Wai Fun's Reflections - In Search of the True Essence of Volunteering
--On behalf of Wai Fun
In the past year，I've travelled around some of the places, but none of them as special as this trip.
I seemed to have embark trip by the time machine - I felt like I went back to experience my dad's childhood life!The experience is interesting for me but it's tough for him I guess! Like the villagers, he used to live in a wooden hut, breed domestic animals, and don't have any toilet in the hut, they have to go public toilet which is shared among all villagers (same with Gia Bac). My father has 7 siblings, which resonates with that in Gia Bac, where the villages have many many children. The children always have to cook or help their parents at the plantations. During the rainy seasons, some big holes in the village will filled up with water and become natural swimming pool, which my father and his brothers liked the most. However, unlike kids in Gia Bac, my father didn't encounter help from volunteers like us, he stopped his studies at Secondary 1 because of his poor financial situation.
Through such comparison, I figured that even if we hadn't been there, kids in Gia Bac would have grown up as usual, like how my Dad did. I'm not sure what impact we have brought to the kids. Inspiration? Role model?(Many life skill they are my role models, they taught me how to mow :P) Hope? Did I?
Hope we brought them memorable school days. Through them, I think I found the part of meaning of volunteering - to provide the best that I can! =)
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What say you?