Making a Difference

The news can often seem a constant stream of bad tidingswars, tsunamis, hurricanesbut every year TIME Asia gets to do something that reaffirms our faith in the goodness of people, and in the world as a wondrous place. In our annual Asia’s Heroes issues, we spotlight ordinary people doing extraordinary thingsinspirations to us all. Next week we publish our latest list. First, though, we catch up with a few of the chosen from last year.

PHAM THI HUE has become a celebrity in Vietnam. The demure former tailor has appeared on television and on magazine covers, traveled abroad, and started working with the U.N. to help HIV-positive people. “I could never have imagined the things I’m doing now in my life,” says Hue, 26. “Just a few years ago, I wanted to die as soon as possible.” In Vietnam, those infected are usually silent and shunned. Hue became a defiant exception. After her drug-addict husband infected her, she went public, and set up a support group in her native town of Hai Phong. In the past year her group has grown to 35 employees and volunteers, thanks to overseas donations. But Hue is still seeking a new pre-school for her young son, after he was forced to sit apart from his classmates last yeareven though he is not infected with HIV. “I need to live as long as possible,” Hue says, “because I have a lot of work to do.”

It’s an old storyboy wins Olympic gold medal, boy is dizzied by newfound fame, boy crashes out of competition. China’s champion hurdler LIU XIANG seemed to be following that trajectory after his golden turn in Athens, where he tied the world record in the 110-m hurdles. The onslaught of patriotic obligations and commercial contracts overwhelmed the laid-back Shanghai native. Even as his visage was plastered on billboards nationwide, Liu lost his athletic focus, spending less time in training and consequently injuring his knee. Nevertheless, by the summer, Liu’s off-track burden had eased, and in August the 22-year-old hurdler strode back onto the medal podium: at the World Championships in Helsinki, he came a close second to France’s Ladji Doucour. And on Sept. 17, Liu raced to victory in front of a jubilant home crowd at the prestigious Shanghai Golden Grand Prix, defeating U.S. hurdling legend Allen Johnson. Trust China’s fleet-footed boy to give that old story a new ending.

if JOHN WOOD were still running a business, he would be looking back on a remarkable year of growth. The founder and chairman of the charity Room to Read, Wood and his associates have doubled the number of schools and libraries Room to Read sets up in underprivileged Asian countries to nearly 2,200. Success doesn’t depend on throwing money at the problem. Instead, Wood seeks to make the community a stakeholder by encouraging local contributions. For example, in Nepal, families brought 50-kg bags of grain which were sold off, raising $1,500 to add to Room to Read’s $8,000. Wood, 41, a former Microsoft executive, combines the passion of a crusader with the calculationand ambitionof a CEO. The lofty goal: 20,000 schools and libraries worldwide by 2020. Says Wood: “There is no better long-term gift you can give a child than the lifelong gift of education.”

Fall From Grace
By Alex Perry

A year ago GAUTAM GOSWAMI was basking in glory. The Indian press had lionized the district magistrate from the eastern state of Bihar for standing up to his political bosses in order to enforce election campaign rules. The sight of an upstanding bureaucrat efficiently coordinating relief to thousands of victims of monsoon floods in a state notorious for crime, corruption and poverty caught TIME’s eye: we made him one of our heroes for 2004. But in August, the Bihar State Vigilance Investigation Bureau charged the 39-year-old civil servant and 10 alleged accomplices with embezzling millions of dollars in relief funds. While Bureau investigators acknowledge Goswami was an efficient aid distributor who did help flood victims, they add that, as the official who authorized payments to relief suppliers, he was the chief facilitator of a scam to overcharge the government by $4.5 million. Bihar’s Additional Director General (Vigilance) Neelmani has also charged Goswami with embezzling a further $3.9 million (not flood relief money) intended for state charities. When the initial accusations surfaced in the Indian Express newspaper in April, Goswami denied them. He has made no public comment yet on Neemlani’s subsequent allegations.