Noble

Christina Noble walks through the streets of Saigon in 1989. She has come halfway across the world on the strength of a dream she had almost 20 years ago. In a series of flashbacks, we see Christina's childhood in the Dublin slums. Her world is shattered at the age of 10 when her mother dies. Her father's alcoholism plunges the family into further poverty and the children are ultimately separated and sent away to industrial schools. She returns to Dublin when she is 16, only to be betrayed by her father and left homeless. She lives rough in the Phoenix Park for a year and struggles to survive. In order to escape the memories of her childhood she leaves Ireland and moves to Birmingham with a friend. For a couple of years her life improves and she gets married to a Greek Cypriot called Mario with whom she has three children. However, as Mario's behaviour descends into chronic infidelity and abuse, Christina begins to have visions and dreams about Vietnam, a country whose location and history she knows very little about. She leaves her home to raise her children in the safety of a new life. Then, with her children finally grown, a brave middle-aged woman decides to pursue her dream. The dream becomes reality on the streets of Saigon when she encounters two young girls, scraping the dirt for any sustenance they can find. She takes them to her hotel and cares for them like they were her own. The two girls lead her to more and more street-children and her destiny unfolds: she will summon the wit, courage and determination that her own survival skills have bestowed, along with an unabashed zest for life and help these children known as 'Bui Doi' - the dust beneath your feet. With the help of new-found Vietnamese friends, including Madame Linh, who runs an orphanage, Christina strives to plan and fund projects to look after the children. This is the beginning of The Christina Noble Foundation that has built over 100 projects across Vietnam and in Mongolia, helping the lives of more than 700,000 children and their families.