Nobert Moss: the man who loves Vietnam
| 17:39' 08/07/2007 (GMT+7) | ||
Untold stories
Dr. Moss, 59, belongs to the generation of German youth who took to the streets to protest the Vietnam War before 1968.
“I feel very close to Vietnam because of the connection of a generation of German youth who protested the war in Vietnam in the past,” he told Tuoi Tre newspaper at the inauguration ceremony of the first sports hospital of Vietnam in Hanoi in May 2007.
The establishment of this VND52 billion (US$3.25 million) hospital is the great contribution of Dr. Moss. This German doctor has performed many operations on Vietnamese athletes. He has opened many training courses for Vietnamese doctors and invited German experts to come to Vietnam with his own money. He also brought to Vietnam a German architect to design the sports hospital.
In the past 15 years, Dr. Moss has conducted operations on 142 Vietnamese patients, including many famous athletes.
The surgery on football player Hong Son in 1996 attracted the special attention of Vietnamese fans because at that time Son was the hero of the Vietnamese national team, which won the silver medal at Tiger Cup 1996, and he returned home from the Tiger Cup 1996 on crutches.
“I remember two things about the operations on Hong Son. The first operation in 1996 in Germany brought Son back to the football playing field but the second operation several years later could help him return to life only. That’s a tragedy!” Dr. Moss said. The German doctor still torments himself because he could not help Son more.
Dr. Moss still remembers very clearly the case of another football player, Dang Thanh Phuong. This athlete came to Dr. Moss after the 22nd SEA Games with a crushed knee. It was very difficult to cure the knee completely to help the player return to football. However, the biggest difficulty was the money for the operation ($8,000). Dr. Moss decided to provide treatment for Phuong for over two weeks free of charge. He only received $1,100 for the artificial arthrosis.
However, Dr. Moss doesn’t want to only perform operations on talented athletes of Vietnam.
“I want to find an open way for the participation of all people. Everybody must be treated, regardless of whether they are rich or poor because there is a latent threat in the world that elite health services will only be for the very rich,” Dr. Moss said.
The way of Dr. Moss is using his only money to provide short-term training for Vietnamese sports doctors or bring German experts to Vietnam. This amount of money is Dr. Moss’ savings from his 35 working years.
“I have many health projects in Mexico, India, and Myanmar but Vietnam accounts for 50% of my projects and I have brought six Vietnamese doctors to St Joseph’s Hospital (Germany) where I’m the director to study.” Among those people are Dr. Le Quy Phuong, Director of the Vietnam Sports Hospital, Major-general Nguyen Tien Binh, Deputy Director of the Military Hospital.
Transmitting his love for Vietnam
People who know Dr. Moss are always surprised by his love for Vietnam, which is “imbued in my blood”, as he says.
For him, “Contributing to build Vietnam is part of my life and I’m determined to do it with my Vietnamese friends.”
This German doctor also worries that young Vietnamese people don’t understand Vietnamese history.
Dr. Moss has collected more than 1,000 photos, which are called “The portraits of Vietnamese people”, the name of one of his photo exhibitions held by the Goethe Institute in Vietnam last November.
These are photos of Vietnamese people taken by French soldiers from the 19th century to 1906. They were sent from Vietnam to France but then they drifted to Germany. Dr. Moss bought those photos to make a valuable collection.
This collection has been recently displayed in Bonn, Germany to the surprise of audiences. The World Publishing House of Vietnam will issue a book of these photos.
Last year, Dr. Moss bought over 40 war photos from a Vietnamese war photographer, Doan Cong Tinh, to prepare for four exhibitions on Vietnam through different periods in Bonn in the coming year.
Dr. Vu Cong Lap, a close friend of Dr. Moss, couldn’t hide his admiration when he saw the exhibition house of Mr Moss in Germany and his timber house in Cologne, which are paved with iron wood imported from Vietnam so he can “live in the heart of Vietnam”.
Dr. Moss sent his 18-year-old son named Johannes to Vietnam several years ago. Instead of living in luxurious hotels, the father hired a boat to take his son through slums along the Saigon River to help “Johannes understand how Vietnamese people still suffer hard lives and to love Vietnamese people”.
“I have to pass on my love for Vietnam because when I go away, there must be someone who follows me,” he said.
“My son is about to graduate from high school and his aspiration is to come to Vietnam to work for several years. He loves Vietnam very much,” he said, and smiled contently.
(Source: Viet Nam Net) |
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