Yến Hai Nguyen: A Rock Climbing Enthusiast, SEA games Athlete And Workshop Leader: Building Community Through Sporting Passion
From the countryside to a city girl, Yen Hai Nguyen was always active and engaged in sport. She’s now found her current calling with rock climbing —- building a community and competing at the SEA games simultaneously.
Yen was active as a child and understood the importance of sport from her Mekong Delta upbringing to the big city of Saigon, and six years ago her life changed for the better when she first walked into a climbing gym.
Yen’s “can-do” attitude for anything sport related meant she took on climbing happily and nonchalantly; there’s a lesson in there to stop overthinking a pursuit and just do it.
Yen was instantly hooked. She’s described spending twelve hours a day on the climbing wall at first, fascinated and curious by every aspect of climbing…how to move flexibly, how to judge angles and how to drag herself up that wall, by hook or by crook.
Physically and mentally, climbing changed her. She understood the parallels between the climbing wall and her life — whenever an obstacle appeared, flexible thinking and looking for another way was the way through. And so Yen would stay there, trying again and again and again until the task was completed. And then she would find the next one.
She had found her calling.
Yen’s commitment, dedication and talent earned her a call several months ago, informing her that she had been selected for the South East Asian games in Bangkok on the 14th December in 2025.
Buoyed and delighted, never thinking she could be an athlete, Yen made a brave move and quit her corporate job. She wanted to leave the safety net behind, focus on climbing and her new passion - building a community, based on the sport she loves.
Yen runs social workshops on weekday evenings and weekend mornings, determined to entice others into the passion she loves. These are based around rock climbing gyms where she lives in Ho Chi Minh, often on Friday evenings and Sunday mornings.
At a climbing wall around the city, you can find Yen and several others learning how to get up the rocks and push themselves to their limits.
As for her own aspirations, she’s healthily ready for the challenge. She’s confident, she’s ready for the competition, and realistic and positive about the outcome.
Her future is bright. From that first ever climb back in 2019 to representing her country in 2025, her story is one of perseverance, passion, authenticity and critical thinking.
Her 2026 calling is very simple; build a community through sport. And she’s doing that daily and weekly. Those interested can access her WhatsApp community here;
https://chat.whatsapp.com/LIpHpjkDfyl7R2IcGWCNx0
To listen to our audio conversation, you can access on the podcast here.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/1is5iycSuIk6WqwUuL5mdU?si=F2Az25C5RjOyXpmZrSJSgg
