CCA Fair

The annual CCA fair was held 22 Nov @ Ngee Ann City... MINDS being part of CCA definitely came in full force to support the event...




MINDS MYG has a game stall...




Earlier on, we participated in the walkathon

Outing to Marina Barrage

15 Nov, we went to Marina Barrage... the latest downtown icon that was officially opened on 1 Nov http://www.pub.gov.sg/Marina/Pages/default.aspx

Thanks to Zhuting & Yiting for organising this outing and being our "tour guides" :)

... All these years ...

I should be writing this post in English but somehow I am in the mood to write in Chinese ... (I guess I express myself better in Chinese than English =p)

前几天，我个朋友问我－你还记得你第一天来到BKTG的情况吗？
想一想，发现10年就这样过了。。。
我很清楚地记得我第一天到ＢＫ的时候，那时候我们还是借住在Special O的地方。
一进去就看到很多大姐姐和大哥哥很专心的照顾着Trainee ... 一点都不需要任何人来提醒他们现在应该做哪些事情。。。从他们的身上，我学到了很多。。。
而我也是在那个时候慢慢的培养一个习惯 - 就是研究其他的人，然后慢慢的把技术学起来。。。

当是的我只有17岁 。。。 我真的不知道也不记得为何那个年纪的我，可以那么的专心的在BK.
之后因为某种原因，我离开了3或4年。

在2005 年四月，我决定找回我人生很重要的这一部份！
在当时年纪轻轻的我来说，BK对我的影响很深。
所以我终究离不开BK的。。。

每个礼拜看到我们的学生，我的心情就会好很多。。
虽然我们常常必须教他们很简单的事情而且可能要重复很多遍。。我还是很愿意。。。
就像简单的数学在作业簿上的练习和实际的用铜板来给他们算钱是没有一定的连接的。。。
他们能在作业簿上把2+3答对不代表他们会明白两块加三块。。
这是我们大家都要慢慢学习。。。

希望BK能努力加油。。。
等下我就要放假去了 。。。
我会想念大家的

Something to Share ...

Just wanted to share this with all of you ....
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A blind boy sat on the steps of a building with a hat by his feet. He held up a sign which said: 'I am blind, please help.' There were only a few coins in the hat. A man was walking by. He took a few coins from his pocket and dropped them into the hat. He then took the sign, turned it around, and wrote some words. He put the sign back so that everyone who walked by would see the new words.

Soon the hat began to fill up. A lot more people were giving money to the blind boy. That afternoon the man who had changed the sign came to see how things were. The boy recognized his footsteps and asked, 'Were you the one who changed my sign this morning? What did you write?'

The man said, 'I only wrote the truth. I said what you said but in a different way.' What he had written was: 'Today is a beautiful day and I cannot see it.'

Do you think the first sign and the second sign were saying the same thing?

Of course both signs told people the boy was blind. But the first sign simply said the boy was blind. The second sign told people they were so lucky that they were not blind. Should we be surprised that the second sign was more effective?

Moral of the Story: Be thankful for what you have. Be creative. Be innovative. Think differently and positively.

Invite others towards good with wisdom. Live life with no excuse and love with no regrets. When life gives you a 100 reasons to cry, show life that you have 1000 reasons to smile. Face your past without regret. Handle your present with confidence. Prepare for the future without fear. Keep the faith and drop the fear.

Great men say, 'Life has to be an incessant process of repair and reconstruction, of discarding evil and developing goodness.... In the journey of life, if you want to travel without fear, you must have the ticket of a good conscience.'

The most beautiful thing is to see a person smiling...
And even more beautiful is, knowing that you are the reason behind it!!!

-Fan Han

My experience at BKTG

I am writing to share with you guys what volunteering is like at the Basic Knowledge Training Group and how the experience had been for me personally. Recruitment is in full swing and hopefully, writing this would encourage more people to step up as we are perennially short of volunteers. However, this is not propaganda but is primarily about the real people, real experiences and real relationships that I had seen in the short time I had been here.

Many of you may have the impression that intellectually disabled people are hard to handle and harder to befriend. Indeed, I wasn’t exactly sure what I was getting myself into when I signed up and can’t help but wonder if I am able to get comfortable with them. On my first few visits, seeing the volunteers taking good care of the trainees and treating all behavioural issues with patience and understanding was a deeply humbling experience. The trainees can be hard to manage at times and very often, they show little progress despite the best efforts. These people know what real charity is and are willing to care for the trainees totally unrelated to them, taking only satisfaction in the fact that they had alleviated some burden for the care-takers and let the trainees enjoy a happier time.

When I started engaging with the trainees, I did have doubts that the activities we organised did not register with them, since they don’t talk and generally don’t do as they are told. However, during parting time, it was very surprising and heart-warming to see one or two trainees give a smile and wave you goodbye. It does feel good to be appreciated and have a special bond with your trainee! All in all, most of the trainees are not too difficult to take care, and there are always other friendly volunteers around to help out in tricky situations.

Lastly, I must mention the awesome BKTG volunteers. They do feel like one big family in disguise! Besides the regular dinners and occasional drinking sessions, they are great fun to be around with and are there for you when you need advice (or simply someone to listen to heartbreak stories). It is quite amazing to see how much camaraderie the volunteers have in spite of the gulf in backgrounds. I think if there is just one special factor that bonds people to BKTG, it has to be the enormously meaningful relationships between volunteers here. Individually, our small and little baby efforts may count for little. But together, we made the world a much happier place for all the trainees under our care.

-Weiliang