In Your Neighbourhood#7- Charity starts at Home
Broadcast Date: 21/12/01
You know the festive cliché: Giving is better than receiving.
But would you mount a personal drive to donate old clothes to a charitable course you encountered overseas?
Hi welcome to In Your Neighbourhood with me, Chong Ching Liang.
This week, we look at a donation drive that started from an individual and result in some very happy street children in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
Sharon Lim is a freelance writer.
In the course of her job, she went to Cambodia and what she saw and the events of the times started her ruminations.
"We were there like almost straight after September 11th so there was a lot of hoo-ha in the media and it just got me thinking. As much as I am sadden by all those people who died and how horrific it is all, I look at the children in Cambodia and I think what's it to them? They don't even have a roof over their head, a decent meal. Even one meal is perhaps all they can get."
In the course of her research on street children, she came into contact with a non governmental organisation, Mith Samlahn.
It was started by a remarkable Frenchman, Sebastien who contributed a huge part of his life to helping the homeless children.
He provided Sharon with a friendly push.
Did Sebastien inspire her?
"Yes! It was so inspirational because here he is, supposed to have just taken one year off, has stayed seven years, practically married to his job."
Well, having a brainwave is one thing, implementing the plan is another.
Sharon on what she faced initially.
"Well in the beginning, it was a bit difficult because it was a Catch-22 situation. On the one hand, I hadn't gotten approval from Silkair, so I wasn't sure how much I could collect and at the same time I didn't want an avalanche of things to come to me and then there would be a storage space and there would be a transport and logistics problems . I approached it by just talking to a few people and telling a few people whom I knew would have the most items that I was looking for ie. Children clothes, toys and shoes."
Kudos to Silkair for donating the luggage space.
Next step. Volunteers.
In a society where time is becoming relatively scarce, this might prove to be a thorny problem.
So planning must be done.
"There was also the consideration that the number of volunteers I could call to help me pack, the number of days that I could get them to pack. The number of people I could call on to help me transport it. You know that sort of things. Logistically that took a little bit of planning and it did take a little bit of raised heart beats. But it all turn out okay as I thought as, as I knew it would in the end."
As the planning unfurls, friends and acquaintances started to rally around Sharon.
Peter Ho, a timber business owner, didn't even know Sharon before this donation mission.
He tells of how he sought a more proactive role.
"First thing that came to my mind was that it was rather ineffective because the question I asked myself was that how is she going to go around? She is going to go to like Tampines, just collect two t-shirts and then go to another friend in Clementi to collect a box of shoes. Then she will spend a lot of time driving around Singapore. So I just talked to her and see if I can help more than just carrying all these stuffs. So we had a very long chat and we ended up having a solution whereby I took the company truck and put it in National Stadium car park and we designate a time and a date. On that time and date, anybody whom we have informed will just drive by and throw everything into the truck."
He modestly calls himself as just the truck driver.
But he made multiple trips and even did everything on his own once.
"And of course the last trip I had come in on my own because Sharon was out of town. So I felt a bit like a burglar because I have to load almost forty boxes onto the truck by myself about four o'clock in the morning. And I think the neighbours, fortunately they were sound asleep otherwise they start peering down and think this guy is stealing the whole house and he even had the time to pack it up into boxes!"
Peter had donated to an Oxfam project before but he says this effort to help Sharon was more satisfying.
Did he get anything out of this?
"Did I get anything out of it? [laughs] Er when I actually got the news that every box went through, I was actually very happy. Prior to that I really didn't feel anything. It was just a job done. But when I got the e-mail that every box went through, its, its not only just a job done. I felt it was, it was a completed mission."
For Sharon and Peter, there is the added satisfaction to see how people are so forthcoming with their gifts.
While Sharon started the project on her own, she never felt alone.
"It really didn't feel that I was doing it alone. I never saw it as an individual project. Yeah sure, I started it. That was my role. I got the ball rolling. But once the ball was rolling, things just followed through. People helped in their individual way. I most certainly wouldn't have been able to pull this through if not for a whole lot of people. Every single person, you know, whether you donate a pair of shoes, or whether you did a whole lot of stuffs. Every single person made a difference because I wouldn't have been able to pull it through."
Dozens of boxes of toys, clothes are now making homeless Cambodian children smile.
And it started from an individual effort that allowed other people a chance to give.
This is Chong Ching Liang, for Newsradio 938.
Related websites:
Mith Samlan
http://www.streetfriends.org
Oxfam
http://www.oxfam.org/
Newsradio 938
newsradio.mediacorpradio.com
You know the festive cliché: Giving is better than receiving.
But would you mount a personal drive to donate old clothes to a charitable course you encountered overseas?
Hi welcome to In Your Neighbourhood with me, Chong Ching Liang.
This week, we look at a donation drive that started from an individual and result in some very happy street children in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
Sharon Lim is a freelance writer.
In the course of her job, she went to Cambodia and what she saw and the events of the times started her ruminations.
"We were there like almost straight after September 11th so there was a lot of hoo-ha in the media and it just got me thinking. As much as I am sadden by all those people who died and how horrific it is all, I look at the children in Cambodia and I think what's it to them? They don't even have a roof over their head, a decent meal. Even one meal is perhaps all they can get."
In the course of her research on street children, she came into contact with a non governmental organisation, Mith Samlahn.
It was started by a remarkable Frenchman, Sebastien who contributed a huge part of his life to helping the homeless children.
He provided Sharon with a friendly push.
Did Sebastien inspire her?
"Yes! It was so inspirational because here he is, supposed to have just taken one year off, has stayed seven years, practically married to his job."
Well, having a brainwave is one thing, implementing the plan is another.
Sharon on what she faced initially.
"Well in the beginning, it was a bit difficult because it was a Catch-22 situation. On the one hand, I hadn't gotten approval from Silkair, so I wasn't sure how much I could collect and at the same time I didn't want an avalanche of things to come to me and then there would be a storage space and there would be a transport and logistics problems . I approached it by just talking to a few people and telling a few people whom I knew would have the most items that I was looking for ie. Children clothes, toys and shoes."
Kudos to Silkair for donating the luggage space.
Next step. Volunteers.
In a society where time is becoming relatively scarce, this might prove to be a thorny problem.
So planning must be done.
"There was also the consideration that the number of volunteers I could call to help me pack, the number of days that I could get them to pack. The number of people I could call on to help me transport it. You know that sort of things. Logistically that took a little bit of planning and it did take a little bit of raised heart beats. But it all turn out okay as I thought as, as I knew it would in the end."
As the planning unfurls, friends and acquaintances started to rally around Sharon.
Peter Ho, a timber business owner, didn't even know Sharon before this donation mission.
He tells of how he sought a more proactive role.
"First thing that came to my mind was that it was rather ineffective because the question I asked myself was that how is she going to go around? She is going to go to like Tampines, just collect two t-shirts and then go to another friend in Clementi to collect a box of shoes. Then she will spend a lot of time driving around Singapore. So I just talked to her and see if I can help more than just carrying all these stuffs. So we had a very long chat and we ended up having a solution whereby I took the company truck and put it in National Stadium car park and we designate a time and a date. On that time and date, anybody whom we have informed will just drive by and throw everything into the truck."
He modestly calls himself as just the truck driver.
But he made multiple trips and even did everything on his own once.
"And of course the last trip I had come in on my own because Sharon was out of town. So I felt a bit like a burglar because I have to load almost forty boxes onto the truck by myself about four o'clock in the morning. And I think the neighbours, fortunately they were sound asleep otherwise they start peering down and think this guy is stealing the whole house and he even had the time to pack it up into boxes!"
Peter had donated to an Oxfam project before but he says this effort to help Sharon was more satisfying.
Did he get anything out of this?
"Did I get anything out of it? [laughs] Er when I actually got the news that every box went through, I was actually very happy. Prior to that I really didn't feel anything. It was just a job done. But when I got the e-mail that every box went through, its, its not only just a job done. I felt it was, it was a completed mission."
For Sharon and Peter, there is the added satisfaction to see how people are so forthcoming with their gifts.
While Sharon started the project on her own, she never felt alone.
"It really didn't feel that I was doing it alone. I never saw it as an individual project. Yeah sure, I started it. That was my role. I got the ball rolling. But once the ball was rolling, things just followed through. People helped in their individual way. I most certainly wouldn't have been able to pull this through if not for a whole lot of people. Every single person, you know, whether you donate a pair of shoes, or whether you did a whole lot of stuffs. Every single person made a difference because I wouldn't have been able to pull it through."
Dozens of boxes of toys, clothes are now making homeless Cambodian children smile.
And it started from an individual effort that allowed other people a chance to give.
This is Chong Ching Liang, for Newsradio 938.
Related websites:
Mith Samlan
http://www.streetfriends.org
Oxfam
http://www.oxfam.org/
Newsradio 938
newsradio.mediacorpradio.com
posted by CHONG Ching-liang | 4:43 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home