iProject - Commitment of Hearts




Sunday, 25 March 2007

A journey to remember

Post Trip
I had never imagined that I would ever be on an overseas school trip. What more an Overseas Community Involvement Programme (OCIP), by plane to Vietnam. I was even more overjoyed when I learnt that I was accepted into the group and my parents are willing to pay for the trip.

First stop was to get to know the various people who were involved in OCIP. As I am a very quiet person, and it took me quite awhile to start speaking up to them and being comfortable with them. We had to raise funds to buy things need for the Vietnamese children and for our trip. This was done by having a catering service for the classes on Teachers’ Day celebration. My main role was to pack the cooked food properly before they are delivered to the different classes that had placed their order. However that morning, when I reached there, I was asked to be in the kitchen and helped to do the cooking. I panicked! Never in my life had I attempted to fry such a large number of fish balls and French fries. Lucky for me, the stall holder taught me a few basic skills of cooking to survive through the session. I never thought that I would learn a new skill even before the trip. Nowadays I am confident to lend a hand whenever my aunty cooks for a wedding.

The Construction
This was something totally new to me. I had never tried doing any construction work. Most of the digging that I had done is due to gardening. Therefore, building the toilet on the first day of construction work proved to be both physically demanding and yet quite satisfying. Although we did not complete the toilet, we managed to contribute to the building of the toilet. That was satisfying enough considering the fact that I had never done it before. However I did wish that I could have completed the toilet and see it actually functioning. That would indeed be more satisfying.

The second day, I was tasked to collect sand near the river. This task was not that demanding but rather an enjoyable one with lots of laughter. It was also interesting to work near such a beautiful clear river. We also manage to dip our legs into the cool and refreshing river water for a moment before heading back to the school when we were done. It is near impossible to find such a river in Singapore. Singapore River just doesn’t cut it. The view from the river was also breathtaking and a picture perfect one.

On the third day of the construction work, I did some stone picking to line the pathway at the back of the school so that it would not so muddy. The stone had to pick from a nearby empty ground and carried to the back of the school. It was not a long distance away, but after multiple trips of transporting the stone, it was physically tiring. One good thing about doing construction work in Vietnam is that although we were under the sun, we did not sweat at all. After those 3 days of doing construction work, my old leg injury took its toll from doing too much construction work. It was sad considering the fact that I would not be able to experience this again. So I had to rest my leg for the next 2 days to keep it from getting worse. But I made myself useful by preparing for the lessons for the day while the rest did the construction work.

On the last day, although my leg was slightly painful, I decided to do a bit of construction work which was scooping sand that the boys had loosened. Overall, I never knew that I could even do 3 long day of construction work since I was on long term MC. So it was an achievement for me personally. Although there was a period of time which I could not do any more construction work, it made me realize more of my limitations and that there are other ways that I can contribute when I’m not physically fit.

The English Lessons
I started the first 3 days with English lessons. I wasn’t really involved in the teaching process. It was more of helping the students to understand and standing at one corner of the classroom with a few of the Vietnam students. For the first 3 days, our class was not as vibrant or exciting as the class next door. It could be because we did not know how to teach them effectively and it was harder to get their attention if they did not understand fully what we are saying. So that was our challenge that we didn’t managed to fully overcome within the first 3 days.

When it was time to switch over, a few others and I decided to stay and continue with the English lessons. So the new group of people and I who switched over from the games group decided to come up with a proper lesson plan so that things are much better. We came up with our own materials to aid our teaching and at the same time got help from the group in charge of the other class. We asked them how they managed to make their class more active and tried to adopt their approach. Fortunately, things made a turn for the better during the following 3 days of English lessons. We and the Vietnam students had so much fun running around and learning English at the same time. What was more satisfying was that, they used some of the new words that we have taught them. That shows that we did manage to contribute to making their life a better one although it was in such a small way.

Overall
There were quite a few challenges that I faced such as being physically unfit to contribute continuously throughout the trip as well as finding the best way to contribute so that the Vietnam students can benefit the most. One thing that I learned was that it is quite impossible to change their lives totally for the better when we are only there for a week. But that doesn’t not mean we can’t make that week that we spent with them a memorable and benefiting one. Hopefully I will be able to go back there and contribute some more and impact their lives in the long term instead of in the short term. As for me, one of the major impacts was how the children there was appreciative of the things we did for them, and here I am mostly feeling that I’m lacking of some things. Despite all the difficulties they faced, they still continued to work hard and never gave up. That is one thing I could learn from them. Even though I could get help from the people around me and did get help, I sometimes do feel like giving up. Who would ever think that they could also teach us something as we helped them?

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