Instead of spending summer on sightseeing tours in exotic or touristic destinations, twenty-two students and professionals decided to use their holiday time as volunteers in an outreach program in the Philippines from August 3 to 17, 2018 organized by Hon Lam Education and Research Association (HERA) with the support of Galaxy Entertainment Group. This service camp to help the needy was the sixth camp organized by HERA since 2015. The idea of the service camp is to provide an experience for youngsters in lending a hand to those families and children who have materially less in life. The volunteers for this summer’s camp came from Macau, Japan, Hong Kong, Spain, America, Kenya and the Philippines.
The volunteers did varied works during their two week stay in the Philippines that included visits to sick children at the Philippine Children’s Medical Center, “Bahay Aruga” a halfway house for cancer stricken children, a squatter community in Quezon City, Dualtech, a technical school for the poor and also giving a hand in repairing a classroom and teaching six hundred high school students at Irawan National High School in Palawan.
At the end of the camp, one Japanese volunteer, Shota Kawasumi, posted in his Facebook page the following account: ¨I went to join a work camp in the Philippines. In Japan we have financially rich children who have high goals, but on the other hand, I realized that there are many children in the Philippines who don’t even have the basic necessities in life. However I think that these Filipino children know how to enjoy life and know how to be truly happy compared to the Japanese children. In Palawan, we taught Japanese language and culture to the school children, played sports with them, and spent so much time chatting with them. They were incredibly kind, cheerful, and have a sweet heart. I’m not sure if they learned much from us. But one thing for sure, they brought us so much joy and happiness. Reflecting on my experience, I felt that we in Japan misunderstand what happiness is by equating it with acquiring all the material things we want; through this workcamp, I learned that real happiness comes from interacting with other people and our relationships with them. From now on, I will think of how I can contribute to society. I will never forget the school children’s cheerful voice and their sweet smile. Actually I shed some tears when we had to say goodbye to them. Truly another memorable experience for me.”
Henry Choi, a recent Macau high school graduate of Perpetual Help College had this to relate in his facebook post: ¨Before the trip, I was told that I would be teaching Grade 7 students in Irawan National High School. I and my friends planned to teach biology or chemistry. It turned out that we gave up the whole plan and taught the whole school Chinese language. That being said, we gave lessons to students from Grade 7 to Grade 12. It wasn’t as challenging as I’d expected. The students were very active and friendly: my Facebook literally got bombed by their friend requests. Furthermore, I was asked to take photos with people whose names I could not even recall. Here, I’d like to apologise for not being able to remember all their names.
“I was really impressed that they were so true to us. Unlike the people in Macau, many of them were crying at the farewell party, revealing the real side of themselves. At the same time, I was delighted to receive letters and souvenirs from my students.”
The experience of the past work camps is that the volunteers set out to give themselves to others, but at the end they were the ones who actually received the most.
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