My Birthday Present

Today is my birthday in Vietnam. But since I wasn't born in Vietnam, I'm not writing my birthday blog until tomorrow. However, this blog is MUCH MORE IMPORTANT. Over the last couple of months I have started to think of a way to do something good with the blog. Well, I've come up with an idea: I want everyone to send me a check for my birthday. That's right, send me a check. $1, $2, $5, $10, whatever you want. I'm going to take all the money and donate it to Habitat For Humanity in Vietnam. The way I see it is this:

a) For those of you who would have bought me a drink/dinner/etc. for my birthday if I was in the USA, put that money (or a fraction of it) towards helping to build a house for someone in Vietnam.

b) For those of you who I don't know that read Ahoy Hanoi, consider this your subscription fee. Throw a couple bucks in the mail and consider yourself paid up for a year worth of reading.

A few months ago I volunteered with Habitat for Humanity for a day and since then have thought that if everyone who reads the blog sent me a check for a few bucks, we could easily build a house (or two). A house costs a little over $2,000 to build and together we can make it happen. I really want to be able to give back a little to this country and to be able to say, "My blog built a house."

I know times are tough in the states right now so I understand if you can't contribute. However, I would really appreciate anything you can give. Like everything else here, a few bucks goes a LONG WAY.

Please send checks to:
[REDACTED]

I'm not sure how quickly these things work, but when I come back in August, I'll ideally I'll be able to help build the house. And well, anyone else who wants to come help is more than welcome to join!

NOTE: I wanted to set up a donation page through Habitat Vietnam but the people over here tell me they don't have that capability on their website yet.