The Meet & Greet Appreciation Event held by the Bodhi Charity Foundation at the home of Dylan & Samantha, Sacramento, California, on September 24, 2022 3:00-7:00 PM was a great success.
As a reminder, Bodhi Charity Foundation is a non-profit, tax-exempt charity with (501)(c)(3) status of the federal and state of California, USA. The Foundation was founded in October 2018, with its headquarter located in San Joe, California. The purpose of the Foundation is to offer humanitarian assistance to the less fortunate and help them realize their full potential. All members receive no compensation whatsoever, even making many financial contributions to help the Foundation since its inception.
In 2019, the Foundation organized three public fundraising events in Sacramento, Hayward, and San Jose. With $48,000 fundraised from these events, the Foundation was able to help approximately 1600 people in need with two self-financed charity trips in July 2019 (from central Vietnam to the North) and again in December 2019 (from central Vietnam to the South).
Since the beginning of 2020, all of fundraising efforts have been organized online due to Covid19. Specially, the Foundation was able to fundraise $93,000 in 2020 and help 5,500 people. In 2021, the Foundation fundraised $128,000 and helped almost 10,000 people.
Now that the Covid19 pandemic seems to be a bit more under control, the Foundation organizes the Meet & Greet Appreciation Event to:
1) Show gratitude and appreciation to the Foundation’s donors and volunteers;
2) Provide a bonding opportunity for staff members; and
3) Fundraise to help more than 200 applications on file for 2022, including scholarship, children with disabilities, orphans, and elderly shut-ins, which totals to $12,000.
At 4:30 PM, the event officially started with the President of the Foundation Dr. Kiet Truong offering the opening remarks, thanking the donors, and introducing guests, including many notable intellectuals living in Sacramento and its vicinities, as well as the 3rd generation guests who were born and raised in the United States.
The venue for this Meet & Greet Appreciation Event is the spacious and quiet garden of Dylan & Samantha’s house, decorated in a meditative style, and includes games for the children; especially the high, wide and open gazebo courtyard.
The event’s menu includes both vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes with Vietnamese homeland style (such as banh beo, fried rice, fried noodles, curry bread, etc.) mixed with local cuisine (such as grilled salmon, butter fried chicken, etc.) interspersed with extremely eye-catching and delicious appetizers. Especially, the dessert part has delicious three-color bean combo chè and chè Thai, along with different kinds of drink; all donated by the hosts Dylan & Samantha for free!
The party seemed more lively by the solo guitar band played by Zayin Collin featuring soft, youthful and romantic cover songs.
After the main course, guests were invited back to the gazebo for a presentation. After that, Dr. Tran Kiem Doan was invided to offer some remark in Vietnamese and English. Although short, his speech left a deep impression in those present; especially in the face of economic, political and social turmoils, there are people who silently devoted their hearts to help those in need. Following that, the endodontist Dr. Loc Tran and dentist Dr. Amy Thu Tran represented the 2nd generation to offer their sincere yet uplifting remarks, with a call for everyone to join hands to help the Foundation for a great cause—for the less fortunate in Vietnam and many parts of the world.
The party became even more fun when it came to raffles with many different prizes. At the end of the event, the Foundation raised $7,769! (Sufficient funding to help hundreds of children in the coming winter.)
At 7:30 PM, the Meet & Greet Appreicaitn Event was officially ended with nostalgia.
1 Amy Thu Tran Rentals $1,175
2 Anne Pham $1,000
3 Anonymous $200
4 Aurelio Campos & Trinh T Tran $500
5 Caroline Nguyen $155
6 Chi Hoang $100
7 Christopher Saepham $100
8 Donation boxes $100
9 Jean Luong $200
10 Kiet Truong $1,000
11 Le T Dang $200
12 Loc $175
13 Majestic Dental Practice $500
14 Mindfulness LLC (Phe Bach) $200
15 Nhac Truong $100
16 Nhan Dang $200
17 Ngoc Tri Dam $100
18 Ning & Jim Downing $200
19 Patris Miller $20
20 Raffle tickets $794
21 Senanu Ekoh & Bright Sewor $160
22 Sherry L. Velte $70
23 Son & Tu $100
24 Thieu Xuan Hoang $200
25 Tri Tran $120
26 Wynn Tran $100
Total: $7769
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