I woke up early to meet up with the group at 6. 30 at the hotel to drive to Cu Chi. I have never visited a brewery before so I was really excited to see how beers are made. We arrived at SABECO at around 9.15 a.m. and got a tour around their production line. SABECO produces 4 main products, in order from low price to premium: Saigon Beer, Saigon Beer Expo, Saigon 333, and Saigon Special. The more premium the beer is, the longer it takes to produce. I was surprised by how organized, modern, and clean their facilities were. Most of their production line, from cooking the malt to making the yeast and packaging were all controlled by machines. They only have about 150 workers on their production line in total to control those machines, check the quality and maintain the them. That allows them to produce about 30,000 bottles per hour. We got to try Saigon Special-premium brand beer fresh out of the production line and it was really good.
After that, we left to go to a Project Vietnam special needs center. It was very emotional for me and most of the group to see the children here. This special needs center adopts children who have down syndromes, mental issues and many other sicknesses that mainly results from birth defects and lack of knowledge and support from parents. They have about 7 nuns who volunteer to stay there and hire 4 others staffs to take care of the children. Most of them cannot control their thoughts and actions so one-to one special care is needed most of the time. Even though their mission states that they would support the children until they are 18 and send them back to their parents after that, many of the children end up staying here much longer because their parents left them when they were really young.
I have seen and got the chance to visit many places like this in Vietnam. Every time I go, I always feel tremendously blessed to have the full capacities to make decision and able to use them to create opportunities. It is always a good reminder to myself to live to the fullest everyday, be humble and give back.