So, how was my trip to Rumah Victory?

First of all, I would like to start by thanking our advisers Dr. Phelim and Dr. Adeline for giving all of us this opportunity to play our part in society by visiting this home. Honestly, this is actually my first time visiting a home and engaging in activities with them. In the past, I have only visited homes and just passed on the donations collected. Thus, this reflection of mine is truly a reflection from a first time experience.

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We left Taylor's at about 2.30 pm after class and we did rush because we were supposed to reach the home at 3 pm. Thankfully, that the roads were not jammed and we managed to reach there in 15 minutes time. As we were unloading the things from the car, a couple of the boys from the home came and helped us carry them into the house. I guess this really formed a good impression of them on us. There were two groups at the home on this day, on in-charge of the food and the other in-charge of the activities and we were the group who were handling the activities. We had two activities for the children on the day; bag stamping and water balloon fight. We started the day with the bag stamping, and I was really amused at how creative the boys got stamping their bags. Some of them preferred painting on them with brushes or using their palms to stamp instead of using the stamps we prepared. As the saying goes, to each his own. Unfortunately, the only thing that was slightly disappointing was that we could not really engage in conversation with most of the children due to language barriers. The boys were mostly Mandarin speaking and from my group only one of us could speak in Mandarin. The others tried really hard in both English and Bahasa Malaysia and we managed to make some conversation. I was really grateful for the other group for their help though. Most of them could speak Mandarin and the really helped us in managing the children and helped us convey what we wanted to say to the children. I was glad that this activity went on smoothly with minimal issues. Later on, while the kids were preparing pizza with the other group, my group prepared the water balloons for our outdoor activity. Judging from the kids excitement when we were filling up the balloons, I could say that they were really looking forward to this activity. I guess I was too. Unfortunately, luck was not on our side as it started raining. It was not heavy yet but we decided not to take the risk in case any of the kids falls sick due to this. The activity had to be cancelled and we could not replace with any other activities due to time constraints. What really touched me the most is that before dinner when they were saying their prayers, they prayed for all of us to achieve what we want in life and this was so sweet of them. After dinner, I was again impressed by the older kids helping to clean up. This helped saved a lot of time and the work finished faster.

At the end of the day, I can really conclude that the home is filled with children of different temperament and this is what makes the place cheerful. I do not know of their background or what are the reasons for them to be there at the home but despite what problems they face, they are a bunch of cheerful ones. This is something we should all learn that if life gives you lemons, make lemonade. I went home exhausted but glad that I spent my day well.

#communityserviceinitiative #rumahvictory #youthandchildrenhome