My New Year's Resolution

Happy New Year everyone! I hope you all have had a chance to share your precious time with your family and friends and have drawn up and laid out your resolutions for the New Year. As for me, another year had just passed and I have yet to fulfill one of my lifelong goals. 

A while back, one of my blog readers sent me an email asking me a few questions in Vietnamese: "Mục đích của Loan đăng trên blog về ẩm thực là có mục đích gì? Và ước nguyện của Loan sẽ làm gì sau này về ẩm thực?" Translation: " What is the purpose of your food blog? And what do you wish to pursue with your food blog?" I recall writing back to him a long note. I told him that I wanted to use my blog Vietspices to create the Spices of Life (Hương Vị Cuộc Sống) Foundation to help others. I envision something that extends beyond my daily bread to encompass the basics of daily living – food, clothing, shelter - for those less fortunate. 

My goal is to reach out to the less fortunate in third world countries with the main focus being Vietnam. It has been on my mind constantly for the past 12 years. Seeing the children and elders laboring on the streets without a home to live, eating other people's leftovers at the restaurants and hoping to make enough money to survive from day to day just tore me apart. There is hardly a day that passes by that I don't think about it. I yearn to help them so badly but didn't have the financial means nor the connections to get this up and running.

Many years have passed and I just can't sit idly by and wait until I have enough money. That day may never come. I need to start this mission in whatever capacity I have. Time is just too precious to let it pass by. Recently I shared my thoughts with my cousin who currently resides in Saigon. What a wonderful joy it was to hear that she and a group of her friends have been doing this good cause for some time. They raise money to buy food and collect used clothes to pass out to the orphans and the poor. She's willing to help me fulfill my goal when I am ready. 

Well, 2015 is here. My resolution is to take actions that will propel me towards achieving this goal. To start, the focus will be on providing meals and items for basic personal needs on a monthly basis. But to expand and grow to where supplies and food can be provided on a more frequent basis, I will need your help and support. Anything you can do to help will make a difference in their lives. I have over 2000 Facebook page readers, not including my blog readers. Assuming each person gives $1 per month, imagine how many lives we can transform. 

I am going to create a donation link on my blog. All the money that I collect from donations and generate from ads posted on my blog will go towards the Spices of Life Foundation for charity. I like to invite you to the table to partake in this wonderful, life-enriching mission.

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