Phuc Xuyen Pagoda, Quang Nam 2024: Monthly Rice Books and the Ninth Stop of the Journey

On March 12, 2024, the Compassionate Hands team reached Phúc Xuyên Pagoda in Quảng Nam and gave gifts to people with disabilities, rice-book holders and students, the ninth stop of the journey.

On March 12, 2024, the Compassionate Hands Foundation (Hội Từ Thiện Bàn Tay Nhân Ái) arrived at Phúc Xuyên Pagoda in Quảng Nam province. The team travelled from one end of the province to the other, a three-hour drive past green rice fields and ranges of mountains. According to the narration, this was the ninth stop of this year's trip, counting from the Mekong Delta provinces in the south.

Phúc Xuyên Pagoda and the monthly rice book

For the past two years, people in the area have gathered at the pagoda to receive a rice book worth 10 kg each month from the foundation in California. The narrator says the area covers 23 communes in Quảng Nam. Many other charities also support the area, but the foundation did not want to forget families along the coast. It keeps reaching toward poor people and ethnic minority students in Quảng Nam, raising funds from its own members near and far.

Gifts were arranged in rows by the members. Wheelchairs were being delivered to the homes of people who cannot walk.

An 89-year-old man

A team member spoke with an 89-year-old man who had cycled to the pagoda early and could not say how long the ride took. He said he had surgery on his bowel and urinary tract a year ago and must now change a tube regularly, which costs a few hundred thousand dong each time. He lives on the state's old-age allowance. He said he sometimes receives rice support, a few dozen kilos at a time.

Sandy land and a message

The organizer of the distribution explained that in this district the soil is all sand, not fertile like the places the team had passed, so farming and production are harder. He said the gifts today and the monthly rice are only a small share of the burden people carry. He said:

We are born into surroundings that limit our chances to grow, but that does not mean we must accept a life of hardship because of outside conditions. We can rise above it by changing how we look at life.

A representative of the group

The Dharma teacher Quảng Hiếu also shared Buddhist teachings, hoping people would apply them in daily life to ease the root of suffering. The organizer added that the team's gifts only soothe for a short time, and thanked the abbot and the organizers who helped arrange the day.

The song Niềm An Vui

The team leader is Thượng tọa Thích Minh Nhựt. That day the members offered a song called Niềm An Vui (Joy and Peace), wishing the villagers lasting peace and happiness. The whole pagoda courtyard clapped along.

The order of giving

The team began with people with disabilities, then those with rice books, then students, and finally those who came unexpectedly. At the end of the film the narrator hopes that anyone who watches, even once, and feels moved to join the foundation in California will become a flame that lights up compassion and spreads love.