We drove 7 hours by car and motorbike to reach a small village in the Cà Mau province to inaugurate the new Friendship Bridge donated by the Zaller family.  Lara Zaller joined us for that part of the trip and she obviously was our guest of honor! In the Mekong delta, bridges are life changing. In this specific case, this new bridge now connects the village to a little hamlet of more than 200 people. Until now, they used a little raft to cross the river and reach the village.  Many elders were not able to cross in the raft and it took a lot of time for everybody else. In case of medical emergency, a bridge is the difference between life and death. 

We also donated notebooks, pen and other school supplies to the children from that hamlet. 

This community heartily thanks Tom and Lara for their generous donation. The funding of this new bridge will change their daily life. 

We also had an impromptu visit of another site in the same community where a similar bridge is needed. 

We got back on the road and drove a couple of more hours. Upon arrival, we took a small motorized boat to reach the southern point of Vietnam. We discussed a third bridge projet. It would connect 2 hamlets across a 40 meter large river to solve similar challenges. The Mekong delta is a tight network of small interconnected rivers and traveling across them for any reason is truly challenging. We hope to be able to realize those two bridge projects as soon as new funds become available