A Pleasant Visit

On 12 Sept 2009, we (one of the Hokkien grps) visited 2 elderly. They are Beautiful Granny (sorry i'm not too sure of her name, will find out upon the next next visit :D) and Mdm Tan.

Firstly, we went to Beautiful Granny's house. We helped to do some housechores for her. After all the cleaning, we sat down and had a chat with her. At the same time, she also took out a few photo albums and we all started happily looking at the photos and listening to Beautiful Granny reminiscing about the past. However, when we saw a photo of her son and asked about him, Beautiful Granny felt sad and troubled. She grumbled that her son does not visit her at all. After that, we tried to change the topic and asked where does she usually go and what activity does she usually like to do. After a short sharing session with Beautiful Granny, we realised that she is not as happy as she appeared to be. She confessed that she was just trying to put on a smile for us. She has been feeling depressed, moody and looks troubled. We also found out that Beautiful Granny does not like to go out but staying alone at home also makes her feels moody. There were many times when she just felt totally at loss. I hope that maybe through an outing organise by CSC, we will be able to bring Beautiful Granny out for a walk. Let her be able to enjoy the warmth and happy atmosphere created by us! Hopefully, through an or a few outings, she would gradually change her negative perception and starts to go out more often and participate actively in activities organise by the community centre. :D

Then, we went on to Mdm Tan's house. I have met Mdm Tan during the first visit so was happy to be able to meet her again. Just like the first visit, Mdm Tan is always so friendly, cheerful and she's really cute! :D She was really eager to share her stories and things she had encountered for the past few weeks. Of course, we enjoyed listening to her stories and had a great laugh at some of the interesting issues that she had shared with us! Ever since the first visit, she has been troubling with her housing issue. She is not able to understand the letter sent by HDB. Furthermore, she has difficulty seeing clearly, thus, unable to travel far alone. But we have take note of the problem she's facing and report to the person-in-charge. Hopefully, this issue can be settled as soon as possible. We also realised that Mdm Tan has a very happening life, she has many invitations to different events and celebrations. She looks forward to each and every event. However, as she's unable to see clearly, she's not clear of the date, venue and time. Thus, we read out the details to her and she has a better idea of the events. Although Mdm Tan is unable see clearly, she still live to the fullest of her life and never shuts herself away from the society or any help render to her. This is a positive attitude which I admired of her.

Overall, we really had a pleasant time with Beautiful Granny and Mdm Tan. We hope that through the subsequent visits, we will be able to get to know more elderly and try our best to help them in whatever problems they might be facing. :)



Boon Peng :)

Virgin Entry

This is my second visit with Touch Seniors.

I guess being in the Canto group really makes me feel appreciative that I am a Cantonese and I’m glad it helps me a lot during the visit. The day started with the few of us traveling to Block 62, 11th floor to Madam Choi Moi’s home where it was actually my second visit there. I always remember Madam Choi Moi as a humble lady who has a lot of laughter on her face, she giggle like a child every now and then. But sometimes, when you actually take notice of her, you would begin to feel the vulnerability she held towards her hearing which she felt that she is deaf but interestingly, most of the time she could respond to our question. She really has a booming voice and sometimes I wonder what’s the secret behind that voice.

The second visit was at Madam Tham Po (Ok, I’m not so sure how to spell her name) who lives on Block 61, 6th floor. The moment we stepped into her flat, we were overwhelmed by the sticky floor which we knew needed some serious mopping (Woo hoo! My first experience with house-cleaning). She talks a lot about her leg problem which created much inconvenience with her movement. She gives me the feeling that she wanted to go to many places but she just couldn’t. She told us that she fell down in her home recently, and in the process she banged her hand against one of the wall, leading to a serious blue-black on one of the finger. I’m not exactly sure how rubbing her finger with saliva (which she claimed is therapeutic) could help much, but I’m rather concerned about it. Hopefully we can make a trip down the next visit to see how she is doing so far.

Some of us have grandparents, but many times I believed we are all so caught up with life and work we barely take the time to truly know each other. I always feel the need to never take things for granted, at the end of the day we should take some time to reflect what is really precious to us, and put some sincere effort to saying “Thank you” or “How are you doing?” Life is simply not just only about ourselves and how we feel.

I will always remember the smile behind the frail faces of Madamn Choi Moi and Madamn Tham Po which are filled with so much words unspoken.

James

The 2nd visit :)

HI!
so 12 Sept 09 was my second visit and i had fun :D

First, we went to (English)Mr Tan's house. As usual, we waited outside for him to change his shirt and open the door for us. Haha! The funny thing is his shirt was like torn in the middle. I was so tempted to ask him why.. coz i was thinking maybe he didnt have money to buy new clothes or something like that.But in the end, i asked him. yeah. So he said he purposely tore it coz the weather is hot so that he would feel cooler. HAHAHA! so funnY! but so cute!!! only he would think of that! He could have just taken off his shirt right! Haha! so maybe ill get some cool singlets for him to wear so that he wouldnt need to tear up his wardrobe. :D

Next, we went to (i think) Mr Chew's house. Oh it was my first time there. But nonetheless, had fun :D He's a great singer and he gets very engrossed in his singing! So he sang for us and we clapped for him. hhaaha. Hes a very bubbly man and he was happy too! Oh but his house was hot coz the fan broke down. But its okay! we enjoyed his company and he kind of felt sad when we said we need to leave. :(

Lastly, we went to (Chinese) Mr Tan's house. Oh this time, his wife was there! So cute! And i really think they look alike! okay back to Mr Tan's house. Realised that he had this urine bag attached to him. But he was still as happy! :) Yeah. so sat and talked. Then Mrs Tan and Mrs Tan said they didnt have Channel U in their TV. So Han Shao helped him tune Channel U into their TV. Yeah. And they were really happy and grateful! Oh now they can watch Suria too! :D

Overall it was great! Cant wait for the next visit! See you all soon! :D
Vanessa :)

My first time (bogging)

Hi, never thought I will end up bogging but it end up I have to give my first time (bogging) to TOUCH visit. Haha, forgive me if it sound weird

Since this is not my first time visiting so it is ok for me now but seriously, until now I still dun seem to remember all the names of the people around there. Ok, let me start by saying the feeling when I first visited. I have never taken a interest in community work b4 so at that time, this was just another boring event to me recommend by my friends but after the whole thing is finish, I was feeling great but sleepy (not used to sleep early so sleep at 4 the night b4).

Let me continue with the first elderly we visited, when we go there, she warmly invited us into the house and we started to do the chores shortly after that. I was assign to clean the window and seriously, it is the second time I clean a window (not in NS because I always act busy so window is out of my job scope, wahaha) so I would tend to take a longer time compare to those with experience. by the time, I am done with the window, I saw they were fixing back the fan so I just try to offer my help also but the end, the fan dun "behave" so instead of 1 whole fan, we return it in 2 separate parts (1 is the fan itself, another is the blade arm). We even ask other people for help but I not really sure what goes on after that because by that time, I am in the next house le.

Next, when we reach there, the finally location where food will be provided but first, some chores need to be done. She is a fun-loving lady and even joke with us. I even got 2 nicknames, fat guy (in hokkien) and Mr. goat (because my surname is yang, in Chinese, it refer to goat) but I am ok with the nickname because since it is able to bring laughter to the elderly so why not just laugh it out and dun take it too hard. Oh talking about that, I think I should continue to the food le, there are chicken wings and fried noodles, they were good and healthy (chicken without the skin) and I even eat 2 chicken wings. At first, I try to eat the chicken wing with fork and spoon but end up, it is just me thinking too much and finally, I just eat the chicken wing the way I eat at home (by hand).

Overall, I really enjoy my times there, kaisheng aka KS. =)

初体验。。

损友: wah seh...y suddenly you wanna go join csc?
Me: 我人好有爱心不可以吗?
损友: 屁la..少来。。亏心事做太多right?
Me: ya lor..must earn some good karma ma..cause 认识了你之后，是我的不幸lor.

Well...Okie lar..quite lame but then..its something along that line lar..haha..when my friends and i was talking/chitchat (start of sem quite 'zhuo bo') like..what are you doing this sem etc, taking what modules....so 聊着聊着就聊till this topic lor.. (anyway by now you should see that i m really not blogging in 'Standard English' so bear with it lar hor..will definitely come across chinese la hokkien singlish etc one...)

So like wanted to try out how volunteering work is like..so joined csc. Actually was expecting like some 'tough' work maybe in a sense like help to do chores or really help them cause they might be physically too weak to do certain stuff. So when i got there, was quite surprised that the center was closed. (Then what we supposed to do?) In the end, i realised its more to a house to house visit rather than center based that kind lar...So okie lar..but in the end, there wasnt really much of a physical chore for us to do lar...so just talk to the elderly...Quite relax actually...haha or maybe cause new ma..so dont wanna scare you away on first orientation...Haha..Just kidding...

就 canto站左边，hokkien站右边，english chinese站中间...like tat divide liao...Well i can listen to hokkien but lousy in conversing so 就with my friend 站中间 lor...

Went up to Mr Tan's house..Well he is an english speaking so really 'test' my english also sia...so as the group of us chatted with him, 就满funny 的 lor。。cause he's real old lar..n cant reali hear us well..then we asked him like which places he visited before...he said, "Thailand". After which we switched topic already like 'where to you go and cut ur hair'..he replied, "orh...barber from thailand". We were like 'huh?' so kind of 牛头不对马嘴like that...but a guy for his age..and can talk to us for one hour..wah..realli must 佩服him..

Then we went to the second Mr Tan's house.. again not much of chore help up..just talk to him...then listen to his problems like medical fees and learnt more about him.. what he did when he was young etc...was really enjoyable...

So after the session and also during the session quite a lot of tots went thru my mind..Like its beeen really long since i chatted with an elderly for an hour lar...since my grandma passed away...its like..memories of mine... like sat down listen to her stories in hokkien when i was a child so..yup..就想起阿ma...Then erm...at some point of time there's like moments of silence lar..like dont koe what to ask them le..so maybe the atmosphere kind of awkward at those point of time lar...i guess..maybe we can visit more elders lar..like 45min in one household...instead of an hour for one..which i feel abit long lar..cause...not much to chat with them..maybe cause its the first time also...

So..yup...looking forward to the next session!

-ken-