"Giving Back" Volunteerism

Friday, 25 September 2009


Went to ACCESS to continue volunteer, help Janice do stuffs. Amanda came earlier together with peter, and they both helped to place the hearts onto the Tree, thus "Giving Tree" Project is said to be completed. I thought that it was a invaluable experience though, not that we were able to help Janice do work, but more importnatly, I think that it is doing it for the AWWA SMILES children. The Tree will be put in a primary school to organise a fund raising event to assist children and clients alike who are suffering from various disabilities, and thus allow them to cope with their daily life. I think that it gives me great pleasure to have contributed in this project, in order to benefit the children.

Next, we assisted Janice to do some paperwork, stapling papers and among them, arranging brochures for AWWA. I was in charge of collecting the arranging the brochures into place while Shawn puts then into a file. Out of those many sets of brochures were 5 sets of brochures, each of which describes the various disabilities clients have suffered from, Spina Bifida, Celebral Palsy etc among others. It kinda interests me to know and understand more of the various physical conditions, and as I read them, a kind of feeling or thoughts, rather came to my mind, so yea.....


We spent some time doing the paperwork and filings. While we do, we also chatted aqbout alot of things etc, then also amanda showed us some tricks using the rubber band so was quite fun.

We were quite busy with the paperwork until about 5, then janice brought us to level 1 to visit the AWWA SMILES children, where they would normally be taken care of after their schooling in AWWA school. Many of the clients are also disabled de, quite like us, some having suffered from spastic disabilities. Having said that, I tink it was very illuminating to be able to interact with the children, understand how they communicate with people and others. It was quite intersting to note that they are the cheerful type, always having a smile on their faces.

Upon seeing us enter the room, most of them would be running towards us and introducing themselves etc. One boy even offered to show amanda around the room, and also wanted to help her push her wheelchair, which is quite positive, as it shows that they would also be willing to help those in need. Many of the clients also came running towards us to exchange handshakes.