Green Shirt Volunteers: Silently Spreading Love

In a very different corner of Hanoi - where there is no brilliant stage, no cheers or halo, there is a group of students quietly wearing green shirts, holding loudspeakers, backpacks on their shoulders, tirelessly crossing alleys, climbing mountains and wading streams to reach the people in the highlands, knocking on doors to distribute late night porridge to poor patients... They are members of the Volunteer Assault Team (TNXK) of the Academy of Journalism and Communication who have chosen for themselves a very different youth: A youth full of scratches but brilliant and kind, a youth that lives not only for themselves, but also for others.

Two Decade Journey of Tireless Hearts

Established in 2004, the Youth Volunteer Team is not simply a student club. It is a home - a place that nurtures the ideal of living a decent life, responsibility to the community and the desire to serve. Over the past 20 years, thousands of students have passed through here, carrying with them the flame of compassion and leaving footprints in all difficult lands: from remote villages in Mu Cang Chai, Si Ma Cai, to poor neighborhoods in the heart of the capital.

The footsteps of the members of the Youth Volunteer Team of the Academy of Journalism and Communication have left their mark on many lands of the Fatherland. Photo: NVCC

Some people may think that volunteering is just a “youth experience”. But for the youth volunteers, it is a choice to live a silent vow that: “I will not turn a blind eye to the pain of others.”

Young people choose to slow down to love

Mai Quynh Anh, a young girl from Hoa Binh, a final year student, currently the captain of the Youth Volunteer Team, has gone through a journey of youth filled with emotions. From a shy girl on her first day at the academy, Quynh Anh has quietly learned to mature through each trip, each failure, each time she shed tears behind the scenes of a volunteer program.

But it was in the most seemingly simple place - in the middle of a cold winter night in the Northwest highlands, when she saw children with dirty faces shivering from the cold receiving their first warm coats in their lives, that Quynh Anh understood why she needed to continue. And amid the countless pressures of running the program "Winter Warmth 2024", with more than 50 - 60 participants, taking care of every meal, accommodation, vehicle, sponsorship, media... she still stood firm, because "where there is love, there is a way."

Student Mai Quynh Anh (22 years old, Hoa Binh) is the captain of the Youth Volunteer Team, Academy of Journalism and Communication. Photo: NVCC

In the eyes of her teammates, Quynh Anh is not only a leader but also a sister, a friend, and a keeper of the fire for the whole group. She does not shout slogans, does not need any titles, only chooses action and lives kindly every day.

Jobs that don't require a badge

For the student born in 2003, the Youth Volunteer Team has become Ma Thanh Dat's "second home". For him, each program and each trip are not just activities, but memories engraved in his soul. Looking back, the first trip with the Youth Volunteer Team brought Thanh Dat to Van Son commune, Do Luong district, Nghe An - a faraway countryside but left a very close mark in his heart.

The first time he left Hanoi to go to a place without city lights, no wifi, no amenities... but there was one thing that the 22-year-old man could never forget: Friends who ate, slept, washed clothes, laughed, and shared every bite of rice and every smallest memory.

Ma Thanh Dat - 4th year student of Academy of Journalism and Communication, member of Youth Volunteer Team. Photo: NVCC

There was an unforgettable volunteer season - the whole team lay close together on the brick floor of the Huong Can Commune People's Committee Hall in the scorching midday sun, sweat soaked their backs; at night, they shivered in the cold rain and storm, the electric poles fell. No warm blankets, no soft beds, only each other's arms to endure. But from that moment, Dat understood: The place where comradeship was forged in hardship, where the dream of spreading love was kindled from the eyes, the highland boy holding a new gift, the tears of the poor old man holding a small box of cakes is the place called "family".

Amidst those hardships and simplicity, Dat suddenly understood: No need for badges or titles, this is the "family" that he will be attached to, a place where kindness is not for boasting, but for growing together.

Quiet, but not anonymous

In an increasingly busy and cold world, Quynh Anh and Thanh Dat have chosen to slow down to empathize, to touch other lives and not waste their hearts that can vibrate. They have learned the greatest lesson that life does not teach: Love is a form of strength.

There are good things that don’t need to be known, but are still powerful enough to change a person’s life. The youth volunteers don’t need cameras to capture emotional moments, nor do they need to stand in the spotlight to tell about what they have done. They just walk silently, like an underground stream that nourishes the source of kindness in society.

There, people don’t ask each other “what did you get” when they volunteer. They just ask: “Did I make someone feel warm today?”

There are fires that do not need bright sparks, they smolder, quietly and persistently, and then one day burst into light. The Volunteer Shock Team of the Academy of Journalism and Communication is such a fire - a fire that was lit in 2004, by young people who are not afraid of commitment, not afraid of hardship, with only one simple aspiration: To live fully with their youth and to give kindness.

If every young person carries a light within themselves, then the volunteers are those who choose to step into the darkness, not to illuminate themselves, but to find places that need light. They do not shout slogans, do not live noisily, but in the small and kind things they do every day, we can see a part of the country's future - a humane future, knowing how to share, knowing how to love and living without meaninglessness.

Phuong Ha

Source: https://congthuong.vn/ao-xanh-tinh-nguyen-lang-tham-lan-toa-yeu-thuong-384069.html