In the poorest provinces north of the centre of Vietnam hope is in short supply. Employment is hard to come by and a secure wage is beyond hope for most. This causes the drift to the city.

In Saigon you will find a tightly-knit group of people from the province of Thanh Hoa living close together in poor dwellings. They work in various occupations on the street such as shoe shining and selling lottery tickets, newspapers, paintings or paperbacks. Although these occupations have no guarantees, these workers desire the independence and look to the jackpots of chance encounters with generous clients and indulgent tourists.

It is 40 hours from their homeland by bus, but nevertheless the community in HCMC remains connected. It is said that the very old and the very young remain in the province while the working population moves out to find work. Because of this, a portion of the money which is earned in HCMC is channeled back home to the families.

This small subset of Ho Chi Minh city stick together. When my shoe shiner friend was beaten up by a group wanting to monopolize the street, his home town friends were roused within an hour to fight back for him (if he had wanted). And when over Tet (Vietnamese New Year) he heard of the death of his cousins on the road in Dalat, news traveled to Thanh Hoa and then back to Ho Chi Minh city and throughout the relational networks within hours.

How could the Gospel of Jesus enter this community? Could the Good News spread through these networks in Saigon all the way back to Thanh Hoa?

Pray that God will send out harvesters to seek them out and work out the best way of explaining the gospel to this displaced community.