here goes:
We set off from school at 8.30am and reached Telok Blanga crescent.
There was a little community centre at the void deck which was our base camp and we gathered there.
we went to our groups, for me, it was group C.
Members:
LiHong
Mavis
Sabrina
and me :D
Lihong and I were from class 1003 while Mavis and Sabrina were from 1008.
well, we listened to the instructions...etc, how to conduct door to door visits and such. since we will be together for almost the nest 5-6 hours, we broke the ice, introducing ourselves.
Mavis is from judo, i asked her if she knew Melvin Chew and she said not very well... haha
Sabrina is from choir. She seemed surprised when i told her I'm in ODAC. I asked her :"why?"
Her reply:" no wonder i see you run rounds around school" XD
Thats what we do every week, run run run... :D
ok, on to what we did during SL.
Paired up with 2 adults, an uncle and an auntie, both really kind and approachable people, but my poor memory allowed their names to slip away and i can't remember the names, which is a pity...
We were in charge of covering part of the 10th floor, the whole 9th floor and part of the 8th floor of block 3. Our objective was to go from door to door and offer free blood pressure check, waist, height and weight measurement as well as let residents answer a questionaire.
Floor 10.
we reached it via the elevator... of course (rolls eyes) >:]
we reached our first unit and pressed the doorbell. there was no ringing sound
...
(we will eventually find out that most doorbells do not work at all and are for show. some units even have 2 doorbells outside the house, both of which do not ring)
so we knocked the door
knock knock knock*
(still no answer)
looks at peephole at door for any indication of people inside.(if light is suddenly blocked and the peephole becomes dark, you know someone is looking into it)
disappointed by the first unit, we continued doing this for the next unit
same result for the rest of our units on floor 10
Floor 9
pressed doorbell. IT RANG!!!
a woman opened the door, YES!
She was a eurasian, but she looks of malay origin. She's a christian and likes oriental art. She eats fresh fruits and vegetables everyday and exercises by walking everyday. She looks overweight but is actually very healthy. She also knows how to speak chinese, malay, tamil, hokkien, cantonese in addition to english. You may wonder why i remember so much about her, well.... i was kind of excited then. yet I forgot the name of the 2 adults that accompanied us =.=
after doing all the necessary stuff, we offered her a free packet of rice. BUT she kindly declined! she told us to give her's to the more needy people on this block and that she has enough rice for herself. She was the only person we visited to decline this gift and ask it to be offered to someone else instead.
I was touched, not in physical but in emotional. Her motto was to forget about yesterday and live for tomorrow, which i felt was very optimistic.
The second person we successfully took measurements of was a malay woman. Her house was the only one we visited which was in disarray. She lived with her husband and her 30 year old son. Then we found out from her that her son became mentally damaged 3 years ago. Her other son was married and lived away from them. I felt that the married son should do more to help his parents...
I felt so sad at that moment...
However, her husband has brought their son for a checkup and were not present.
Sweeping my view across the room, looking at the piles of clothing, plastic bags and adult diapers, i feel thankful for the life i am leading.
we gave her 2 packets of rice when we left.
the 3rd person we visited was another malay woman. She has two children, who are quite young and cute, one was sleeping on a mattress on the floor while the other was reading from a tiny picture book. We cooed and gaga-ed over the little guy. i admit i did give in to his adorable-ness for a while... but it was a while.
while Mavis and Lihong helped with the questionaire, we told the little guy reading to study hard and love reading, giving him some subconscious message to do well in future and escape the poverty cycle.
Then the shock came, we were told that he has a hole in his heart.. but..but he seemed so lively!! and the other child sleeping has some problem although i forgot what...
I silently prayed that they will lead a happier life and gave them 2 packets of rice when we left.
the 4th person we visited was an old 82 year old cantonese woman who only knew how to speak in her dialect. Thus i only understood 1% of all her ramblings. she was hospitable, even arranging chairs with her weak body to let her guests sit. The uncle and auntie had to be our translator.
It was indeed a lot of rambling, even though the woman needed a hearing aid.
it was close to lunchtime, we gave her a packet of rice and we left for base camp, still hearing her talk as we slowly walked to the lift lobby.
LUNCH at 12.00pm:
just gathered in our class, talked about what we experienced so far.
after lunch, we set off again.
5th person we visited was a chinese man of probably 58 years old.
He looks like a really active sporty guy because we saw a gym bench, a mountain bike, bowling ball and several running shoes in his home.
I did the questionaire with him this time and i had to ask all the questions in Chinese!
he was friendly, has low blood pressure and may have high blood glucose sometimes. Whenever we suggested something related to his health, he kept saying that he could treat it with Zhong Yao or chinese medicine. Oh, another thing, he cannot live without coffee, he drinks it at the kopitiam every morning.
6th person, was more of a surprise. we were knocking and waiting at this door for quite a while. we were about to leave, then the door opened. a man on a wheelchair opened it, i saw that his right leg was missing.
well then, at first he was hesitant... but we eventually persuaded him to measure his blood pressure.
He claims to be a singer in the 1960s to 1970s. earning a really good income of $600 to $1000 which in today's value is 6000 to 10 000 dollars. The sepia coloured photo of his younger self seemed so handsome, yet now, he is wheelchair bound, naked from waist up, living in a a one room apartment. He said that if he had a family and had children, he wouldn't be here at this state today.
then he gave us a lengthy somewhat of a lecture for almost 45mins, of his history. By the way, he was 80 over years old, i doubt he will even finish. He said that he was a construction labourer after his singing career and even helped to build some of the institutes of learning in Singapore, even Nanyang JC ! :D
other than that, he gave lots of wisdom... consisting of being thrifty.... do not spend money on pop stars... women have equal rights to men.... our generation determines the future...
we left........ yea, eventually.... it was interesting to hear what he has to say.
that was our last visit and we returned to base camp... returned the surveys and questionaires and left for school at 3.45pm.
we checked 32 units, of which 6 were visited. I must admit, i have much to learn from these 6 very special people. I am thankful to be able to experience this. I realised that the family is one of the the most important thing to be able to have and we cannot afford to lose our family.
I hope to do another SL project again. It was meaningful, a meaningful 5-6 hours.
Random: Sabrina is very very interested in the wooden woodpecker door knocker. we kept teasing that she was a kid... haha. Now she can't say I'm weird when i wobbled a little to that "nursery rhyme" sounding doorbell ring XD
signing off.
while wrapping up Mich's present today, i realised something terrible.
I have done something terrible, wait, rather it would be, I have not done something important.
will make it up to you someday..
majors exams over, A level pw and chinese heading my way, life of a jc student no brakes at all.
im doing pw all week. sigh.. presentations are hard.
I got sick.
yes, really.
a really leaky nose and a fever to boot, with achy joints and a cough.
Every time i breathe, i feel like coughing.
My throat feels like sandpaper and I felt that i was breathing in fine powder.
.................
that was 3 days ago, i didn't post this because i went to sleep immediately after typing this out.
Had my GP Promo test today. Fingers crossed. Hope it scores well. I certainly finished my AQ question, but my summary was half done :(
Tomorrow's the Econ test. Just a week more to go, and it'll be over.
Just worried about Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Bio, Chem and Math exam respectively.
Have not thought of doing anything or planned anything after promos, im just focusing on doing revision now.