'Doctor' in the hearts of the people

Originated from love

Mr. Le Quoc Trung started his volunteer work nearly 20 years ago. It started from his thoughts when he was in high school, when he learned about leprosy. The patients themselves suffered from the pain of the disease, their limbs gradually lost their joints and were amputated, their eyes became blind, their bodies were peeling... and they were also feared, despised and avoided by everyone. From then on, he felt that he was much luckier than those patients, so he loved them in a very special way and then went to them. At first, they were still shy and timid, but then convinced by Mr. Trung's sincere feelings, they gradually accepted his care. He helped them cut, wash and bandage their wounds, cut their hair, bathe; then gave them medicine, instructed and instructed them to keep themselves neat and clean.

'Bác sĩ' trong lòng dân- Ảnh 2. — The joy of the patient when meeting Mr. Le Quoc Trung

Mr. Trung is a freelance musician, his job and income are not stable. However, whenever he has time, he rides his motorbike alone to ethnic minority villages to help them with many things. The villages he visits are scattered all over the province, some are a few dozen kilometers from his home, some are hundreds of kilometers away, the roads are very difficult, especially in the rainy season. He often goes to remote villages with low education level, especially leprosy villages, because few people dare to go there. Sometimes he is seen cutting hair for the elderly and children, other times he is seen distributing medicine and food.

In particular, the most common image is him disinfecting, cleaning wounds, and changing bandages for patients like a real doctor. When I first met him, I thought he was a doctor, because of his professional and skillful operations. But later I found out that he had never attended any specialized school. He learned his medical knowledge by himself through books and from doctors and nurses when he transferred serious patients from the village to the hospital. Over time, he accumulated experience, that's all. He said "that's all" as lightly as his thoughts about the work he was doing.

Previously, Mr. Nguyen Quoc Trung often went to help about two dozen villages, but now, his health and finances do not allow him to help about a dozen villages. His job is not stable, but he saves every penny to buy medicine, medical equipment, and food to help the sick and the poor. When he has no money left, he asks his family, relatives, and friends for help, but that is very rare. He intends to quit his job in the future to spend more time visiting leprosy villages, and helping children's hospitals, helping poor sick children. Now, he only wishes to have enough health to continue to come to people. He hopes that people will look at people with leprosy with an open heart, without fear, so that they will suffer less.

'Bác sĩ' trong lòng dân- Ảnh 4. — Mr. Trung on the way to the leper villages

The journey continues

Trung’s trips and helping patients were so numerous that he could no longer remember their names, even in very special cases. Once he went to a very remote leper village, the village was isolated on the other side of the Ayun River (lepers often built houses in remote places, then other patients heard about it, came to live with them, and over time it became a village, isolated from other residential areas).

The road to the village was very difficult, Mr. Trung had to leave his motorbike and hide it in the bushes at the edge of the forest, then walk, climb over mountains, wade across rivers to get to the village. The people here are backward in every way. When he entered the village, he met a boy with a very high fever and convulsions, and when people here are seriously ill, they only invite a shaman but do not take him to the hospital. They said that Giang (God) wanted to take the child. They sat around the child waiting for him to stop breathing. Mr. Trung quickly took out fever-reducing medicine to give the child, but was stopped by adults. After persuading him in every way, he finally got the medicine to be given to the child.

That night, he stayed in the village to take care of the baby, guard it, give it porridge and medicine. The next morning, the baby's fever had gone down and he was awake. When Trung left, the villagers said that the baby had actually been taken away by Giang, but he had kept the baby, so from now on he had to be the baby's father. He accepted and left. After that, he continued to go to other villages, never to return again. A few years later, Trung accidentally met the baby again in a village on this side of the Ayun River. The baby ran to hug him and called him Ama (father). Trung's tears of happiness welled up.

'Bác sĩ' trong lòng dân- Ảnh 8. — Mr. Trung helps leprosy patients wash wounds, bathe, cut hair...

In another village, a child had an accident. Because his family was too poor, they could not get proper treatment. His two legs were almost completely gangrenous. When the hospital sent him back, the nuns near the village felt sorry for him and took him in to take care of him, but his condition became worse and worse. His legs became more and more ulcerated and very painful. The nuns heard that Trung was good at treating such wounds, so they came to him and asked him to clean his wounds and take care of him. Unexpectedly, after a while, his child improved. Seven years later, Trung unexpectedly met the child who had now become a healthy young man, not in the village but at his home. Seeing him, the young man ran to hug him tightly and cried. During those seven years, the child wanted to find him to thank him but did not know where he was. He went to churches to ask for information, and after asking for a long time, a priest finally knew him and took him to his home. Now he has a wife and children like many others, Trung feels happy like a father happy for his child.

Every trip with Trung was a memory. When he arrived, the people laughed, when he left, they cried. Some people said they dreamed of Trung coming last night, and the next day he really came. Some people missed him so much that they looked at Trung’s picture to ease their longing. How could they not remember? They had to witness with their own eyes what Trung did for the people to fully appreciate the actions of a kind heart; especially for leprosy patients whose skin and flesh were constantly ulcerated, oozing pus, and whose joints were corroded and gradually falling off… Not everyone was brave enough to wash their wounds and change their bandages.

Not only that, there were rainy and stormy seasons, there were isolated villages, the volunteer groups could not reach. At that time, Trung, because of the terrain, familiar with the way of moving, he waded through the mud to take care of the people. There was a time, each family cut down a banana tree to keep in the house, then cut pieces of the banana tree trunk to chew to relieve hunger. Trung brought them some food, how could they not miss him.

Mr. Trung never considered what he did as charity. He always thought it was just very small things. However, he felt that he received so much joy and happiness in return. He was happy when he returned to a village and saw that people knew how to live more hygienically, that they understood more about their illness and had less inferiority complex. People with better health participated in labor and farming to earn a living. For him, that was great happiness. People called Mr. Le Quoc Trung "doctor of lepers". He told them not to call him that because he was not a doctor, but they said they liked it because, to them, he was a real doctor.