FUN FOR KIDS - Many children in HCM City have received Trung Thu gifts, including mooncakes, candies, fruits, and traditional lanterns during the Mid-Autumn Festival, which falls on September 17, thanks to local organisations. Photo courtesy of Suối Tiên Theme Park.

HCM CITY — The HCM City Youth Union and its partners have launched a charity programme to offer mooncakes and gifts for disadvantaged children in celebration of the Mid-Autumn (Trung Thu) Festival on Tuesday (the 15th day of the eighth lunar month).

The event, called Trung Thu Mơ Ước (Full Moon Dream), targets several thousand children aged three to 15 living in the city.

The kids receive Trung Thu gifts, including mooncakes, candies and fruits delivered by the union’s volunteers. Traditional star lanterns are also included.

“We’re very happy to offer full moon celebrations for children with music and song performances and traditional games,” said Nguyễn Ngọc Nhung, deputy head of the union’s Office for Children, a member of the programme’s organising board.

Nhung and her staff delivered Trung Thu gifts to children from 400 poor and migrant households in Tân Bình District after the event’s launching day last week.

“We hope our programme, Trung Thu Mơ Ước, will encourage children to never stop your dreams and wishes,” she said.

Nguyễn Hùng Anh Huy, 14, who lives with his parent in a small alley in Tân Bình, was happy to receive a mooncake and a star lantern from the event’s volunteers.

“We played and lit up our lantern to wish for a peaceful and happy world,” he said.

Artists from the Phương Nam Art Troupe offered a special show for 200 disadvantaged children at Gia Định Park last weekend.

They offered puppet and musical performances about Chị Hằng (Moon Lady), who lives on the Moon, and her friends, traditional characters called Cuội (Moon boy) and Thỏ Ngọc (Moon Rabbit).

“Our art brings messages about love and life. It encourages children to fight against bad things,” said the theatre’s art director Trần Được.

MID-AUTUMN CELEBRATION - The HCM City Youth Union and its partners have launched the charity programme Trung Thu Mơ Ước (Full Moon Dream) to offer mooncakes to poor children in celebration of the Mid-Autumn (Trung Thu) Festival, which falls on September 17 (the 15th day of the eighth lunar month). Photo from HCM City Youth Union.

Labour unions at industrial parks and export processing zones in the city have also presented several thousand gifts to poor children and teenagers this season.

Cultural houses for children in rural districts will host programmes from Friday to Thursday, featuring lantern and fruit-tray design competitions, music and dance performances, and water-puppet shows.

The Suối Tiên Theme Park has offered many moon cakes, lanterns and other gifts for children as part of the Trung Thu Festival celebrations around the country.

On the night of September 17, Suối Tiên will offer free tickets to more than 5,000 poor children who will participate in lion dances and a lantern parade, and receive notebooks, pens, clothes and toys. — VNS