Some Reflection

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

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

Ying Cong

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 (:

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!

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

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

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.