The 2026 Vietnam Charity Trip: From Sóc Trăng to Huế

The Compassionate Hands Foundation visited ten pagodas from the Mekong Delta to Huế, giving rice, basics and cash offerings to poor, elderly and disabled villagers.

The 2026 Vietnam charity trip of Hội Từ Thiện Bàn Tay Nhân Ái (the Compassionate Hands Foundation) passed through ten pagodas, from the Mekong Delta, along the Bình Thuận coast and into the Central Highlands, then up the central coast as far as Huế. The group of monastics and lay Buddhists from the United States was led by Venerable Thích Minh Nhựt, the foundation's chairman. At each stop the team gave rice, instant noodles, cooking oil and other basics, plus tịnh tài (cash offerings), to lonely elderly people, people with disabilities and poor children. This post follows the order of the stops as told in the foundation's two-hour film.

From Saigon to the Mekong Delta

The team gathered at the Victory hotel in Saigon, then drove more than 320 kilometers to Khánh Anh monastery in Sóc Trăng, where Khmer families were already waiting under the pagoda eaves. Before the gifts were handed out, the monastery's preaching monk gave a Dharma talk on compassion and letting go, and offered prayers for the 200 people receiving gifts that day. Thầy Thích Minh Nhựt thanked the abbot for letting Vietnamese who live far from home in the U.S. hand the gifts over in person to people in hardship, people with disabilities receiving wheelchairs, and students.

On the morning of the 12th, the team went on to Vĩnh Thái An pagoda in Bạc Liêu. Villagers arrived early and listened to a talk about gratitude before receiving anything. A foundation member explained that the foundation had supported many people with 10 kg of rice a month for over ten years. After the pandemic, funds fell, so the amount was cut temporarily to 5 kg, and the foundation promised to try to restore it.

5 kg is not enough to eat for a month.

a foundation representative, in Bạc Liêu

The gifts included rice, noodles, salt, soy sauce, cooking oil, seasoning and warm blankets.

Bình Châu, then Bình Thuận

After a night in Saigon, the team reached Khánh An pagoda in Bình Châu, where villagers waited under an old shade tree. The team leader described three groups the foundation helps: elderly people receiving monthly rice, people with disabilities who need wheelchairs, and students who once received scholarships twice a year but now get occasional gifts because funds are limited. Each recipient also received a string of prayer beads, with the suggestion to recite a few of the Buddha's names each night before sleep.

In Phan Thiết the team visited two pagodas. Giác Hải sits by the sea and, according to the narration, is the home region of Thầy Thích Minh Nhựt. He said the foundation had not been able to visit for a long time but had never forgotten the place. Liên Hoa pagoda was still being built, with the main hall about 90% finished. One of the monks in the group recalled his first visit almost 20 years earlier, when there was only an old hall, and congratulated the abbess and the villagers. Chinese, Chăm and Kinh families sat together under one roof.

The Central Highlands: Từ Hiếu Pagoda, Đắk Lắk

From Bình Thuận the road climbed past coffee farms to Từ Hiếu pagoda in Đắk Lắk, a province home to more than 50 ethnic groups. An older man who received a wheelchair told the monk he had wanted one for a long time but could not afford it, and that he was very glad. Thầy Thích Minh Nhựt stated the foundation's purpose plainly.

We do not distinguish by region, by religion or by ethnicity.

Venerable Thích Minh Nhựt, chairman

Another monk reminded the villagers that donors abroad had set aside part of their retirement savings to send this help, and asked recipients to live more lightly and cheerfully in return.

The central coast: Phú Yên, Quảng Nam, Đà Nẵng

Diệu Tịnh pagoda in Phú Yên is one of the first the foundation supported, almost 20 years ago. Thầy recalled the original aim: to reach remote villages and give lonely, disabled elderly people 10 kg of rice a month. Later the foundation added wheelchairs, scholarships for poor students, and one-off gifts for families who did not yet receive monthly rice. Cô Mỹ, who represented the foundation in the recent flood relief across Phú Yên, Bình Định and Quảng Nam, told how the team had to hand out aid while staying ahead of rising water, pooled their own cash on the bus when it ran out, and were taken in for the night by local people.

After seven hours on mountain roads the team reached Đại Xuân pagoda, deep in Quảng Nam. The road was too narrow for the large bus, so they switched to small vehicles. Some villagers rowed across a river to receive their gifts. The team leader said that even when the U.S. economy was hard and funds were short, the foundation had kept this stop going without a break.

At Phước Huệ pagoda in Đà Nẵng, the second stop of that day, the team gave 200 gift packages: rice, instant noodles, conical hats, cooking oil, soy sauce, seasoning, sandals, towels, blankets, milk biscuits, toothpaste, soap, medicated oil, prayer beads and tịnh tài. Local Buddhists helped to set things out. Thầy remembered that almost 20 years ago the abbess lived in a run-down pagoda with no bed, yet was always thinking of the poor families around her.

The last stop: Diệu Viên Pagoda, Huế

Diệu Viên was the tenth and final stop. Thầy explained that the foundation returns to most places every three or four years, sometimes longer, but returns to Diệu Viên every year and gives two or three times as much.

Here we come back every year and give two or three times as much as anywhere else.

Venerable Thích Minh Nhựt, chairman

The crowd was larger than at any earlier stop: blind visitors, people in wheelchairs, sick children lying in their mothers' arms. A monk who spoke before the handout said 52 children were present with disabilities linked to Agent Orange and with illness. When the last gift was given, the film closed the trip and said the team hoped to meet again on the 2027 journey.

What stays

One thing repeated at every pagoda: team members, including the monks, picked up the carrying, wheelchair pushing and walking elderly people to their seats without being assigned. Thầy Thích Minh Nhựt was also open about the limits. The foundation's funds cannot yet restore 10 kg of monthly rice everywhere, and it will do what it can.