It seems fate was pulling Coast resident Carol Stewart toward the Vietnam Friendship Village. She had travelled in Vietnam in 2005 but didn't hear anything about the project until she had moved on to Laos and chatted with a young German woman in a restaurant one evening. The woman told her why she had been to Vietnam: to help on a project, a friendship village, that would house, feed and provide medical services and education to orphans, the elderly and Vietnamese war veterans.
The kids, now in the third generation since the Vietnam War, are still suffering the effects of Agent Orange -the herbicide that was used extensively during the war by the U.S. to clear jungle vegetation, thus making the Vietcong visible. The children are still being born with birth defects such as stunted limbs and loss of sight and hearing. The evidence is strong for Agent Orange as the villain, but because it cannot be proven conclusively, the U.S. government has never officially recognized the damage wrought on the Vietnamese.
Stewart returned to her guest house in Laos that night thinking about the German woman's project, and she turned on the TV. By coincidence, a film was playing, The Friendship Village, by Vancouver filmmaker Michelle Mason, who had taught film at Capilano College where Stewart had also worked.
That film will be screened by the S.C. Film Society at Heritage Playhouse in Gibsons Tuesday, Feb. 27. The director will be in attendance and Stewart will be there to show slides of a recent visit to Vietnam.
Later, as a Canadian representative, she joined a formal, international organization that determines such issues as policy and budget for the Vietnam Friendship Village project. Because Stewart's background is in children and behavioural problems, she takes a keen interest in the results.
"The children, the elderly and the soldiers - you don't see them in society in Vietnam at all," she says. "It's as if they are hidden away to serve an unproductive life. We want to show that these kids are treatable and educable."
About 120 children, aged from six to teens, live at the village for a few years where they go to school, are treated at the clinic and learn skills through the vocational program. Veterans also visit there for a few months at a time to use the clinic or receive prosthetics.
Mason's film is 50 minutes long; she explores the project from the point of view of founder American George Mizo, since deceased, whose wife, Rosemary, is still involved in the project. Mason has won numerous awards for her film, including the grand jury prize, best documentary and best director of a documentary at a New York independent film festival and best documentary at the 2003 Chicago international television awards.The Film Society will also host a silent auction on Feb. 27 starting at 7 p.m. For sale will be some items from Vietnam that have been made at the village's vocational school: embroidery, tailoring and silk flowers.
"I also have two wonderful Ho Chi Minh propaganda posters for the silent auction," Stewart says. Tickets are $7.50 for members and $10 for single event admission.
