T.H.E.seniors

2012-02-11T03:33:00.002+08:00

Ops, really sorry for the late posting~ :p

Ha, this is the second visit of mine!:) and since there're quite few elderly staying at home this week, we had only visited a elderly who are Mdm Chua~

Mdm Chua's home can really be considered quite clean that we didn't really need do too much cleaning stuffs~wat we did were just sweeping and mopping the floor and also wiping windows~all those were done withiin 30 minutes~ :) and for the remaining time, we're just chatting with Mdm Chua~~

We found that Mdm Chua really like the decoration that members of T.H.E seniors did during the week before, especially the "dragon"! She said that every time she woke up and look at the dragon, she'd feel happy^^ ha, i think person who did it will definitely be proud and happy with that^^

While chatting with Mdm Chua, we found that Mdm Chua will always keep repeating what she said, probably is because of the weakening of memory, and really hopefully, her condition will getting better and better!:)

same as the first visit, it's really a good experience!:)

Bringing some joyous elements to the life of elderly is really meaningful^^

2012-02-09T23:22:00.015+08:00

Hello all!

This was my first visit to T.H.E Seniors and first time blogging too! But am excited to share my experience because it was a very rewarding one.

We visited Mr Ling, whom the volunteers have never visited before until the previous session. Therefore there was a lot of cleaning that needs to be done! Mr Ling refused to let us in at first, insisting that his house was very clean and didn't want to trouble us. In the end we tricked him into letting us in by saying we want to go and have a seat to chat with him! HE FELL FOR IT hehe. The moment we went in, we had someone distract him by chatting him up, while the rest of us immediately got down to work. The house looked neat, but it was in fact very dirty! The floor felt grimy and dark rust marks were on the kitchen floor.

We cleaned his toilet and rinsed the walls and shelves of the kitchen. The floors were also mopped and the windows wiped. This ledge was really black at first but some scrubbing revealed the white again!

We checked his utensils and found that they all had rust on them already. Hence we bought him two packets of new forks and spoons. It was also the first time I saw a knife being hung like that. I kept worrying that it'll drop and chop someone's toes >.<

Mr Ling is very spritely even though he is already 86 years old! He knows many languages but knowing that he was Hakka/Khek made me feel a lot more closer to him :) I was very glad that he could speak Mandarin well since I know no dialects. We had a small chat about the Hakka provinces in China and I really enjoyed talking to him. It amazed me how independent he was. We also gave him mandarin oranges as it was still Chinese New Year. I hope it brought some festive cheer to him! :)

- Jiaying (from TEACH!)

2012-02-08T16:00:00.004+08:00

*faints* always tio blogger dunno y so heng or unfortunate... Today was the most "xin nang" visit as we only need to clean up one hse tad is Mdm Ho's one!! To start off, my group got 2 guests from L-derly befrienders, Yu Ting n Hui Min(稀客!!) plus T.H.E.S Wei Jiang. As usual we do the household chores but something different this time round is Bai Nian with mandarin oranges=)
Everything was completed within half an hour.We then sat around Mdm Ho and chat with her. Out of nowhere, enthusiatic Shawn Goh appeared and wanted to help with the cleaning up. Since we have nothing else to do he then joined in the chat. He was so outspoken that he can keep the conversation ongoing with Mdm Ho ; seriously I admire his capability.
Mdm Ho then took out her photos and shared with us her stories including her trip to Hokkaido. She then took out 2 foldable caps and wanted us to put on. We 勉为其难( cant think of a more appropriate word) put on and took a picture with her. To my surprise she was so joyial upon seeing us with the caps on. Haha, tad's was worth it though to cheer her up.
Tad's all for the brief visit today !! Hang on there fighting against the pain Mdm Ho jia you : )

Cheers,
ZW

2012-02-04T23:20:00.003+08:00

Today was the first time I came for a Touch Senior's activity, and it was truly an eye-opening and meaningful experience for me.

I went with several others to Mr and Mrs Tan's flat. It was rather clean and well-kept, although when I mentioned this, I was told that there was still some cleaning that could be done. Indeed, the members of our group immediately set out mopping the floor and cleaning the windows, among other things.

Mr Tan's flat has been plagued by bed bugs for some time. Though pest exterminators have come before, there are still occasional bugs around. Mr Tan produced a powder-based insecticide, and asked us to help him apply some to the holes in the wiring casing and celing corners. Ken and I helped him with this, and in the process, I found a dead large bedbug in one of the holes.

The bedbugs have caused the Tans much agony. When the problem was much more severe, they would come from their nests and crawl all over the ground, eventually finding their way to the Tans. For a period, Mr and Mrs Tan had to leave their lights on when they slept, since the bedbugs seemed to be afraid of the light. The Tans have thrown away their mattresses and some wooden furniture, but even now, an occasional bug stills fall from the celing. They now sleep on blankets on the floor.

As the flat was rather clean, we finished our work in a little more than an hour. We spent the rest of the time sitting down with the Tans and watching TV. We also chatted about many things, including work, studies, health and childhood, and the Tans' hospitality certainly made us feel at home. Mr Tan mentioned how applying insecticide to the high wiring casing holes was inconvenient for him, and we promised to help him with this during our future visits.

-Pius

When the dust gets so thick...

2012-02-03T23:29:00.003+08:00

......you can even write "TOUCH" on the wall with your fingers.

.

Okay the result of blogging only 2 weeks after is that... I've only got super vague impression of who I visited -.- so! I shall blog about the experience! (well that's kinda the main takeaway too right! :x)

When I arrived, I was told to go to the house with "the most slippers outside". (guess who gave this kind of description?) So I did and when I was looking out for the unit with "the most slippers outside" (okay lah actually I was also given the unit number so I was looking for it as well), this ahma that was mopping the floor suddenly pop her head out and said "你在找我吗？" LOL so cute right! I thought she looked familiar because I did the sample namecard of her so I kinda stared at her face long enough already haha. She's none other than our cute Mdm Cheong! :D

My group was mostly done with the deco already so after putting them up, we went to Mr Lim's house! (reaaallyyy relying on implicit memory now :/) Before we went in, he said "Don't need to clean my house! It's very clean, see! Just come in to talk can already" BUT when we went in......

It was super dirty!! Initial inspection: floor was sticky (take note of this word!), bugs in the packet of uncooked rice, salt left in the open, dangling light.

Secondary inspection: kitchen floor is super duper sticky, ALGAE on the sink (thank goodness for stainless steel! must give the inventor a big hug), white tiles turned grey/brown and the natural colour of the toiletbowl water is........ B-L-A-C-K.

Not shocking enough?

While sweeping the floor, swee fen found a half eaten biscuit.

I thought the natural colour of the sink was greenish grey due to wear and tear but nooo its algae.

Food was left in the open.

Spoons were rusty. and I mean 1cm thick of hard, solid, rust.

We can see one part of the skeleton of the ceiling! Not just the paint but a part of the ceiling has fallen off.

....and many more!

Highlight of the day:

Not one not two but THREE baby(take note!) cockroaches appeared when yingcong cleaned the second shelf that was too high for me to reach! (thank goodness for being vertically challenged, it totally freaked the beauty out of me! T^T) Luckily, yingcong was hero enough to catch it!!

I was so freaked out that I jumped backwards (literally!) when someone flipped the floor mat outside the toilet over and I mistook a broken tile chip for a cockroach -_- this is called 杯弓蛇影 *cries*

There was a point of time where I think NINE volunteers were there to do the clean up but it was still not enough to finish cleaning! And throughout the cleaning we kept telling Mr Lim "要好了要好了" but he waited for us till he fell asleep and when he woke up we are still saying "要好了" LOL.

Then, we finally found out the reason why his place was so dirty - he didn't clean it ever since he moved in!! = 20+ years *shocks*

Oh! but one thing worth mentioning is that much as the house was dirty, there isn't any ants! (:

After deciding that we cannot possibly accomplish a full makeover for the house, we left and decided that the next group shall uncover the mystery of.......

What is inside the black kitchen cabinet (read: WHERE ARE THE PAPA AND MAMA COCKROACHES??!!!)

This visit really left a deep impression in me because it really reflects the elderly's attitude towards life after he aged ): I went home and told my mum about this and the law cells in her were activated...which made me quite surprised. She told/asked me:

1) there is a law under HDB that says elderly are not allowed to stay alone when they apply for a flat, so why do most of the elderly we visit stay alone??

2) HDB can actually mend the falling ceiling for free as long as the elderly applies for it, so I think we should either apply for him or get the centre to do so, pronto!

Images of the visit were probably still in my head because I nightmare-d about getting a cockroach attack that night D: humans should evolve to fly, not cockroaches! :C

Okay I'm going to sign off with a rhyme!

- camy is kay-me so please pronounce correctly! (:

MORE DECORATIONS

2012-01-30T00:03:00.006+08:00

SUP ERRIBADIIII

k this visit was a week back so i don't remember everything that went on..

So... in line with CNY, we've been helping the elderly with their spring cleaning and new year decorations! Did that the previous week too.. and now still doing!! sian (just kidding)

Anyway we visited Mdm Tan and Mdm Chua to do just that..

The photos aren't with me so i'll just draw themMdm Tan

Went to Mdm Chua's house first but she wasn't around.. so we went over to Mdm Tan's instead. She was sitting at the lift lobby area but I didn't notice her hahahaha. Anyway we went up to her apartment together.

I think house cleaning wasn't much of a chore. Everybody seemed much more committed to making the decorations (as usual the "8" and the fish). Sometimes it seemed like we were there to make decorations and not spend time with the elderly. Maybe next time we should get them to help out with making the decorations too.

Zhenxiu began making some sort of chain with the angpaos. Damn funny cause who on earth makes hong bao chains. Not exactly "吉利". pardon my chinese

Mdm Chua

Later on we tried to visit Mdm Chua again, but she still wasn't home i think. Then just nice bumped into her just as we were heading back downstairs at the lift. (ha ha to the peeps who went down). Helped her clean up the place a bit and began going crazy with the decorations.

Zhenxiu's chain got transformed into a dragon:

It really looks like that. Anyone who wants to see the real thing can go to Mdm Chua's house or bug wyne for the photos. I think Mdm Chua was quite happy with it. Haha at least everyone else was!

Well that's the end of this entry! Can someone with real photos to upload please do so?

wj

im hurt

2012-01-17T01:20:00.004+08:00

had a conversation with somebody, and that person could not understand why im doing so much for CSC, including the regular visits to the elderly. she found it lame and a waste of time.

im really hurt.

i have joined t.h.e.s in year 1, all by myself without knowing anybody. i thought "just try out lar, no harm". then i became the programmer, and started planning events for the elderly. the activities i have planned are not perfect.. but seeing the smiles of the elderly i have really fell in love with t.h.e.s.

then in year 2 i thought i shld relax myself a bit before going exchange. but it wasnt until exchange then i began to realise i have wasted 6mnths in nus leading a life without any purpose. so i approached darren (ex-chairperson) to tell him i hope i can be in the committee for t.h.e.s again. i really want to do more for t.h.e.s

throughout the years in t.h.e.s... i have seen volunteers come and go. even some of my really good friends i have made in t.h.e.s, i no longer seen them around. to be honest, im really sad to see that happening. i have always seen new volunteers coming in , full of excitement, talking to the elderly like they are their own grandparents.some even went the extra miles for the elderly. but somehow.. after a few mnths.. they left. they disappeared. only a few stayed on. i understand the busy schedule of students, i understand after entering the workforce ppl have less time. im not asking for full attendance.. but at least appear once in a while to visit the elderly. they are old, but they remember you. and i doubt you have forgotten them.

even if i cant join any csc projs anymore, i will never give up t.h.e.s. i will stay on.

okay, i think i have went a bit out of point.

but yeah, i have found my meaning in life. have you? :)

wynne

Let's clean & decorate for the new year! ;)

2012-01-08T22:23:00.005+08:00

On the 7 January visit, my group visited Mdm Tang, Mr Tan & Mdm Choy Moi ;)

Mdm Tang is one of the new elderlies that we visit, and according to Sheng Xian, she was too engrossed watching Taiwanese soap opera last visit to chat with them ;p But this visit, she happily invited us into her home, and allowed us to do some cleaning for her. I was cleaning the window grills, when she came over and said some stuff to me in Hokkien, and I pretended to understand her (even though i didn't ;p), and I guess I didn't do what she was trying to tell me to do because she said the same thing a second and third time.. Luckily, Joanne came to my rescue. Mdm Tang wanted me to wipe the windows.. (Joanne doesn't know Hokkien too, so I guess I need to brush up on my inference skills..)

I'm guessing Mr & Mrs Tan clean their home ever so often because their place is even cleaner than mine.. ;p Their kitchen tiles are like wow, sparkling white! But he allowed us to do some wiping and cleaning for them.. Mr Tan is cute and shy, and he calls Mrs Tan a 外星人 because she needs to have her lunch by 1130am hahaha ;) He offered us drinks, but Joanne and I secretly sneaked them back into the fridge when he was not looking. It was so funny because he was saying 喝水啊, pointing to the table where all the drinks except for his were missing.. ;p I also saw bed bugs for the first time in my life! It was kinda shocking to hear that they've been living with the bed bug problem for 6 months! Really hope that the problem gets settled for them by the new year..

Mdm Choy Moi is simply one of the cutest and funniest elderly I have ever met! She is always so happy to see us, and her smile and laugher are so so so contagious! From her cactus, to her hair and smile, everything about her is so cute and funny! She allowed us to decorate her home any way we wanted (yay!), and sat on her usual chair observing us, smiling and laughing at what we were doing occasionally. And finally when we were done, she said it was pretty and took a few pictures with us and our finished 'product'! hehehe ;D

cheers! ethel ;D

2012-01-08T22:15:00.005+08:00

To mark the start of the new year this week we done spring cleaning and chinese new year decoration for the elderly.As usual we split ourselves and proceeded to the units.The first one visited was Mr Lin ( new beneficiary assigned) , this uncle is damn hilarious. His house is extremely dirty and in a mess but he insisted he doesnt need any cleaning and tidying up. We guessed he regarded us as strangers since this is our first encounter with him afterall. Fortunately he agreed to let us touch up on his house on the next visit !! :)

The second one visited was Mdm Lim Chuay. We did the usual house cleaning and cny decoration at her hse. Most of the time we were doing the cny deco and neglected her unfortunately as we were too engrossed in the deco making.

The last one visited was Mdm Ho. We helped her with the normal household chores and changing of her bedsheet by the two gals , Carline and Jocelyn. Yi An also bought her a cake as we missed her birthday earlier on and celebrated her belated bdae. She was jovial when we sang her bdae song and was so touched!! Haha .. I guessed that's it for this week !!

Shawn...

2012-01-06T20:14:00.002+08:00

Hello people! Late entry, 3rd time blogging! :)

Let's talk a bit about the major outing on 20/12 at Botanic Gardens (otherwise it will be a very short post hahaha). Thankfully it didn't rain that day although the sky's gloomy. And the participation rate of both volunteers and seniors are very high! Became a freshie leader leading the senior volunteers and the folks. Basically we took a walk in the orchid garden which hosts many species of orchids and other plants, playing games, singing xmas carols in between. The folks in our group were lively and participated actively in all the activities, especially the lady who sings very well, can't remember her name. Would like to thank the folks, as well as the volunteers in my group who helped take care of the folks as well as to help us navigate our way through the park. :)

Back to main point. On New Years eve last week, my group and I visited Mdm Ho. Mdm Cheong wasn't around so we stayed at Mdm Ho's place all the way until the visit ended. And so we helped her clean her flat by cleaning the windows, the floor and wiping off dust from table tops and surfaces. Something I learnt: don't be afraid to ask for things like window keys; I was asked to clean the windows but the grills were locked. I tried to improvised by using a pole to stretch to the external side of the window which obviously didn't work. So Ken asked me to ask Mdm Ho for the key hahaha. When we were done, we gathered around (there was a large group of us, about 10) and chatted with her.

Next visit's tomorrow! It will be 大扫除 to prepare for the upcoming lunar new year. Cya all then!

-Jeremy :D

31st Dec Visit

2012-01-06T12:16:00.003+08:00

This week visit is a little shorter than usual, as most of the elderly was invited to lunch at the new opening of a coffeeshop, hence they are not around for us to visit.

For my group, we visited Mdm Chow Moi first, and her house was generally clean, so we just sat down and have a chat with her till 11.30pm where she will be attending the lunch buffet too. She doesn't use her hearing aid anymore, so we need to speak louder and repeat a few time or else she wasn't able to hear us.

Next, we went to Mdm Chua house, where we help her clean her house. We mainly helped her clean her cupboard and drawer, as we found it dirty, and also there are cockroaches eggs? (not sure what it was) She also handed us money to buy Baygon and air freshener, and Shawn took up the task of doing it. Though her memories is not as good as it used to be, somehow she can 'sense' that the money she gave us is not enough to buy the things requested (overshot by around 70 cent), as she kept asking whether the money is sufficient.

Other than that, it is the usual routine and we ended the day by visiting the new coffeeshop too :)

-Eng Soon

2011-12-26T21:53:00.002+08:00

I am so sorry for the delay of this post!

Belated merry christmas everyone! And so grateful that our major outing turn out fine even though it drizzled a little=)

Last saturday my group went to visit Mdm Chua, Mdm Ho and Mr Chiu. I swept the floor at Mdm Chua's house and found it quite dusty becasue she said she won't clean or sweep the floor herself. She will mostly spend her day at the centre during weekdays. Also she keep saying that she is very fortunate to live in this estate because there are volunteers like us who will visit her. She said she gets agitated rather easily and will feel like crying for no apparent reason. We feel sad to see her like this. Hope that our presence did bring a tinge of joy to her!=)

Next we visited Mdm Ho and I also swept the floor. She told us about her gradchildren and god-children. She treated one of our volunteers to a bao and another to the chee chong fun that they got from the church.

Last but not least we visited Mr Chiu. He received a very interesting electrical appliance which can help to wash his butt. But we did not know how to fix it to his toilet bowl and to prevent us from spoiling his toilet bowl, we gave up the idea of fixing for him. Zhenxiu bought 3 more cds to add to his collection. It's a pity that it is a karaoke cd so he cannot listen to cd at home since he does not have a vcd player. Maybe if we can, we can try to get a cheap vcd player for him?

Yup that's all. Looking forward to the next visit!=)

Sheng Xian

My first experience with T.H.E

2011-12-19T13:47:00.003+08:00

Last Saturday was a special day for me because it marks my first volunteering experience with T.H.E.! I was assigned to be in the same group as Yinmin, Criss, Pheng Heong and Jeremy that morning. :D

We started off our day by visiting Mdm Cheong. Upon arriving, I noticed the cute lady in the house walking towards us. But the rest laughed and joked about Mdm Cheong being a “Commando”. I was taken aback by Mdm Cheong’s superb memory as she could easily recall who she had seen before and pointed out that I am the newcomer! HAHA. As usual, Mdm Cheong delegated task for each of us. After completing our “missions”, we settled now and had a good chat with Mdm Cheong. I was touched and amazed by Mdm Cheong’s positivity towards life as she talks about how she actively tries to stay healthy by exercising frequently and how she tries to活到老，学到老. I was surprised that Mdm Cheong actually knows so many languages! That morning she demonstrated Chinese, English, Teo chew, Hokkien and even Malay! I’m ashamed that I’m struggling with Hokkien even though it’s my dialect. Goshh. :X

After which, we visited Mdm Tan. She is a petite elderly who greeted us with her lovely smile. We helped Mdm Tan cleaned her house and checked her mails that morning. During our conversation with Mdm Tan, she told us that she plans to stop accepting meals provided by the Buddhist Society as she heard from her friends that the CC may be catering daily meals for the elderly. Moreover, the volunteers from the Buddhist society have been interviewing her frequently, asking her about how many children she has and how much money they give her monthly. Mdm Tan was worried that this may implicate her children. As such, she is hoping that the CC would be catering food for the elderly so that she can stop accepting meals provided by the Buddhist Society. We might want to take note of this matter during our next visit to Mdm Tan’s house. Also, Mdm Tan was telling us that she enjoys the food provided during the occasional buffets organized by the CC. However, she has stopped attending such activities due to her failing eyesight. She can’t exactly see what food she was taking and was afraid of asking the other elderly for fear of troubling them. This broke my heart upon hearing that. I am really amazed by Mdm Tan’s courage towards life. Regardless of the difficulties she is facing, Mdm Tan is always bearing a smile on her face.

Lastly, we visited Mdm Chow Moi’s house. Mdm Chow Moi greeted us with her wide smile. We didn’t have time to clean up Mdm Chow Moi’s house today due to the shortage of time. During our conversation with her, she noted Pheng Heong as the giggling boy. HAHA. As Pheng Heong and Mdm Chow Moi tease each other, we noticed that Mdm Chow Moi has been coughing quite badly. We asked her if she has sought a doctor but she said it would be a waste of money. As such, she is only taking 枇杷膏to relieve her cough.

I had an enjoyable and enlightening experience interacting with the elderly at T.H.E. I have learnt so much from the elderly I visited. I’m surprised by their spontaneity and their strong will towards life. These are lessons that we can’t learn from books and school. My experience with the elderly last Saturday morning certainly motivates me to quickly brush up my Hokkien. There is so much that I would like to learn about them. I am looking forward to the good memories and laughter to come! I am praying hard that it won’t rain tomorrow. I am certain that tomorrow’s major event would be filled with love and fun! :D Aja Aja Fighting! ^^

lots of love,
Carline :)

3 Dec 2011 Visit

2011-12-13T23:43:00.002+08:00

Hey! Sorry for posting so late. Had to settle other things :/

Anyway, Jian Ting (I may have typed her name wrongly, do help me edit it Im wrong), Guowei, Eng Wee and myself visited Mdm Lim, Mdm Tan and Mr Chiu.

We went to visit Mdm Lim first. We didn't need to do any housework so we just sat there and talk to her. She was telling us that she quite frequently get breathless and her heart will beat very fast. Then she will need to take medicine to calm these symptoms down and if she take 3 tablets already and the symptoms still dont stop then she will need to go down to see the doctor. Because of this condition, she was feeling quite depressed and was saying that if she passes on then so be it... better than having to suffer through this :/ She also said that sometimes her legs will feel very weak and will give way so she need to walk around with a walking stick. And because of her spinal cord sticking out, she has to sit up to sleep instead of lie down. Her visitation reports show that we never really visit her either cause she's not at home or not feeling well. If any of us get to visit her again do try to cheer her up :D :D and also check on her condition :D:D

At Mdm Tan's house we help her do housework - clean the windows, sweep the floor and mop the floor. Her eyesight as usual not very good. She told us that she ask her friend to help her buy those packet coffees from the supermarket. She said that she every morning also need to drink coffee.

Finally, we visited Mr Chiu's house. No cleaning was needed. He was reading chinese newspaper before we arrived. He showed us songs lyrics of an event he attended organised by the CC if im not wrong. There were quite alot of people that participated in the event. I think it was something like there were a some people who had to go up on stage to sing the songs that were on the song lyrics paper he showed us.

Yep that's about it. Sorry can't really remember everything we talked about with the elderly. If i miss out anything do add in! :D

Cheers,
Yixiu

3 Dec Visit! :)

2011-12-12T03:37:00.001+08:00

Heyhey! Sorry for the late post oops!
My group consisting of wynne, zhenxiu and ying cong went to visit Mdm Chua and Mdm Cheong on saturday.

Mdm Chua was a little emo that day, as she was having a headache too. She tends to be very forgetful, and I realized her bedsheet hasn’t been changed for some time although she always said that she’ll change it the following day. Maybe we could help her with it if it hasn’t been changed by the time we next visit her. Mdm Chua also insisted on treating us to coffee, so maybe we should arrange hers to be the last slot, so we can bring her down for coffee next time. We did the usual cleaning, and settled down to watch the tv, which was airing the show about celebrity dads learning how to take care of their kids. Mdm Chua told us that in the past, only the woman in the house takes care of the kids, while the man goes out to work and earn $$ for the family. Guys must learn from these celebrity dads k! :)

We then proceeded to Mdm Cheong’s house. We could smell the aroma of the jin zhen hua liang teh she was boiling from the doorstep. She was very cheerful that day and looked really pretty in her flowery blouse. :) After splitting the work among us and having done them all, we settled down to chat. Mdm Cheong told us that she is trying to learn to speak Chinese, so she kept trying to identify objects using Chinese. I really take my hat off to Mdm Cheong’s 活到老学到老 spirit. Meanwhile, Wynne had a good sleep in the beach chair while Mdm Chua looked on and laughed. Hehe.

Yea that’s about it for last sat’s visit. See you guys and the elderly soon! And please help publicize about our MAJOR OUTING on 20th Dec and get your friends to join us too, it'll be fun! :D

yinmin

12th Nov visit

2011-11-23T09:44:00.003+08:00

Hello all! Pai seh ah, exam period then I mug until forget to blog. Haha.

Anyways, we visited Mr Tan! It was the first time I visited his place since I joined and I was excited so I took a picture of it. Haha. He would be on his way out more often than not when we wanted to visit him. So for those of you who weren't lucky enough, here's a picture of us in his house!

I came only for the later part so I wasn't too sure what happened earlier but I heard them discussing about the European debt crisis so I guess Mr Tan is quite an interesting elderly. And I arrived late, so they're just done with the cleaning up. Haha.

Mdm Ho

And so I jumped group and joined the group visiting Mdm Ho. Her legs are slightly better already I guess, but she looks skinner compared to the past so she needs to eat more. But anyways, we moved her sofa down to the void deck because she doesn't want it anymore. It's a good thing I guess, no sofa means lesser place for the bedbugs to breed because the bedbugs situation seems quite bad at her place. As usual, we helped her to clean the floors and fans and to beat the carpets. There's quite a lot of hair stuck to the carpets so maybe we'll need a vacuum cleaner to remove them or something like that.

Anyways, we created quite a mess trying to operate the washing machine because she only wanted us to remove the curtains and put it into the washing machine but we thought she wanted us to wash the curtains for her. First, we had difficulty figuring out how to add detergent into the washing machine, which took us some time. Second, we didn't know that we have to put the water outlet pipe into the toilet so the waste water ended up flooding the kitchen. Lucky for us, we managed to clean up the mess before she realises. Haha!

That's all from me and good luck for all your exams, though it's a bit late! =P

Yi An

2011-11-14T15:33:00.000+08:00

Newbie in the house yo! Anyway, 12th November comprised of visits to Mdm Tan and Mdm Cheong.

Mdm Tan seemed like a really cheerful lady. Bright smile and all. The first thing we did at Mdm Tan’s place was to do the routine clean up- sweeping and mopping of the floor, and cleaning of the windows. Next up, we helped check the bag of canned foods at her place; whether they were expired etc. In addition, we had a difficult and somewhat hilarious attempt to explain the different canned foods to her in dialect e.g. instant or required cooking, and what they were. After which, we sat around and had a little chat with her. Being terrible in dialect, I just sat in the circle and listened. I understood (partially) but I could not participate in any way. Language barrier; I need to work on my dialect and overcome that. First up on my to-do list after exams! We had also found expired medication on her shelf, to which one of the eye drops had an expiry date in 2009. Therefore, I personally feel that the checking of medication expiration should be a key agenda when doing house visits. We definitely do not want medication which was intended to improve their conditions to turn around and end up aggravating their conditions, do we?

Next up, we made our way to Mdm Cheong’s place. She seemed like quite an energetic lady, given that she was active in helping out in the housework which we were performing for her. Apart from the usual clean up, Mdm Cheong requested that we cleaned the back of her television which was somewhat her mini storage area and it was collecting dust. After the clean-up of her place, Mdm Cheong was so kind to offer us drinks! While sitting around chatting, she showed us photos of the chalet she had recently attended which was a 2 day stay as she explained. She seemed quite excited when she took out the programme booklet and showed it to us, and in her attempt to introduce some of the people in the pictures to us. Seeing that such events bring so much joy to individuals like Mdm Cheong, I believe that the upcoming visit to Botanic Gardens for Christmas would be a visit that many of the elderly would look forward to. However, we should consider factors like walking durations for future outings as Mdm Tan from our first visit of the day had raised this concern because she said that her legs were weak and feared that the outing would be too physically strenuous.

Anyway, exams are coming! Good luck and mug hard to all! Till we meet again for the next visit.

Regards,
Kelly

Good to be back!

2011-11-12T20:05:00.002+08:00

It's been quite some time since I last visited the elderly..well at least I'm done with all those assignments for now..and exams are really around the corner!

It's heart-warming to see the 'lao jiaos' and at the same time, abit 'alienated' to see new freshies as well (laughs). But it's really good to see more people joining the seniors. And this time, more guys than females! Definitely have to give credit to the new committee for the successful publicity! (heard that most of the 'gong lau' came from Yi An who sacrificed his 'se xiang'..Well done 'tong zhi'! (Salute!no wonder you been hitting the gym to buff up)..Okie enough of the crap...

Visited Mr Tan of blk 62 today and asked about the bedbug situation in his house. Conditions have improved, however only slightly. He is still able to catch some of them at night, crawling underneath his pillow etc. Anyone knows how to tackle the problem of bedbug? Does spraying of insecticides help? or are there something that we can do to help? feel free to share! Got to chat with him more today and realize that he is very knowledgeable in current affairs (i.e. European debt crisis etc) and he likes singing! So do chat with him more on these topics while you watch the TV with him.

Next we visited Mdm Choi Moi. Jovial as usual, I hardly remember any instances that she ain't smiling! However, my 'dan tian' is not strong enough to sustain a long convo with her (cause she is hard on hearing and most of the time we had to raise our voice to talk to her. And if she still can't make out what we said, we had to repeat it again and again..). Was working on a project for my prof earlier on the elder's attitude towards assistive technologies (i.e. usage of hearing aid and walking cane etc) and it kind of struck me why she does not put her hearing aid even though she has one. Citing that it is troublesome and not comfortable, she doesn't use it. I guess lots of other elderly also think that way. Perhaps we should try to encourage them to use these AT, as the more that they don't use it, their conditions would deteriorate way much faster...

Lastly, visited Mdm Ho. The other group of people helped threw away her sofa under the request of Mdm Ho's daughter. Guess the sofa is also kind of old and I think it's wise to throw it away to help alleviate the bedbug problem in her home as well (of course, the sofa is kind of spoilt as well, given its long serving services to withstand the pressure exerted by particularly zhen xiu la, Wynne la, every visitation. Haha). Mdm Ho is still in and out of the hospital for her leg problems but her mental status is all well and good!

All right, that's all the update for now. Nice to meet all the new people! (I will ask the names next time la..haha.. I old already, lazy to memorize names). All the best for the exams peeps!

Ken Chandrakumar s/o Muthusamy Pillai Narendran - gosh it's damn hard to remember this la!

Some pictures that overdued =P

2011-10-31T20:53:00.005+08:00

Free shot from Mdm Chow Moi

Photo of shot presentation

Mdm Choi Moi's new hearing aid

Group photo at Mdm Tan's place

Yi An

2011-10-30T07:14:00.003+08:00

As usual we were divided into groups but today instead of 3 we formed 2 groups instead as some elderly were either unwell or not around at home. Thereafter we proceed to the new elderly hse , Anthony's unit. I must say he is the most amusing joker I ever encountered so. Before we went into his unit , his neighbour who is a divorcee auntie kept telling us to visit him often so that he wont be tad lonely. At that moment we were feeling awkward for some reason haha ... Anthony didnt required any form of tidying and cleaning of his house so we sat around him and chat with him. Oh btw , he is an english-speaking elderly so whoever doesnt understand dialects can visit him ! There he goes telling us his stories of his past experience in Saudi Arabia such as his diet,his encounter with the women there etc. And he made dis statement that amuses us when he mentioned the ladies there cmi and the others are left for ya guys to find out.Btw all his storylines are somehow similar to what we had seen in the dramas and I bet all would enjoyed it. To end it off the visit to his unit, we revealed a big secret that his neighbour might be carrying a torch for him ..Omg Lols !!

Next we made our way down to Mdm Chua's hse.This is the first time I went to her hse.Initially she wanted us to just chat with her but Yinmin and Wei Jiang took the initiatives to sweep her house though while we were like slackers dots..Wei Jiang even went to the extent of wiping the floor instead of mobbing the floor , something that must be complimented . Mdm Chua wanted to treat us lunch at the coffeeshop and she unknowingly kept repeating it. Although she was abit 'lo so' , she didnt meant it and was quite cute in a certain way I guess. She also kept talking about her grand-daughter and this was when Wynne interrupted and asked Mdm Chua to intro her to us. We were taken by surprise and we knew tad was a joke. And so the whole conversation revolved around these 2 topics , the treat and her grand-daughter mainly.

To end our day we proceeded to the last unit , Mdm Tan's hse. This was where the other group joined us shortly after we done all the cleaning up. Everyone was chatting among themselves while some sat around Mdm Tan to chat with her. Follow up on this can juz refer to Ying Cong's post haha to avoid repeating the same stuff again.

Our day ended by normal debriefing and having lunch together at the market. Today we created smiles once again on the beneficiaries and hopefully this will keep them going on cheerfully in their lives : )

Shawn

Visit on 29 Oct

2011-10-29T16:49:00.002+08:00

Hi Everyone

Having missed the past few visits, it is good to be back. It was also nice to see some new faces (ok, maybe it's because I have been away). Anyway, we were divided into 2 groups and the first my group went to was Mdm Ho's house. Mdm Ho seems to be getting less mobile. Besides that, her house was struck with bedbugs. So we helped her to change her mattress cover. She made a concoction of some powder and dettol to apply to her bed frame. She seems to be getting less cheerful. I think getting hospitalised a few months back has made her feel more vulnerable.

Next we went to Mr Tan's house. Again, his house was struck with bedbugs. Mr Tan did not need us to clean his house but we helped him to tilt his cupboards as he suspected that the bedbugs hid at the foot of the cupboards. Because of the bedbugs, Mr Tan discarded his bed and Mrs Tan and him sleep on the floor now.

We were then supposed to go to Mdm Chow Moi's house but she wasn't around. So we joined the other group at Mdm Tan's house instead. Didn't do anything there as the other group had already cleaned her house so we just sat and chit chat.

Having kena bedbugs before, I know it's really troublesome. Hopefully the bedbugs will all go away as soon as possible and I hope it won't turn the volunteers away. Just make sure check your stuffs, your clothes and wash yourselves up and it should be fine :) That's it! Jia you for all those who have projects/assignments/tests due in the next few weeks!

Ying Cong

2011-10-09T17:17:00.003+08:00

Hello! This is Shi Tien, my 2nd time blogging in my 3 years (old liao~).

This time round I joined the Canto group although I dont know how to speak canto, I can listen to it prety well!! But we got a pro-canto speaker in our group, so all speaking will be done by her and I shall do all the housechores:D

Mdm Cheong's house is the 1st place we visited. For those who never visited Mdm Cheong at all, you will miss out her "command" skills. As usual of what she will do, Mdm Cheong likes to be organize and then "command" us to do some chores. As for me, I am the window cleaner that day!! After the cleaning, we sat down and prepared to have a chat with her. And then, without us realizing, Mdm Cheong got hold of a kitchen knive and like going to "kill" someone, argh.....!! Haha:D I am just kidding, Mdm Cheong only wanted to open the packet drinks and treat us to it. So, seeing Mdm Cheong holding a weapon, everyone becomes obedient and get a drink. So, we continue with some little chats with Mdm Cheong and she is going for a camp (wow! strong and healthy). Mdm Cheong, have fun there!!

Next, we went to Mdm Chow's house. I have visited her several times since I joined T.H.E. She is a very cheerful person and always carry a smile with her at all times! And as usual, i hardly got the chance to clean her house as she doesn't require us to clean. So, everyone sat down and have a chat with her! Since Mdm Chow is a canto speaking person, we let our pro-canto speaker, Wan Jun, to sit beside her to chat. That day, Wan Jun literally becomes Mdm Chow's granddaughter as our dear Wan Jun keeps lying on Mdm Chow's legs (and Mdm Chow keeps patting her!). Mdm Chow also tried to tie Wan Jun's hair several time but not very successful. Oh ya, Mdm Chow dont like to be massage as she dont like to be tickled, so it ended up having Mdm Chow massaging Wan Jun!!! Next time, we should help Mdm Chow to overcome her fear of getting massage :D

Yup, that's all for the visit that day! Another meaningful and unforgettable visit! See ya everyone soon at the next visit =)

Shi Tien

2011-10-08T12:26:00.003+08:00

Yo! Jeremy here. 3rd visit on 1st October 2011 (children's day hahaha), 2nd time blogging. Quite a late entry so sorry about that. Here we go.

There were some activities at the void deck like a fortnight ago. This time it was an event held by the Boys and Girls Brigade. A few school children were teaching the elderly how to make balloon sculptures. Many smiles on their faces!

First, we visited Mdm Chua's place. After we cleaned her flat, we sat down and chatted with her. She was a jovial and friendly lady. Sad thing was that she tends to forget and asked some questions over and over again, for example asking us if we want coffee, and where was our next destination. Furthermore, she doesn't go outdoors often as she may forget her way home. This is one of the horrible things that old age can do to us when we grow older. Before we left, we took a group photo together.

Next up we visited Mdm Tan. I remember that during my first visit, she was the first senior I visited. Her house was clean and tidy so we chatted with her. She has cataracts, so some parts of her vision is blurred. She was also camera sensitive when we took a photo with her. When we were taking her shots, she would wear her trademark glasses and smile to the camera.

That wraps up the visit on Children's day. See you guys soon next week!

-Jeremy :D

2011-10-06T17:13:00.004+08:00

Hello! This time it's Pheng Heong bringing you the exciting happenings from the Chinese dialect group.

Our last visit on 1st Oct kicked off with a birthday celebration for Mr Chiu. He'll be 74 years old this coming Sat, quite the young one huh (: Mr Chiu loves singing. He even wrote a song himself! He was too shy to sing it at first, saying it's too 肉麻 (mushy), but his inner showman couldn't resist in the end.

His songbook

Charming the girls. Guys, you know what to do! (:

He had a lot of wishes... Pic from our Facebook Group

Next we went to Mdm Ho's house where the mood wasn't quite as jovial. Apparently she's been troubled by bedbugs recently. The guys dusted out her mattress and made sparing use of insecticide as a temporary measure, on top of our usual housekeeping.

Mdm Ho is one well-travelled and chatty lady, and shares with us stories of her visits to countries like Hokkaido, Japan. She must really have been something to be seeing the world back in those days. If she's in the mood she'd show us photos, and tell us about "wa ey da por lang" (literally "my man" in Hokkien).

But that day Mdm Ho was a little more pessimistic. You know, when it was her time to go, that kind of stuff. It's inevitable that the elderly will have these thoughts, and consoling them beyond the usual "Choi!" and "Take each day as it comes" remains an art for me.

Cheer up, Mdm Ho!
We'll see you again on our next visit on the 15th.

All the best to people who still have their mid-term exams!

Pheng Heong

2011-09-19T22:30:00.003+08:00

On the 17th September 2011 was my third visit so far yet to my surprise the number of people who attended was much lesser than the previous one lols!! As usual we were split into 3 main speaking groups namely the eng/mandarin , hokkien and cantonese groups thereafter proceed to the respective units.
As we made our way to the units , we came across a crowd of elderly queuing up to get their food and many of them waved and greeted us with smiles.Thinking about it , it was quite enjoyable to hang out and mingle with the lot when we are elderly like them in a few decades.
It was a joke when all the units we went the elderly were not at home !! We wanted to chill somewhere and I went down the stairs from the 11th floor , thereafter to realise Mdm Tan was takin the lift when I was walking down the stairs. And yea the first unit we visited was Mdm Tan's house , as usual the house was already tidied and clean but we still continued the normal household clean-up. After that we sat down and chat with her and as usual the 'high' Wyne did most of the talking. Mdm Tan randomly wanted a photo of her taken previously in the pretext for informal use. But to me I guessed she wanna keep a photo for her "sheng hou shi" , for a moment we had the same kind of feeling too. Indeed life is unpredictable we should live life to the fullest and always be as cheerful as Mdm Tan. Before we went off we took some pictures with her and hopefully the happy moments with us will remain with her and keep her moving on.
The next unit we visited is an epic one that is Mdm Choi who had 'selective hearing'. She always claimed that her hearing is deteriorating but I gave her the benefit of doubt. But it is interesting though for she can filter those she dont wanna hear and listened to those she liked. But u might be surprised to see that she can actually eat quite a big chunk of the mooncake without denture on ... We also chat with her and helped her with some household chores. Oh ye she was lamenting her television broke down when Wyne switched it on and realised the tv set was actually still working just that Mdm Choi switch to a blank channel. Haha !! Elderly are sometimes quite interesting when u saw the flabbergasted looks on their face filled with innocence when u solved something which they can't. We left shortly after proceeding to Mdm Cheong's house.
Wah.. this Mdm Cheong was really hard to tackle with , she was like giving us a list on the do's and don'ts and what to do for her household chores. We even went to the extent of helping her to wipe the pipes. But afterall I found her amiable and amusing when we conversed with her. I was nearly tricked by Wyne into placing her chairs next to her bed ( chairs touching bed frame ) but luckily Li Young cautioned me not to do that. I heard that previously she was somehow unhappy when someone did that claiming that dust would accumulate on it. Therefore we had to ask her what to do first before we actually started the work distribution. Before we left we gave her a mooncake and took some pictures with her.
This visit gave me an insight to the different personalities of the elderly and better understanding of the inner world of them. My day ended with making the smiles on them bringing joy to them as well as to me : )

Shawn

2011-09-19T00:32:00.002+08:00

On 17^th September it marks my second visit with T.H.E. Seniors, and I am really looking forward to it. We got an additional task today, and that is to distribute the mooncakes to the elderly and take photo of them with the mooncakes. Anyway, this is my first time blogging, so here it goes.

My group first visited Mdm Chua, where we get down to the usual routine of cleaning her window, floor, and fulfilling any other requests she had for us, while the others sat down and accompanied her for a chat. Seeing the conversation with her reminded me of what age can do to us (which is quite saddening). Though Mdm Chua is still looking energetic and jovial, her memory just wasn't as good as it used to be. Our conversation with her was sometime kept in a loop, where she will keep asking the same few questions, for example, “How do we know her home number?”, “Did she said the wrong number just now?”. But the group (yinmin, sheng xian) attended to whatever she ask with patience, and they bring liveliness to the same few conversation. I think this is really important as it will help her stay mentally and socially active. :)

Before leaving her home, our leader, mingyuan, suggested to take a group photo with her, and upon knowing we want to take a photo, Mdm Chua went to the back and comb her hair, and put on her spectacles as she wanted to look good in the photo. It all ends well seeing Mdm Chua is still so cheerful and happy.

After leaving Mdm Chua house, we then went on to Mr. Tan apartment, whom wasn't around, and thus, we headed to Mr. Chiu house to meet up with the other group. So we had around 12 people in Mr. Chiu house, where we sat down to chat with him, providing multiple pairs of “listening ears” too. As the conversation goes on, we found out that he bought new Karaoke VCDs, but didn't actually have any media player able to play it.

Well, the time had come for all the visits to end, and we had the usual debrief and sharing between groups, before finally parting out way. Though the turnout wasn't anything like my first visit, but it was still a really fun and refreshing experience, helping others and interacting with the elderly.

- Eng Soon

2011-09-18T12:45:00.002+08:00

Hello everyone! 17th September was my second visit (I'm a freshie writing first time in this blog!) with T.H.E. Seniors.

Was looking forward to this one after attending the first visit a fortnight ago, as every visit would bring about a new experience. We were then split into smaller groups, namely the English/Mandarin speaking, Hokkien speaking and Cantonese speaking to facilitate with communicating with the old folks.

As we were making our way to the flats, a huge crowd of the elderly were queuing up to collect their food from the sponsoring vendors at the void deck. When they saw us, they smiled and waved at us and we did the same to them too. Can tell that they were really happy to see us around. I also saw Mdm Cheong, the lady who I visited last week (but I don't think she remembers me hahaha). As usual she would help some of her neighbours to collect their food as they are unable to do so on their own due to physical disabilities. We can tell that although these folks are living on their own, they will still look out for one and other, which is a heart-warming sight.

My group of 8 first visited Mdm Ho, 88. She was one of those whom Mdm Cheong helped collect food for. Her knees are showing signs of deformity and has difficulty moving around. She mentioned that she has to go for check ups at Tan Tock Seng hospitals occasionally. Her doctors advised her to undergo surgery but she refused to do so. A common understanding of the elderly is that when they are told to undergo surgery they will choose not to do so. Is is because of the high costs of doing so and they are not able to afford? Or the pain and after effects the surgery may bring about?

So after some basic introduction, we got down to business and started cleaning her flat, and 2 other friends helped her to buy her dinner at the hawker centre. Her request was to help clean the underside of her bed. There were a lot of dust accumulated there, and even dead cockroaches where swept out. It was understandable as Mdm Ho, being physically disabled, would not be able to reach for those inaccessible areas. Cockroaches wise, she was living on the second floor, so that increases the likelihood of these bugs 'visiting' her. She even have to place an insecticide on standby. So maybe we can highlight to the relevant authorities regarding the standard of cleanliness which gives rise to the number of cockroaches in the estate.

Once we're done with basic cleaning of her home, we sat down and chatted with Mdm Ho. While most of the time she speaks in Hokkien, she can also speak Mandarin and some English to the foreign volunteers who were with us. Then we found out from her that she is now a great-grandmother, and her grandchildren are about the age of 30-40. Her husband passed away recently. After talking to her, I think that she is generally optimistic in life and was really happy to have us around. Before leaving, we presented her with the mooncakes from PRIMA DELI and took a group photo together.

We then visited Mr Chiu, 75. He was very jovial and bubbly, always smiling. When asked if his house was needed to be cleaned, he declined and so we sat down and chit chatted with him. As like Mdm Ho, we presented Mr Chiu with mooncakes and took a photo together. Initially clad with just a pair of shorts, he specially wore a nice looking shirt with printing that looked similar to the SIA flight attendant's uniform just to take the photo. Mr Chiu loves to sing karaoke with his friends and in fact sings pretty well too, when he sanged a part of a song to us. He shown us some VCDs of Chinese oldies that he brought from Chinatown. However, he did not have a VCD player and his normal CD player was incapable of playing that. Apparently the VCDs were produced in a set of series, ie the ones he owned are volumes 11 and 12. So maybe next time we should look for a VCD player for him so that he can sing to his favourite music, as well as volumes of Chinese oldies, not restricting to the older volumes of the VCDs he owned.

That sums up the visits this week. Enjoyed myself thoroughly and I hope the rest who attended did too. The next visit will be in a fortnight's time on 1st October, the old Children's Day hahaha. Definitely looking forward to it!

- Jeremy :D

Orientation Visit Two

2011-09-09T23:19:00.002+08:00

Okay, so it was my very first visit with T.H.E.seniors and the turnout was apparently a lot larger than usual. Most of the people who turned up were freshies, like me. We took a bus down to TOUCH Seniors Activity Centre where we met the rest of the group. After some encouragement from enthusiastic and cheery seniors, we arranged ourselves in a huge circle and began the self-introductions by stating our name, which school/faculty we belonged to and something interesting about ourselves. Somehow, most of the interesting information about ourselves had to do with our ability or inability to play the guitar and whether or not our flipflops were new. I digress.

Anyway, after we got the names of the elderly all sorted out, we split into 6 groups of 5-6 people each. My group visited Mdm Tan, an 80 year old woman and has really poor eyesight. Apparently, when she looks at us all she sees are dark black shadows. I don't know about you, but for me, imagining 6 fuzzy shadows trailing into your house is just beyond scary, much less having those shadows move around, clean your house and start talking to you.

Mdm Tan's house was really quite clean to begin with, so our tasks were pretty simple and straightforward. We helped to mop her not-very-dirty floor and clean her windows with damp rags. It didn't take very long. Those of us who didn't have any real chores to perform sat on her bed and spoke to her while helping her to poke threads of different colours through the eyelets of needles. After about half an hour or so, we were all crowded around this friendly old woman, listening to her tell us her stories in Hokkien while those fluent enough at the dialect kept the conversation going.

I'm sure many members here would already know Mdm Tan, but I'll still write a little about what she told us about herself. She has many grandchildren, and yet they only see her once a year during Chinese New Year. It was heartbreaking, really, to listen to her say that having such a large family was meaningless because she lived alone and apart from them. Even though she mentioned that her son buys her mooncakes during the Mid Autumn Festival and her daughter-in-law buys her clothes (in particular a shiny purple blouse she was wearing that day), I think anyone would have been able to tell that all she wanted was their company. I do remember seeing her face light up when the topic was eventually steered towards yummy rice dumplings, though :)

We then went on to Mdm Ho's house, which was crowded as could be with all 32 of us (including her) squeezed into her tiny studio apartment. Mdm Ho spoke mainly in Hokkien and Cantonese, with the occasional English phrases. It was really funny when she spoke in Cantonese to someone who didn't understand a word of the dialect, then attempted to do it again and again.

We then bade farewell and ended this orientation visit with a debrief session, and several group photos ;)

-Kerryn

2011-09-05T20:21:00.001+08:00

We had our second orientation visit last saturday and I was in-charged of facilitation. Just want to say that it feels weird that Mr Tan is no longer around and I do not have to go and knock on his door to ask what time he is free for us to visit him. Yup.

So after facilitation I went to meet of the volunteers and I was so surprised to see so many volunteers!!! But it's a good thing to see some many new volunteers who are interested to join us=) When I reached they had already started introducing themselves and after which we were split in several groups. My group went to Mdm Choi Moi's house. As usual she prefer us to sit down and chit-chat with her because she insisted that her house was not dirty. She is her usual cheerful self and talks very loudly becasue of her poor hearing.

I must say she is really a very carefree old lady. When we ask her if she thinks about her past, she said there is no use for thinking of the past. When we asked her what she like to eat, she say she like to eat everything. When we ask her what songs she like to listen, she said she had no preference too. Because her theory is that people will go mad if they think too much. So she prefer not to think about anything. Maybe that's her secret of for still being so healthy at the age of 91.

She love to watch people from her window. Her job in the past is similar to that of a sum siew woman, which might explain how come she is still so fit at the age of 91. But she said she is getting forgetful. She will tend to on her water tap and leave it running without remebering to turn it off. Which according to her, the reason behind her high water bill every month :O She also don't like to close her window even though it is raining becasue she don't want the house to be stuffy. She is really a very cheerful and friendly old lady and I'm sure other than myself, the new volunteers also enjoyed interacting with her. Our new volunteers spoke cantonese to her and she responded spontaneously=) Last but not least, we went to Mdm Ho's house before we ended our visit with the usual debreif session=)

Sheng Xian

Orientation Visit 2 :)

2011-09-05T15:58:00.003+08:00

Saturday was our second orientation visit and we had a record-breaking volunteer count of 42! :O We did a round of self-introduction and split ourselves into 7 groups (i think) instead of the usual 3 groups as there were so many of us. My group visited Mdm Low. Just an introduction to Mdm Low, she is a very frail elderly who is quite shy. As she has some breathing difficulties (asthma), she usually takes some time before responding to our questions (so I had to make a mental note to pause for a moment before asking her more questions).

When we reached, Mdm Low was sitting on a chair with her back facing us. She kept saying “Uncle!” when we tried asking if we could go in (any idea why? :|), but we just entered anyway. Her flat was quite messy with clothes and things lying around. After settling her down to eat her lunch (fried kway teow, which was left at her door by some kind soul who collected it for her downstairs), we got to cleaning up the place- sweeping and mopping the floor, cleaning the windows and surfaces. We managed to find a super dusty vacuum cleaner, and used it to clean the area around her bed which was collecting a lot of dust and not very hygienic for her sleeping there. We also chanced upon her unusual 'pet' which she kept in a bottle- cockroach!! Not sure how it landed up in the bottle, but yea there it was.

I guess as she was just discharged from hospital last week, she was not really in the mood for talking much, and we only managed to ask her simple questions which she replied mostly either by nodding or shaking her head. However, she made us all laugh when she played with the horn on her bed and gave us a round of high-fives as we left.

We then proceeded to our last stopover at Mdm Ho’s house which was overcrowded with 31 of us! The evidence can be found on our facebook group haha, so do check out our facebook group "T.H.E. Seniors" k. Yup, that’s all for now. Hope to see everyone next visit! :D

My First Visit with T.H.E Seniors!

2011-08-28T14:41:00.002+08:00

Hello everyone!
Firstly, I'm really sorry this post is coming in one week late! >< Secondly, I'm here to share abt my experience last Sat morn! (Yes, I'm a freshman! So it was Orientation Visit 1 for all of us freshmen last Sat!)
I was rather apprehensive in the morning when I was heading down to Kallang station where we were supposed to meet. This was cause I was going ALONE for my FIRST visit! Yikes! However, when I got there, I met a few other Year 1 students who came alone too! (haha so much for worrying.) We introduced ourselves and the mood quickly changed from awkwardness to friendliness. (:
When majority of the student volunteers arrived, a grp of us bused down to the place. We were met by many others who were there earlier than us. I was nicely surprised by the crowd I saw as I was kind of expecting only a small group! :/ haha anyway after splitting ourselves into 3 grps, English/Chinese, Hokkien and Cantonese, we headed to the homes of the elderly!!!
I joined the Hokkien grp despite my poor limited knowledge of Hokkien. (Actually, I'm a Teochew-nang, not a Hokkien-lang, but I can understand the dialect! just not speak it ://) Yes, haha the first home we visited belonged to a gentle and sweet-looking ahma called Mdm Tan. From the seniors, I learnt that Mdm Tan's eyesight is poor. Yet, she still welcomed all of us into her home jovially. We quickly set ourselves at work, sweeping/mopping the floor, wiping the window grills/panes, washing her fan, etc. There were 10 of us so the cleaning up of her alr very clean house was done in no time! haha the rest of the time was spent talking to her, or rather, listening to her talk! ^^ Wow she really likes to talk! She kept saying she's vey "hua1 hi4" that there're so many of us to talk to her. She shared abt herself- the no. of children and grandchildren she has... then she shared abt her past- how she had to go all around the kampong area looking for her 6 children after work everyday... THEN she shared abt her pastpast!- how her father worked so hard as a farmer to support the family... woah haha ;D
After that, we went to the home of Mdm Chow Moi! oh my she really speaks (and laugh) very loudly! But that's due to her poor hearing. We didnt clean her house. She insisted we "zeh zeh" and talk to her. Actually, we spent most of the time laughing with her and at her cuteness! :D I was indeed very delighted at the sight of her, even at the age of 90, laughing so heartily.
All in all, I'm glad to have plucked up the courage and joined T.H.E Seniors last Saturday morn visiting the homes of these two elderly ladies! haha yay! I've come to the end of my rather loooong post! Thank you all and I'm looking forward to my next visit! ^^
Regards,
Carina!

Johnny Tan

2011-08-23T00:42:00.005+08:00

"eh, Richard just informed me that Mr Tan Po Seng just passed away, maybe he fell in the house" text message from Yi An.

Seriously. I was totally shocked. No, Im still in shock now. Mr Tan.... though kinda old, but he is one of the healthier beneficiaries we know of. Few weeks ago he just sang Japanese song for us, and waved the Singapore flag happily! And now... he is gone.

Remember how Mr Tan used to repeat his stories? He worked in a Japanese Tobacco Coy when he was young, so had to learn Jap language. And he had travelled to China before, with his good friend whom isa teacher. And many more stories.... I used to tell this joke to the freshies whenever we are heading to Mr Tan house " Mr Tan confirm tell you guys these stuff later... I used to work in Japanese company, then I learnt Jap... etc", and it ALWAYS happen as expected.

[Stolen these photos from facebook. The caption was "Mr Tan telling his army stories again"]

I thought ... I could have told the same joke last Saturday during Orientation visit 1.

On a more personal level, I have some interesting experiences with Mr Tan which accumulated throughout the past 2 full years of volunteering at T.H.E. Seniors.

- He once cut holes in his shirt (the tummy area.. like really big to see tummy) so its more cooling. So cute right! haha

- Volunteers were always so "afraid" to clean his house cos of the slippers trail! But we were always there cos we love to talk to him!

[ lifting his leg high up like a young boy!]

- When I was in Year 1, I helped Mr Tan to get an english name! He wanted Michael at first, but found it too common, so he decided on Johnny finally! I thought its just some random conversation we have with the elderly (and ya, given the memory disk space of most beneficiaries, they would probably forget the crap I said in each visit), but he actually remembered it! The following visit when I called him Johnny he responded! And he kinda love that name, and continued using it!

- How he appreciates the gifts we gave to him during festive seasons. like the Christmas hat, the part hat! he kept them with him and hang up high high!

[we found this in mr tan place weeks after the celebration. he got it washed!]

- Being in T.H.E.Seniors for so many years. I always feel kinda guilty towards Mr Tan. During festive seasons, we have to host celebrations in C
hinese as majority as most of the beneficiaries can understand Chinese. Mr Tan, could only speak english, always looking so blur and lonely, and needed help from volunteers (good that our volunteers can speak good english. haha). Though having difficulties joining in the celebrations and fun, Mr Tan ALWAYS turn up for our celebrations, knowing we have put in a lot of effort! Thanks Johnny!

[Rong Sheng helping Mr Tan during Christmas celebration!]

- when Yi An and I went to knock on his door (about a month ago) , he actually said to Yi An "Pardon? Are you speaking English?" . Seriously, I burst out laughing on the spot! HAHA. Mr Tan's command of english language is really powerful. He uses words like "pardon, excuse me" when I only "HAR? SIMI? OI! SIAM LEH!"

I guess volunteers who have visited Mr Tan before must be sad to know he is now no longer there waiting for us anymore. No more Japanese language, no more massive cleaning, no more free English and Japanese tuition.

To be honest, when I just received the news from Yi An, I felt quite useless. He might have fell at home and we werent there to help him. If... only if we were there with him, we could have sent him to the hospital immediately and nth like this gonna happen. For a moment I felt useless in T.H.E.Seniors.. Then I talked to a close friend of mine, kinda figured out that at least... we have at least brought joy and memories to Mr Tan and ourselves.

Yes Johnny! Enjoy your life up there! I guess its cooling there and you dont have to cut holes in your shirt anymore! And probably you will meet some of your army boys there, and you can repeat your army stories for a thousand times! And if one day, I see a black line across the sky, that must be your famous slippers trail! :)

Mr Tan, we will miss you!

Wynne (my name is not Winnie okay! Mr Tan please dont get my name wrong again!)

Visit 2011/08/20

2011-08-22T22:46:00.004+08:00

Hi peeps! Long time no see (to oldies like wynne, zhen xiu, hui ting, shi tien etc. Etcs you know who you are!) and a BIG HELLO to those who have no idea who I am. My name's Rong Sheng!! Anyway, it's been a LONG LONG TIME since I've went for visitation and I'm really happy to see all you guys and the elders again!

The first house we went to was Mdm Cheong. .Since we had a lot of "workers" around, we finished up the work pretty quickylt. Anyway, we've only cleaned half the living for her cos she insisted that we can clean the other half for her next session. After that, we just sat down and chatted with her a little.

It was very heartening to see her still so cheerful and really 中气十足 lor~!! As we all know, it can be a jittery job cleaning Mdm Cheong's house cos she has very high QC standards that keep us all on our toes!

Second stop was Mdm Chua's house. We didn't really clean a lot for her house cos she said some other group of people have already helped her done it. Basically we just chatted with her most of the time. We talked a little about the presidential election and just checked with her whether she knows the location and if she received her voting card (or whether that piece of paper is called~~). But she seemed to mix up this election with the MP election cos she keep saying that PAP will win! We tried to explain to her the difference and who are the candidates but in the end she still said: Aiya anyhow vote PAP will still win one....(Us: .....).

Also we checked with her if she knows when to take her meds for her high cholesterol cos she says recently her memory is failing her.

Alrighty!! I know i'm boring all of you with words and no pictures so i shall stop here for this post!! Hope to see you guys next visit!!

Cheers

Rong

Orientation Visit 2011

2011-08-20T16:48:00.006+08:00

This is the first visit of this academic year and it is also the orientation visit for newcomers. It is great to see almost 30 volunteers turn up for the visit with a mixture of both seniors and newcomers.

The first elderly my group visited was Mr Chiu. Mr Chiu was initially having lunch but he started to chat with us. He told us that he has the ability to see supernatural beings. In one occasion during a 歌台 (getai), show put up during hungry ghost festivals, he said one of them came to talk to him. They were discussing the show but after the show finished, he was followed back home. Thankfully, he was no longer stalked after he passed by a temple. Ever since that incident, he has not been to getai.

Mr Chiu also sang for us. He took out his file of lyrics and starting singing some songs. Here is the evidence:

Next up was Mdm Ho's house. We talked about the upcoming presidential election and she said that she has already decided who to vote for. She also mentioned that recently a doctor told her she has some kidney problems and recommended her to drink more water. Mdm Ho also showed the newcomers some old photos.

As for me, I hoped everyone have enjoyed themselves and I look forward to seeing the elderly and more newcomers in the next visit.

Ying Cong

Orientation Visit 2011

2011-08-17T22:02:00.007+08:00

Hi Everyone!

T.H.E. Seniors Orientation Visit will be held on 20th August and 3rd September. For newcomers, please meet at 10.00am at Kallang MRT station. For seniors, please be at TOUCH at 10.30am.

See ya there!

2011-08-09T10:34:00.005+08:00

what a lovely post below there((: with pretty pics n video.

hoho. but not my turn.

Home Sweet Home 1: Mdm Tan Ah Kim

She was just as fine. Super like her clean clean house. She didn know we will pop by that sat morning n does the sweeping herself. her floor clean clean, but can find evidence aka the grass grass dropping out from the broomstick. anyhow, we did the mopping (:

年轻时养孩子。

年老时养医生。

so true. it says that when one's young, u use hard earn money to feed your kiddos. when grow old, the money earned is used to feed the doctors. This is the second time i heard, once when i worked in tan tock seng hospital. Quite an interesting quote.

Home Sweet Home 2: Mdm Chua

grew depress as time goes by. emoemo elmo. was wondering how to cheer her up. Is there any way to help her? she don't sound as cheerful as before. Is that the path which elderly will eventually be lead to when they grew older?

almost everytime we go visit her, she feels giddy else headache. quite worry for her.

she mentioned herself missing her favourite bedsheet which cost her 100 plus bucks during the time she bought it. she was advised to throw that bedsheet away, coz don't know is that a cause to the itchiness she encounter when she slp. now she missing her bedsheet.

Thats for all.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Alright, Today's National Day. Below is a not very well taken firework shot by me during a preview last sat. but i tot it's quite colorful. hope to bring some colors to all.

HAPPY NATIONAL DAY((:

-Pei Jen

2011-08-08T02:01:00.001+08:00

*pics may not be correctly displayed so click on them to see the whole picture

Hi kids, me again so pardon my lousy ang mo. School is starting soon so this is the last visit for AY10/11. AY10/11 wasn't the best of all time but at the same time it wasn't too bad i guess, so hopefully AY11/12 will be much much better.

2 new volunteers joined us today, Yixiu and Shuyi. I joined the English/Chinese group along with ZhenXiu, EngWee, YiXiu and JianTing.

Cut the emo and self-reflecting crap, so pit stop 1: Mr Tan

His place was surprisingly clean when i arrived, no residual Mothballs stenches or traces of black marks on the floor. Since i wasn't there from the start, I'm guessing that it is either that there was another group of volunteers that cleaned his house a few days earlier or that our group did an extremely great job. Haha. Either way, the important thing is Mr Tan has a clean home to live in.

Inevitably in deep gratitude for our work, Mr Tan sang us a Japanese song that he learned a long time ago!

Also, he went into a patriotic berserk! Haha! He started to frantically wave the Singapore flag! Wah, super scary i tell you. No shit.

So after we managed to calm his patriotism, we took some peaceful shots.

Pit stop 2: Mr Chiu

Ai ya, it was a pity i forgot to take pictures at his place. Mr Chiu's place looked the same when we entered, but on a closer glance we realised that many of the furniture are new! According to him, Richard and a few others who interviewed him found his furniture too old so they decided to replace them.

We left his place slightly earlier because Mdm Ho requested for EngWee to paint the hinges of her garbage chute as the rusts were flaking off and resulted in a mess below the chute.

Pit stop 3: Mdm Ho

As usual, we swept, mopped and beat the carpets. Equally as usual, the guys did most of the work while the ladies sat down. Don't say i lie ah, i got evidence. Haha!

See, i don't lie one.

Haha, that's all from me. Have a great semester and AY ahead!

Yi An

One Day In July

2011-07-15T22:07:00.015+08:00

The first elderly my group visited was Mdm Low. Since she only came under our care recently, I shall talk more about her.

Mdm Low is rather weak. The first time I met Mdm Low was on the day we celebrated Chinese New Year. Wynne and I went to her place to deliver some canned food and an angbao. She never lock her door and the main door is always slightly ajar. I guess the reason is for the convenience of volunteers to enter her house as she is pretty much bedridden.

On that day, we knocked on her door and peer through the gap in the door. She could only acknowledge with the horn (as you can see in the picture) because she has some breathing problems.

On this visit, she did not want us to clean her house as she said that her son will do it when he comes to visit her. So we sat down to talk as she ate her lunch. She ate very slowly as she needs to catch her breath. We don't quite know what to talk but thankfully Eng Wee can communicate with her well in Teochew. We chatted for a while before leaving her to finish her lunch.

Next we visited Mdm Chow Moi. As usual, she was looking out of her windows to past the time. She was in good spirit. I realised that she was previously a 红头巾, or female construction worker. I guess that explains why she still looks strong and healthy despite being 91 years old. I think the way that Mdm Chow Moi take things in her stride and stay positive and contented in life deserves our respect.

Next was Mdm Tan. You can really feel her warmth when she smile and said "来咯!" as she opened the door. We helped her to thread some needles. It is easy to find something to talk with Mdm Tan and she enjoys talking to us. Her poor eyesight prevents her from going down often to talk with other residents. I think she only talks to us and her daughter. So I feel she looks forward to our visit as a time when she has someone to talk to. She seems a bit disappointed whenever we need to leave.

The last elderly we visited was Mdm Ho. Mdm Ho had just returned home after being hospitalised for pain in her legs. She said it was due to a suppressed nerve. She seemed less comfortable than usual. The treatment requires her to take a lot of medicine. Her daughter is living with her at the moment to take care of her. There is nothing we can really do to alleviate her pain. I hope she will be in a better shape the next time we visit her.

That was it for the day. Different elderly, different personalities and different circumstances they are in. There is only so much we can do as volunteers but it is definitely better than not doing anything.

Ying Cong

Ethelonter External Hunt

2011-07-04T19:51:00.006+08:00

Hi ya peepur :) It has been months I never blog. That is berry bad. *guilty* I miss eberione, especially the elderly badly. Again my bad, sorry peeps :(

On 29th June, Ethelonter VIII had our external hunt! Mii and my fellow lovuli YAMATO councillors and freshies had visited Mdm Chua. Awww, TOUCH center has almost done with the renovations and its now much spacious! With TVss, Karaoke equipment etc. *bounce bounce ball* I feel so so happy for the elderly and they keep praising how TOUCH does a great job in taking care of their welfare :)

Na ge uncle, whom I can’t remember his surname jio me for karaoke some more nyehehehehehe. Saw aunties for eg Mdm Cheong and the super cute auntie who brought along goggles when we went to ECP the other day. :D Mdm Cheong told me 'gam loi mou lei tam o ga' in Cantonese (means you never come and visit me for so long ady), I told her I have to work, and she even asked me to take good care of myself. That's berry sweeeet of her :')

Let’s move on to the visit at Mdm Chua's home. She happily greeted us when she opened the door. She was surprised to see so many of us, freshies and me and my MKC and yian and darren, make up a total of 14 persons. As usual, she insisted us to sit on the chair or sofa, if dun mind can sit on her bed. She does not allow us to sit on the floor.

My aweeeeeesome freshies are great in chatting with her. :D They asked her about her life, her previous jobs, her children and her grandchildren. While sharing with us her life before believing in God, she suddenly burst into tears. I guessed most of us were shocked. Our soon-to-be volunteers did a great job comforted her. She told us that she was too touched and happy to see so many of us visiting her and chat with her. She said that, she is so blessed that in her golden age, there are still people who are willing to listen to her, help her with her house chores and do not turn her cold shoulder when she needs help.

We chatted for almost an hour! Although some of the freshies cannot really speak or understand neither Cantonese nor hokkien, they tried their best to translate what she said to each other, and peepur, that's berry heartwarming. *clap clap* I wanna tell you guys and girls that, you all have really brighten up her day, and she really appreciate it a lot. I am certain our freshies have gained a great experience as well :) right?

We greeted Mdm Chua goodbye by cheering our 'good good cheer' while surrounding her. She was really really happy and she thought it is someone's birthday! Hahahahahaha. Compliments given to our girl freshies who suggested this, and also everyone, who tried their very best to understand her. And you see, just a simple act of yours- to care, can really carve smiles on the elderly face. :)

Thanks Darren and Yian who have made good explanation to us too!! :D Hope to see more people join T.H.E seniors!!

Love,

WanJun

Visit 18th June

2011-06-24T00:05:00.003+08:00

Hello all!

A few of us went down earlier that day to Mdm Ho's place as she told us 2 weeks ago to clean her house at 10am so that she could prepare the curry chicken after that. However, we were really surprised when she was not home and we thought that she was at the market at first. It was only when we saw Mdm Cheong that we were told that she was admitted to the hospital last Thursday.

I visited her on Tuesday and found out that she was admitted because of pain in her legs and she couldn't really walk. Other than that, she was basically her usual self which was good (: She also said that she had already bought all the ingredients and will make us the curry chicken when she is better!

Please contact me for the ward and bed details if you'll like to visit her at TTSH.

Okay, back to the visit, we also visited Mdm Cheong and did housework for her as usual. She gave us each a packet of drink afterwards for our hard work! We also cleaned Mr Tan's place and aired his house as he likes to keep the windows closed. We chatted with him about his recent trip to Universal Studios and he seemed to have enjoyed himself a lot. Lastly, we visited Mdm Chow Moi who refused to let us do any housework and insisted that we just sit down and chat with her.

It was a good visit this week except for the unfortunate news about Mdm Ho, but here's hoping she gets better soon (:

-Darren

Visit on 4th June

2011-06-08T21:35:00.002+08:00

We visited Mr Chiu that day. His house was under "renovation". A mining company had liaised with the centre and helped to re-paint a few of the houses in the area. They have also helped them change some of their furniture. So, we can only help Mr Chiu shift his things out to the corridor and chat with him outside of his house. Looking forward to see his newly "renovated" house soon. It is sad that while we have already thought of repainting his house for him before this actually happens, we are a step too late. Nevertheless we are happy for him.

Derrick

4th June Visit - Team Hokkien

2011-06-04T21:25:00.002+08:00

Mdm Lim

She said she caught a cold two days ago, was feeling feverish with body-ache
Doctor initially suspected the cold was because of dengue, based on symptoms
She claimed that she didn't kena any mosquito bites
She suspected the cold was because of her showering late at night
She feels quite tired, complains of twitching eyes, but is recovering from her fever after taking medication
She is also feeling anxious about her coming X-ray scan this coming Monday

Mdm Chua

Tends to repeat specific statements several times during conversation
E.g. offered to treat us to coffee, complained of too many stuff in her house, commented that she speaks too loudly and Mdm Lim speaks too softly
Totally indulged in the professional massaging techniques of Missy YY

Mdm Tan

Told us about her recent hospital visit
Complained that the nurse was not good at extracting blood from her
Poor blood extraction skills resulted in her sustaining bruises in several regions of her arm
Complained that another nurse confused her by saying that she may be suffering from stroke, rather than flu

Mdm Ho

Shared with us photos of her Australian buddies, old house, Hokkaido trip and her precious 18-year-old sweet photos
Offered to buy us lunch but we declined
We bought chicken+duck rice and ate with her
Want to treat us to her savory chicken curry on 18th June!

t.h.e. book of records: least no. of people who turned up for visit!!

2011-05-22T16:48:00.003+08:00

We had 8 people in total today! Woah, totally broke record haha!

Stop #1: Mdm Cheong.

Mdm Cheong was mincing meat when we arrived. She preferred to do it on her own because “自己做比较清洁!” (love her canto accent :]). We helped with the usual cleaning and lined the shelf tops with new layers of newspapers. She had a phlegmy cough, but the doctor had already prescribed her with cough drops. Get well soon Mdm Cheong!

Stop #2: Mdm Tan.

Mdm Tan’s kitchen was infested with ants. We got a shock when we discovered that her sugar jar was invaded by ants. Luckily Ken was sharp enough to notice it, or else Mdm Tan would unknowingly be eating more ants. Eeew. So we changed her sugar jar and tried to seal off the ant hole with tape. Hopefully the situation will improve. We also helped her sort out some of her old letters and bills too. Amazingly she only spent less than $20 on utility bills this month. As Darren said, “What had she been doing?” Haha.

Stop #3: Mdm Ho.

We chanced upon 4 dead cockroaches while cleaning Mdm Ho’s floor. Though Sheng Xian and I cringed at the sight of them, Mdm Ho remained unfazed, picking them up with her bare hands and throwing them away. Heh. As usual, she told us many stories and political news, and I really take my hat off to her when it comes to this. I think I really need to read the papers more often. :p Oh, she also asked about the absence of Boon Yong, Kai Sheng, Zhenxiu, Chen Hua and a few others, and I think she misses y’all. Come visit her soon k?

Alright, that’s all for updates right now. Hopefully this record remains unbroken. :]

Yinmin

Major Outing @ ECP

2011-05-20T22:32:00.015+08:00

It was our major outing last Saturday at East Coast Park. Each group played 3 games with our senior friends. I was attached to the orange group and our first game was "Pass the Water".

Although we made hole in the cups to make the game more challenging, our friends overcame it easily with one finger...except the second uncle who you can tell is the most honest guy around.

The next game we played is "Lead the Blindfolded". Shi Tien, our group leader, was volunteered to be blindfolded. The seniors helped to guide him through 3 obstacles.

The last game is called "Minefield" where participants have to find the correct pathway through a grid.

After the games, the seniors had some refreshments and free and easy time. Some went cycling, some strolled on the beach while others just sat around to have a chat and enjoy the sea breeze. A group of Malay ladies came well prepared with their own picnic food.

It was a fun day out in the park. I hope both our senior friends and the volunteers enjoyed the occasion. Many thanks to the volunteers who shared their time with us. There are more pictures in the Picasa link on the right column under Stay Connected. And finally, thank you for reading to this point although I know it looks like a report. Goodbye! :)

Ying Cong

Sign Up for Major Outing

2011-05-12T22:50:00.000+08:00

We will be having our Major Outing this Sat(14/5), at East Coast Park from 8.30am to 12noon. Anyone interested please sign up here

Ying Cong

The GE entry

2011-05-04T01:15:00.001+08:00

It's been awhile since I last blogged.

I was in the Hokkien group and we visited Mdm Tan and Mdm Ho. Both of them were fine and cheerful as usual. With the elections just round the corner, we chatted a bit about it in addition to doing the usual household chores. It was really good to be able to talk to the elderly about politics and hear things from their point of view. Sometimes, we all need to take a step back and look at things from a different perspective instead. That said, it's 3 days to polling day, so vote wisely everyone! :)

Following the visit, we had a short recee to East Coast Park, the venue of this year's outing! We'll be bringing 60-80 elderly to East Coast park on 14th May 2011. There will be some group activities planned, lots of fun and interactions, and not forgetting photo-taking! Details will be sent out within the next few days.

Looking ahead, there's not many visits left till I leave for SEP in August. I'll really miss the visits and the elderly (like how Wynne is missing them now). I'll cherish the remaining time I have till then!

Take care all!

-Darren

A late blog

2011-04-11T11:10:00.001+08:00

Finally, my turn to blog (3 weeks late) le. Anyway, I also have not blog for a long time. After 2 years of being in “touch”, I finally know that every member nd to do facilitation, hahaha. In any case, it was the first time I do the facilitation and I come on the dot. YEAH!!!! On that day, my group has visited 2 elderly (Mdm lin and Mdm ho). Mdm Lin is seriously very weak, so weak that it feels like she will fall down anytime. She also does not eat much so it is quite worrying for her to be alone. Mdm Ho is still the same. A cheerful granny who can always bring out the laugher so it is always very fun to visit her. Overall, every visit is a very meaningful visit. And I am sure that I will continue to go. Lastly, I will say to say “touch” helps to strengthen the bond between us and the elderly and the friendship between the volunteers. yang meh meh!!

The Ties that Bind

2011-04-08T23:11:00.005+08:00

Well, I guess it's time to get a taste of my own medicine? Used to ask people to blog and now..=)..but come to think of it..I haven't been blogging for quite some time le..haha..

I kind of ponder like how should i go about writing this post...haha as you can all see..I'm still in the process....ZZzz..

I have been into Touch for almost 2 years (I think) and there are 2 things I treasured the most that i like to share. One is the ties with our elderly and the second is the friendship with all of you in the club.

Well, I never had a chance to ask Chen Hua (okie, i did have chances but I just didn't ask him..) why he would come down on every saturday and spent his time with the elderly for the past 7 years. Well i guess is the kind of special and unique bond with the elderly? it's (the rls with the elderly) something that doesn't establish itself overnight but kind of like an old wine, the longer that you let it ferment the better it would be, and the more that one would like and keep on drinking it. Having said that, it is rewarding to see one being identified and recognised by the elderly for one's conscientious effort and showing concern towards them. (i.e. Mdm Ho and Chen Hua or Mr Tan and Joanne).

On the same note, friendship is the other that motivates me to stay in the touch. Totally enjoyed the 'crappyness', the fun and laughters during and after the normal visitations. Thus, i doubt that i would come down and visit the elderly myself without you guys...haha =)..

Guess to keep the long story short...i shall end here..GOOD LUCK for your exams and see ya ard!

Ken

charm within a picky auntie

2011-04-03T03:08:00.005+08:00

Hi, this is Koji, a Japanese exchange student.

Yesterday(I've just finished one assignment, Hooray!! ) was my 2nd and the last participation to THE seniors :(

Among a group of 7 exchange students, I was somehow assigned to Hokkien group, which firstly appeared unreasonable to me, but later turned out to be a fun experience.

The title seems to be misleading since I cannot even understand basic Mandarin, but

as I was hoping to get some chance to show off my pre-nursery school level of Mandarin, Hokkien group seemed to be a nice option to me at the same time.

Our group has done quite a lot of cleaning at the first auntie's room, mainly because of her hair that was scattered around the room. However I enjoyed the cleaning and it was worth putting energy, since I hadn't done much cleaning most of the time before.

Besides, her room looked not as messy to me as everyone was saying.

My grandpa's house is so chaotic and filled with dust all over the place, so I might have an immunity against messiness. (and I'm quite disorganized as well)

As for chatting with the auntie, I had been clueless despite the initial effort to catch up.

Before moving to the second auntie's place, I was warned that she is particular about the way how we clean the room, so I had been picturing some grumpy auntie in my mind.

Admittedly, she was indeed picky about cleaning and everyone had to follow the way she told us to do. BUT, contrary to my prediction, she turned out to be somewhat adorable to me. The way she commanded was not domineering, but rather I could observe some genuine auntie-ness from her (I had no idea what she was saying, but the pronunciation was comfortable to hear, and the way she speaks reminded me of one of my favorite neighbors I used to play with when young. she was also fastidious about many trivial details)

All along, I had little idea what everyone was talking, but I really enjoyed the family-like atmosphere marked by frequent laughters.

It was another fruitful experience for me (even after discounting the hassle of coming over all the way to Kallang from PGP in an early?? Saturday morning), and though my last visit made me get disappointed by myself with my helpless Chinese, but it also left me some nostalgia and some warm-feeling.

2011-03-26T20:02:00.002+08:00

It's blogging time again.!!!

i dunno y pc's face like tt. but it's quite entertaining.. hahaha..

Cleaning Mdm Lim Chuay's fan... can tell she's worried tt we might spoil her fan..

After the number of tries by jerome n peeps, all done well n nice.

her toilet flush is spoilt.. water keep dripping. shall help her by informing the touch centre :D

Upon reaching mdm ho's place, we c her lying on bed. draggin herself out of bed with her aching legs.. feel pain upon cing her walking with difficulties. anyway,,, Mdm Ho is v excited to c quite a number of new faces.. She's v chatty that dae, keep disturbing the japanese TF volunteer.... :D

everyone looks tired, bet it's the cause of schoollllll.. but keep the spirit on ya. cya all on the next visit.!!! (:

a karma positive afternoon~

2011-03-25T22:32:00.003+08:00

hi beloved fans, here i am again. donning my usual selfless and chivalrous character i volunteered myself to do this blogpost just so i can relieve yingcong the dilemma of deciding who to pick for this visitation's blog post.

i strongly believe kindness pays so i urge you kids to volunteer and blog the next visit! =)

back to the my main topic: the karma positive afternoon

karma=+1

mr tan's place!

as usual, we scrubbed the stained floor!

before:

after:

super ups and zai right?

so when we're done mr tan went to inspect if everything is up to his standard.

btw, there were a lot of moth balls in mr tan's flat placed by some other volunteers according to him. and according to sheng xian and gang, mothballs are bad for health so they managed to persuade mr tan to throw them away after quite some effort.

**sheng xian's house was out of water so she tried to take a bath at mr tan's place. haha.

karma=+2

so the next pitstop was mr chiu's house. hmmm, rather clean la so we merely swept and mopped his place. oh ya! i single handedly cleaned his window grilles and windows okay! although still got the dust stain cause i didn't use newspaper, fairly clean i'd say. haha.

also, mr chiu complained to us that his akira radio wasnt working. no problem mr chiu! we have the quick witted joanne who managed to fixed it in no time so you can sing along with your favorite tunes!

proof that singing makes one happy!:

karma=+3

then we went to the super ultimate uber clean apartment that belongs to mdm tan. i think her eyesight not really good so maybe we can get her a pair of specs or something like that. yeah. she only cleaned her place yesterday so we just sat down and and talk cock with her.

actually its was more than just talk cock cause she was explaining to the girls that it is more important to find someone with brains than someone loaded but without brains. from her point of view, a person with brains can slowly work his way up and earn lots of money in the future. so do take note of this girls, HAHA.

a group photo of the discussion:

conclusion!:

i am 3 karma points closer to nirvana!

yi an signing off!

i am positive karma-ed, are you?

My 2nd or 3rd time blogging? :o

2011-03-17T22:12:00.002+08:00

hello fellow volunteers of T.H.E.Seniors!ahh im finally back here to blog again haha!!!

first of all,shoutout to forthewynne ng: i feel so bad tt i couldnt make it to the cny celebration and forgot to bid you farewell!!!aye.请你原谅我！shall email your or smth soon =) enjoy the xlbs there and take care!

okay lets talk about the visit on 5th march!haha wanjun told me to join their group cuz jerome and shitien will be leaving early,so i was in the canto group as usual! went to mdm lim,mdm cheong and mdm chua's place. it was hilarious at mdm lim's house when we wanted to help her clean her fan but couldnt 'dismantle' it and mdm lim seemed rather worried that we will spoil her fan!pictures w jerome! :)

nxt up was mdm cheong! really miss her loads! first thing when i went to her house she will shout "梁美女!" at the door haha! after forcing her to call me that i guess shes used to it alrdy hehe. and we helped her to mop the floor, wipe the chairs, clean the windows as usual. this time round she treated us to her cny goodies! and packet drinks! learned that she just came a few months back from her intestine operation, and glad to know that she's feeling fine! although she said that she can't really carry heavy stuffs though. and made me think of kampor. shall we go visit her again sometime?

last visit was at mdm chua's place! cleaned her house and realized that her light was flickering. and gotta rush off since it was time.

yup so that basically summarizes my previous visit. honestly sometimes i'll ask myself why am i still going back to t.h.e. seniors? (even though i admit that i cant/dont go for every single session) but i'm sure for each and every one of us, there's a reason why we're back every fortnight, and why we're here to stay :)

My first visit (5/3/11) ^^

2011-03-13T14:02:00.003+08:00

Hello, I am Nicole! Am exchange student and also my first visit to Mdm Tang!! Just one word to describe 'T.H.E seniors' - Love !! This is my first experience in joining service in Singapore. I am excited and glad for the visiting to help the elderly doing chores, chatting and concern them. It is a fantastic job and full of love !! Hehe ^^ As i know from Mdm Tang, she is a cheerful, strong and healthy person. Although already aged 70++, but she is still able to do exercise, up and down, and do the things she wants to. It has really impressed me and feel touched. Thanks T.H.E seniors, giving me this pleasure chance to join you guys. You guys are so awesome! All the best!! See you guys around! =)

CNY Celebration 2011

2011-02-25T01:03:00.017+08:00

Here are some photos and a video of CNY Celebration. I will upload the rest to Facebook. Pls help to tag. Enjoy!

The Hosts

Prizes for the elderly

Lovely Smiles

Bingo!

"Queen of Dealer" Mdm Tan and "Queen of Gambler" Mdm Tan

Huat ar!!

The joy of sharing

Mdm Tang's contagious smile

Happy Chinese New Year!!!

Ying Cong

CNY celebrations (12th Feb)

2011-02-14T08:44:00.005+08:00

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR EVERYONE! (and happy valentine's day! haha see we love THE SENIORS so much that on valentine's day we show our <3 by telling the whole world what a great time the volunteers, and definitely the elderly, had last sat)

We started off with around 15 rather bored looking elderly. But as the celebrations progressed, they were definitely getting more enthusiastic, and by the time we had the lo-hei, it was in fact their high-ness which infected the volunteers instead! first we had the elderly's all-time favourite BINGO!! everyone got the hang of it real quickly, and soon even the volunteers wanted to play the game themselves. lots of prizes were given out. yay!

Next off was a new game called "the price is right" modeled after the popular TV show. we packaged common ntuc items such as milo, chicken essence, braised sharkfin into hampers and asked each elderly to guess the actual price. whoever was the closest would win the hamper. this game clearly showed that the elderly were quite good at mental calculation, with each determined to bring home the big hamper.

Finally we came to another new game, one that the elderly seemed to have thoroughly enjoyed: Hi-Low. to cut things to the chase, the elderly had to guess whether the next card was to be a bigger or smaller number, quite easy, and it kept them in suspense. you could see the exhilaration on their faces when they got the right guess, and a mild disappointment when they didn't. but at the end of the day everyone was a winner, each of them lugging home loads of presents. oh yes must mention that we also had a very nice company sponsoring rice, biscuits, chicken essence for the elderly, so it was definitely a "windfall" for all the participants, not forgetting the many cans of abalone/clam/chicken essence/mushrooms distributed too:)

And how could one possibly end a CNY celebration without lo-hei?

There you have it - another memorable event for the elderly to look back and laugh to themselves :)

- Pris

Spring Cleaning and House Deco

2011-02-04T23:32:00.033+08:00

The Canto group visited two elderly on the last visit where we helped to spring clean and decorate their houses.

First up was Mdm Chua's house. Initially, we were unsure of how to make decorations using angbao. Fortunately, there were examples to follow and we soon came up with two 福balls, one angbao fish series and the classic springy chain to replace the dusty old decorations. It was nice to see that Mdm Chua was delighted.

Next up was Mdm Cheong's house. After completing the tasks she assigned, we stick to our experience of making fishballs. The next time you feel a wee bit unhappy when Mdm Cheong reminds you yet again to keep the chairs away from the bedframe, look up to the exquisite arrays of fishes and balls and you'll feel much better. All thanks to the Canto group!

Whose mouth is bigger?

Jerome fixing the 福ball

Ying Cong

Once upon a time....

2011-01-28T20:56:00.016+08:00

a random conversation after our visit created this story (characters used are those who turned up fo visit on 15Jan2011).

------------------

Once upon a time.....Priscilla and Adeline finally got their HongLi (bonus) USD1million from the company - Derrick Pte Ltd they have worked for years...so they decided to share this piece of good news (share news only, not share the $$) with their Wanjun biao mei (cousin)..

*PING PING PANG PANG BOOOOM BOOOOM* <--- thunderstorm

unfortunately, it was raining heavily and they couldnt get to wanjun's place... instead they took shelter at Yi An Chen (takashimaya)

obviously, Yi An Chen is a very sian place,and the rain die die also bu hui ting (huiting), so they decided to buy a Ken(Can) of Ying Cong (7-up).

*GONG XI LAO YE, HE XI LAO YE*

Adeline and Priscilla hengheng won (past tense of wynne?) Ying Cong Pte Ltd first prize - a Shi tian (Shitien) Jiu Ye (10days9nights) Zhenxiu (sewing) course.

And they lived happily ever after. The End. ***clap clap****

---------------

So.. i also dunno why we are blogging this story..hahaha.

Anyway, wanna take this chance to say my last words (choy choy. slap my mouth) before leaving for peking duck.

Yea people, must enjoy yourself for the following 153days while i enjoy my peking duck. It would be good if you guys can help me with the following issues :

1) convince Mdm Ho that i really never steal her curtain pegs. yesh, i never.

2) continue to let Mdm Cheong rmb me as Huang Mei Nv (and forget abt liang mei nv)

3) do not change the angmoh name "johnny" i gav mr tan!

4) email me often to remind me not to eat too much. i want to come back with double chin (dont want to upsize to triple chin)

5) update this blog often so when im sick and tired of peking duck and start to miss home and t.h.e. i can read this blog

6) tag me in cny celebration photos (i'll try all means to use fb even in beijing! if i comment on the photos = good for me =D )

7) enjoy your every visit!

8) wipe the window until it has the 'ekk ekk' sound!

9)if mcdonalds got doraemon toys for happy meal help me collect. thanks!

10) MISS ME! (so to help you guys with this.. i decided to upload a photo of myself here. WAHAHAHA)

yesh. im damn zi lian, becos i truly believe that i'm not "some people look better when their face is covered". =PPP

LOVE T.H.E. SENIORS!

Regards,
Wynne (though i dont think this is neccessary to let you guys know who wrote this post)

Visit and Outing on 8th Jan

2011-01-14T15:00:00.010+08:00

Dressed up and ready to go

Copying songlist for Mr Chiu

In action

Trying too hard to smile

My first TOUCH

2011-01-14T08:12:00.001+08:00

Actually i never blog before, forgive me if i did anything wrong ya.

This was my first time joining the T.H.E seniors, it was quite fun and interesting except one unpleasant incident happened. Due to my recklessness, the detergent went into my eyes and i have to suffer the pain for the whole day.

However, i think that the people seem happy when seeing us, especially Mr Tan ( I am not sure did i remember correctly his name), who would went to sing K with the team, seem to be very excited. I hope i will have a chance to go with you guys next time.

A successful blog~

2011-01-09T23:15:00.004+08:00

A successful blog is one layered with words and pictures
~ Yi An

ho ho ho, my turn to blog again. i know that it had been hard on you guys(my fans) during my hiatus and i certainly hope that yearning for me had not taken toll on your physical being or soul.

As usual, after gathering we shuffled into 3 different dialect groups and something not as usual, i decided to join the canto group. Part of the reason being they were lacking in numbers and the other part being i had not really a chance yet to interact with the elderly in the canto group so... why not?

Pit stop 1:
Mdm chua
When we knocked on her doors she was drying her clothes so naturally we lent her a helping hand.

pc and wj having fun mopping the floor and cleaning windows

mdm chua watching tv

Her happy face should tell a lot about the excellent quality of our work, or i hope it will. haha.

Pit stop 2:
Mdm Chow Moi

Her place was unexpectedly clean and she said that she can take care of the household chores so we sat down and checked on her well-being amidst the chit chat session.

As always, she gleamed with pride whenever she showed us her alcoholic obsession(some hua tuo tonic wine).

group photo with mdm chow moi

Pit stop 3:
Mdm Cheong

One thing that I've learnt, Mdm Cheong is a cheong-ster. She already has a list of the tasks she needs help with in her mind, and without wasting any precious time she assigns each of us a task the moment we entered her apartment. She has her standards to keep up to and will not hesitate to point out your mistakes if you have done it the wrong way.

And the end product? Everything done neatly in the shortest possible time. She will not skimp on extending her hospitality so you can expect her to invite you to have a seat the moment she is satisfied with your work.

Everything was in a rush at Mdm Cheong's place so i forgot to take a group photo. haha. =P

And so the visitation ends, thank you ladies and gentlemen.

xoxo,
i know you love me.

Yours sincerely
Yi An aka Handsome aka Hunk

Xmas Celebration 2010

2010-12-19T14:15:00.023+08:00

Here are some of the photos from Xmas Celebration. The rest will be uploaded to Facebook. Enjoy!

Programmer and
Hosts of the Day

Our
Beneficiaries

Christmas Hat
Decoration

Some people
look better
when their face
is covered

YUM YUM!

Merry Christmas!

and

黑白配!

Ying Cong

long time no see! :)

2010-12-12T17:48:00.003+08:00

Having been busy with exams for the last few weeks, I was very happy to visit our elderly friends again! :) I'll just give a brief update on Mdm Tan and Mdm Ho, whom we visited.

Mdm Tan was rather chatty that day, telling us about the braised pork she cooked the previous day and asking us to help her install the batteries of the portable emergency gadget (which took us a long time to figure how to open the battery compartment :P). She also asked if we knew of any news about government pay-outs as there was an announcement on the radio regarding the matter. However, as the news was in Teochew, we could not understand it but promised to check it up for her. Although she lamented that she could not join the rest for outings because of her failing eyesight, she still joins the other elderly for activities in the SAC, which is comforting because at least she still remains active and not coop herself up in her flat all the time. As she complained about recent recurring headaches on one side (which may be migraine), I think we’ll have to keep an eye on her condition.

Mdm Ho looked sunken as compared to the last time I saw her. However, she was happy to see all of us. All 26 of us SQUEEZED into her flat and took group photos with her. She was very sporty as she didn’t mind taking many shots, and she also asked for copies of the photos taken. As usual, she shared with us photos she took with our volunteers and told many stories.

Can’t wait for the Christmas celebrations next Saturday! Hope the elderly will enjoy themselves! :)

Yinmin :)

2010-11-07T16:20:00.004+08:00

well well. yi an's post gt many pictures. so i think im here to bore u guys.

i was there early, attended the volunteer training for approximately 1 hr before joining the rest for usual visiting. i hope the HCA, L-elderly Befrienders volunteers had enjoyed the training as much as our T.H.E Seniors volunteers do.

Guess i will just update bits on Mdm Tan. Her spectacles is spoil again. During the conversation, it was heartwarming when you knew that the thing u did for her was much appreciated by her. (There was once when Boon yong and I tried to repair her glass n succeeded.) Unfortunately, the specs spoils again, cannot be repaired and she insist not to get it repaired. It is very disheartening when she say she was not given the tickets for admission to events organised by certain communities. Reason being, her eyesight not good, then the people don't give her the free ticket. I do not think such discrimination should exists. They should be given a chance to enjoy as much as others do.

Exams coming. Exams coming. Exams comingggggg...
knowing everyone chionging the project deadlines and revising hard, please take good care of yourselves ya. (:

All the best for exams.! Jy people.

Pei Jen.

Volunteer Training 2010

2010-11-07T13:48:00.005+08:00

So while the old birds proceeded with the usual visit, the newbies(from THES, HCA and LB) were all seated in a room listening attentively to the presenters.

As the saying goes, pictures speak a thousand words. I shan't bore all you guys, enjoy.

playing some ice breaker games to get familiar with one another

Lom, chiam, pass (or Rock, paper, scissors)

Pass the message

time to be serious and attentive

learning how to operate the wheelchair

basic phrases in dialects

getting to know each other better cum lunch

group photo to end

Yi An

Some Reflection

2010-11-02T23:50:00.002+08:00

For this entry, I shall reflect on some of my experience since joining T.H.E. Seniors.

Joining T.H.E. Seniors is truly my first voluntary work. Previously the voluntary work that I had done was through school events. They were all part of CIP requirement which everyone had to fulfill. So when I felt that I could spend some time to do something meaningful, I started looking around for voluntary work. There were many kinds but I always preferred one that will give me a chance to interact with the elderly. And that’s how it begins.

The seniors may have their own character and habits (like putting things in a certain way) but they are always appreciative of what we did for them. I sometimes feel that it must be terribly boring for them in the weekdays and so our visits would have given them something to look forward to on Saturday. Although it feels somewhat routine after a few visits and sometimes the seniors tell the same stories, it still gives me a sense of satisfaction to have done something meaningful.

Doing voluntary work requires more effort because we are not pressed by deadlines or grades. But I think it is worthwhile that every extra bit of effort that we put in lets the seniors know that there are people who care about them.

Ying Cong

Love Your Neighbour Carnival 9 Oct 2010

2010-10-15T22:07:00.021+08:00

Here are some photos from the Carnival. I will upload all photos to Facebook.

Ying Cong

2010-10-04T00:53:00.004+08:00

First experience with T.H.E Seniors

Prior to visiting the elderly, I imagined I would meet cranky elderly who lived in poorly furnished flats, with heaps upon heaps of their belongings taking up most of the space. I was walking along the corridor on the 2nd level, towards my first destination, when my imagination was reinforced. The layout of the HDB block was such that there was a long, straight and narrow corridor with flats on both sides, and it was illuminated only by sunlight at the end of the corridor. Yes, it all feels quite sad, doesn't it? However, the elderly occupants of two of these flats were anything but.

I joined the Hokkien group and visited Mdm Ho first. I was, at first, slightly concerned the situation would be a bit tense and how I should engage her, given it was my first visit. Mdm Ho proved to be extremely amiable, and instructed me to clean her TV set. Her flat was also not the squalor I had pictured in my mind. We chatted with her for a while. She was talkative and jovial. She happily related her stories to us and was eager to offer us drinks. Later, she displayed her sense of humor when she said she wanted to inspect her TV set to ensure that the cleanliness was up to standard. She dragged a finger across her TV set ( I was reminded of bunk inspection in the army!) and found no dust on her finger. I passed! Phew~

After that, we proceeded to Mdm Tan's. Mdm Tan's flat was tidy and required only simple sweeping and mopping of the floor. Her flat was probably neater than most of our rooms! After some cleaning, we sat down to chat. Mdm Tan told us she could not see clearly and my heart went out to her. However, Mdm Tan was stronger than that and was not bogged down by her condition. She also said she is receiving treatment and naturally, all of us wish her a speedy recovery. She related to us, stories in the olden days when her family reared chickens, ducks and pigs, and how her salary of $1.50 per day could see her through because apparently, back then, you could get bean sprouts, kuehs and sweets with 5 cents, to name a few.

The visits were meaningful and I learnt a few things. I was touched to know that there are, in fact, many others out there who care for the elderly, when the elders showed me pictures of themselves with other volunteers. What I felt especially meaningful was doing those simple chores of sweeping and cleaning for them. What, to us, may be tasks easily accomplished, are beyond the elders because of their ailing bodies. A simple act to meet their needs, and they appreciate it, and they show it. Giving is simple like that. I look forward to future visits =)

Wishing the elders health and joy,

See Kiat

Visiting 3 lovely Seniors (:

2010-10-01T18:41:00.003+08:00

For the Hokkien group, we went to visit Mdm Ho, Mdm Cheong and Mdm Tan.

Mdm Ho always give us a warm welcome whenever we visit her. She is very chatty and loves to joke around with us. Mdm Ho can talk about almost anything under the sun and she can communicate in quite a few different languages and dialects --English, Chinese, Hokkien, Malay and Canto. She never fails to bring laughters and joy to us whenever we have conversation with her :D During the visit, Cong Ying asked Mdm Ho if she cooks, and we can answer that on her behalf ;) Mdm Ho is really a good cook. Her famous dish is curry chicken (tried and recommended by many volunteers). So must look forward to the next time she cooks curry chicken for us.

Mdm Cheong is very fit and healthy. She's a good friend of Mdm Ho, so naturally she's also very friendly. In my opinion, she sounds quite comical when she speaks and sometimes make us burst out laughing in the midst of a conversation. She is quite particular when comes to housekeeping, eg. the two white chairs placed in front of her bed cannot touch the bed frame. Whenever we visit her to clean the house, one thing to take note is to wait for her instruction before starting to clean anything. As she will nag a bit if we did not do things according to her wish, but she meant no harm, still a very amiable senior to talk to :D

Mdm Tan is a very cute senior and always gives us a great smile to welcome us. She keeps her house really very clean. Whenever we visit her, there isn't much house cleaning to be done. Hence we would spend more time chatting with her. Mdm Tan has been experiencing some vision problems. She sees really very blur images, in fact, it seems that her vision condition is deteriorating as she couldn't really see the image even if the image was placed quite near to her. Due to her blurred vision, she had a fall previously when she was on her way to get some stuff. In fact, she still has that phobia from that previous fall. Thus, she tried not to go anywhere too far from her house and stay at home for most of times. As a result, she missed out many activities organised by the community and various welfare organisations etc. Hope she will go for a medical check-up soon and regain her vision soon.

Hope you guys would look forward to meet each and every elderly! As they have many interesting stories to share with you guys! (:

With blessings,
Boon Peng (:

Selegie ‘豆花' Cyclohunt! - Volunteers' Outing 17092010!

2010-09-19T23:57:00.006+08:00

I totally enjoyed myself that day! Thanks for all who came down. *Sorry for the late notification especially the new members!* Do look forward to the next volunteers' outing! (More photos would be uploaded to Facebook. Do click on the link on hte right hand side.)

Ken

11 Sept Visit

2010-09-11T17:18:00.002+08:00

Here's another first-timer writing about her experience. And like the rest, I have only good things to say about the visit. Because, truly it was a meaningful time spent with a friendly group of volunteers, with an equally friendly bunch of elderly.

I don't know if it's just me, but when I got off bus 13 and attempted to make my way towards the void deck, the Geylang Bahru estate had this distinctly 'ancient' vibes - you look around and you see more elderly than if you were in Tampines, Bishan etc; and the area seemed abit more neglected and run-down. It seemed like the perfect place for volunteers to come, and hopefully do something to 'brighten' up the lives of the elderly. I admit that on my part I was expecting to meet downcast, bored, pessimistic elderly.

However, to my pleasant surprise, the 2 elderly - Mr Tan and Mdm Chow (i think?) were really warm. In S'pore, we are always feeling warm, but how often do we truly feel warmth? I was quite taken aback by how positive/optimistic/cheerful/joyful/chatty the elderly were. they were everything I had not expected. Although I do hope, that us volunteers, met their expectations. It was funny because they didn't really seem to need our help with the household chores, in fact Mdm Chow kept insisting that we just sit down, while Mr Tan welcomed us to join him to watch TV. So then I realised, perhaps it was not so much what we did, but it was our presence, the fact that they had companions, and had someone to chit chat with that mattered.

As a first-timer, it did feel awkward at times, struggling with the language barrier, and also thinking of how to get the conversation going. in fact, it was Mr Tan and Mdm Chow who initiated the conversation at times, and they were so earnest to chat with us, it almost seemed as if we were the 'elderly' who had to be taken care of!

2 hours flew past and the visit was over. Mdm Chow asked me why I kept smiling, she jokingly asked whether I had picked up money. I kept that question in my head, and then I realised, that it was perhaps because these few hours spent interacting with the elderly were probably the most meaningful hours in my entire week. I could have spent these few hours mugging, shopping, eating, playing, sleeping and doing things that probably made me happy, but at least for these few hours at Geylang Bahru, I felt like I had made someone else happy too.

So I certainly looking forward to the next visit! because I know it is not seeing us once that makes the elderly happy, but it is seeing us returning back every now and then, that makes them truly happy (i hope!).

- Priscilla (Canto Group)

My first true community service

2010-09-06T21:18:00.002+08:00

This Saturday will be my 2nd to visit the old folks at Kallang. Though late in writing the post (I admit I forgot bout this for 2 week), I can still remember how fulfilled am I one week ago.

At first, I misjudged the timing and arrived earlier at the Kallang MRT station. I was alone and feel pretty nervous, did I alight the wrong station? Fortunately, the peoples coming for the THE Seniors became more and more, it is certainly out of my expectations that so many peoples came for this meaningful activity.

I originally signed up for Hokkien group as I seek to brush up my hokkien speaking as I am a hokkien myself. However, I switch to Cantonese group as they are low in number and I happened to know some Cantonese. ( I lived near KL, Malaysia before coming here)

We met two old madams which I couldn't remember their names (bad memories, must be spoiled by those carzy modules). As we goes on helping them to clean houses and interacts with them, I've found out that languages are not important, they sometimes speak a mixture of dialects so fast that I couldn't catch up. In this case, I feel like I am the old man with slow reflex.

The madams were nice people, one of them chat with us for almost an hour despite feeling depressed (I guess we helped relieve her bad mood somehow), and the other one, thought very particular in certain things, insisted that we accept her drinks after we cleaned her home.

Helping the elderlies were actually quite helpful in relieving stress, when I was helping them doing house chores, chatting or even just listening to them, I felt calm, relaxed, accompanied, just like the feel when you are with your family and friends, forgetting all the troubles at the moment where somewhere in the heart, an empty space was occupied. I guess they felt that too, thats why they kept chatting with us, somehow, in this fast paced world, everyone is lonely and feels empty, where we help each other by filling in the empty spaces.

There's a lot of lessons to learn fro the elderlies, one of the madam actually told us her past career at a hotel, she worked for 20 years, serving salads and other appetizers to westerners despite not knowing anything about English. She told us how she learned to memorize the English words by using Chinese pronunciations. For me, this is quite amazing as such perseverance does not exist in me.

The debriefing sessions are quite hard for me as I couldn't, at that moment summarize my feelings. But now, I just said this out clearly and certainly I am looking forward to meet the seniors again this Saturday as such experience and fulfillment cannot be found elsewhere. I will end this with a pun on MasterCard advertisement:

Broom: 5$

Public transport fares: 4$

A lunch at Kallang: 3.50$

A day with old folks: priceless

For everything else, there is the coming Saturdays.

Sat 28th Aug

2010-08-30T23:21:00.002+08:00

It was my first trip to the T.H.E Senior at Kallang that day. My friend and I met up to join the crowd at Kallang Mrt station to be led to T.H.E Senior. Honestly, I do not know what to expect. I do not know how we are going serve the elderly. And, I am kinda worry if i can communicate well with them.

Upon arrival at the location, we were briefed on our job scope and after which we are splitted into groups according to dialect. We move on from there to visit the elderly in their one-room flat.

We started off by helping to tidy up their room. After which, we settled down and have a chat with them. As verified with the CSC seniors, the care centre at the void deck closes on weekend. Our job there is important to keep the elderly accompanied and to lend a listening ear to them. It is actually quite surprising that the elderly are opened up to us. They could talk about almost anything. It is interesting to listen to their stories and their perspective of life.

It was an enjoyable trip for me and I believe this won't be my last visit.

-derrick-

My 1st experience =)

2010-08-28T04:20:00.003+08:00

Hi all, I am going to depart for my 2nd orientation of T.H.E Seniors in few hours time. So just let me briefly share about my experience during my 1st orientation last week. =)

After meeting the senior volunteers at Kallang MRT station, actually I felt kinda nervous because that was the very first time I joined home visits. However, this feeling gone off when I found that the senior volunteers are very helpful. So do not feel hesitate to join. There are always seniors to guide us. =)

So after being separated into different groups, we started the home visits. =D

We helped them to do some simple house chores, for examples sweep the floor, wipe the windows etc. As I expected to see a very very messy house, so I am quite surprised that their house were actually clean enough (cleaner than my room?) LOL.

I found Madam Chua, the 1st elderly I visited very interesting. When she answered to our door, she started to grumble, 'come so early, I want to rest' (something like that), but actually I can feel her happiness when we helped her to clean her house, and ya when we talked with her, she is warm and friendly. She even teaches us poker card divination!

This went the same for the 2nd elderly we visited. She is a senior that very easy to get along with. =) During chit chatting session, she actually told us a joke, (if I did not interpreted wrongly) and she laughed so happily that even though I cannot catch the humour in it, I still laughed from my heart. Hahahaha..

I really (I mean really really) had a wonderful day with the elderly last week. Although at first I feel very odd, do not know what should I do, but our senior volunteers guided us and make me feel belonging. Again, do not feel hesitate to join us. =)

These elderly look very okay to live alone,and they seem to be fine with their life, but somehow I feel that they just trying to be brave. So I will keep joining this activity as I feel like listening to them and keep them accompany. I thought I am the one who will brighten up their day, but actually they make my day. A smile always carve on my face whenever I think of their smile. =) I am looking forward to organize and join them for the coming mid-autumn festival!

Thank you T.H.E Seniors! =)

Cheer,
Jun

2010-08-27T21:06:00.006+08:00

Went for my first visit with T.H.E Seniors volunteers! :) It was my first time volunteering with the elderly, so I really didn't know what to expect. The elderly whom we visited live in one-room flats, some living alone. I learnt that just being there for these elderly and interacting with them made a whole lot of difference to their lives.

Initially, I thought that it would be difficult to start a conversation with them due to our big generation gap. However, I realised that they talk about almost anything under the sun, from their favourite pasttimes to modern TV shows. Mr Tan, one of the elderly we visited, was able to talk to us about a lot of current news which really amazed me! It was a joy listening to their experiences as well, such as the activities they took part in. The warm greetings received when we visited them, and seeing the cheerful look on their faces as they recounted their experiences touched me. Deespite the fact that some of the elderly experience loneliness, they never took it in their stride and instead spread warmth and cheer to those around them. This was a valuable learning point that I took home with me that day :)

These elderly are lonely and sometimes all they really need to be happy is to have someone to listen to their happy experiences as well as their woes. I'm glad I was part of T.H.E Seniors last week spending time with the elderly. It was a fruitful experience and worth the few hours off the afternoon. I wished I could have interacted more with them, and help them out in other areas as well, such as helping them with some chores as they are frail and need our assistance in these areas.

Also, thank you T.H.E Seniors volunteers for making that day a fun and enriching experience for us who went for the first time! :)

Charmaine :))