Think of them...the urban poor

I'm the very last minute registered camper, before this camp I had participated two times in the year 2004 and 2005. At that time, the camp was in big crowd, it was not DIY camp. This year was the first time I participated in DIY camp. What I wanted to say here is, you guys really awesome!!! This DIY camp was really successful!!! I enjoyed very much in this camp. Before participating this camp, I knew about the poverty issue, in fact, I have seen the video of those children staying beside the water heater. It is still fresh in my mind on how the children live there.

When I was exposed to the first challenge, I was thinking, it was so hard for us to earn money, what about in real life? They are worse than what we experienced in the challenge. We still have paper box to make our shoes, but what about them? They have no shoes to wear!!! We are far more lucky than them, and yet we still can complaint on some little things. What about them??? what do they have??? NOTHING!!!

The hunger that we felt in the camp was not as much as what they feel everyday. We did not eat, but we did not need to use much energy during the 30 hours, but for them, no food at all the time, but still they have to use their energy to work for the daily life. At least we still have Ovalitine and milk from time to time, but for them??? what do they have???

At night when we was sleeping in the canteen, yes, we can feel how people sleeping in the street. The canteen still have roof, but they really have to sleep at roadside. I did not have a good sleep that night, keep awaking for the whole night, because of mosquitoes and also mattress. In the morning, when I woke up, I felt so bad, because only once in a while I have to sleep in this condition, what about them? They have to face this kind of situation everyday!!! What can we complain further??? They don't even have the chance to complain either, but they still live their live so toughly, facing each and everyday with courage.

All thess experiences have made me think deeply. Think of what we have in our life and provide me the courage to face the problem that we are having in the real world. Even until now, I still cant imagine if I am one of the children living in urban poverty. How i can help them??? What can i do for them??? I hope every camper will have the same feeling as I have, aware that urban poverty is a serious problem in our world!!! No point for us to starve for 30 hours but in the end we are still the one that are not aware of this issue.
I hope that people will start the ACTION!!! Do what we can to solve this problem.
I would like to thank our camp leader Chee Hoe, all the committees and also volunteers for making this camp so successful and awesome!!! BRAVO to all of you!!!

p/s: I would like to suggest to organise some events to help the urban poor, or any activity that could raise awareness throughout the year before the next camp. This would be more practical for us to help solving the poverty issue.


Jackie Ang
Group A