully each day, and not to deceive myself. I do not hope to put on someone else's "armour" to make myself strong, nor do I want to wear the weak face of a coward, of someone bullied. I always want this life to be peaceful, without scorn, without reproach; all I need is to be happy every day, to live gentle moments through the years.
Dreams and aspirations are nothing but empty theory if you do not persevere each day, striving to fulfil them. Anyone can dream in their sleep, but that dream will become real when you wake and begin to seek it out, striving every second and every minute to seize it. And once you have taken hold of it, you must make it bear fruit; otherwise your dream will collapse, and you yourself will be the one who ruined it.
You and I, all of us have aspirations and dreams. Come with me to fulfil our dreams and take hold of them. I always believe in the wonders of this life, wonders that spring from unceasing effort, wonders that are always present in the small things around us — and you, what about you…?
Will my dream and yours come true…? We ourselves are the ones who will answer this question, by real actions rather than by sitting still and daydreaming, with our own lives as the living witness. Because I believe that no effort goes un- rewarded, that no care given fails to bear fruit. Try with all the ability you have, and you will see where the goal you need to reach lies, and how to get there. I wish you, and I wish myself, that we may reach the goal of our dreams.
Nguyễn Thị Dung Tràng Đình parish - Can Lộc deanery Field: Law University of Law - Huế University
