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Published: January 11th 2013
This one week is the most meaningful week in my life so far. It is a long-time dream came true for me and a journey full of mix emotions: anger, sadness, happiness, helplessness. It will be an experience that I will always cherish and remembered and the foundation of one of my new goals in life.
When I began to have this idea of taking a long period of time off from working, my plan was to find a teach opportunity in a rural area in China, such as GuiZhou, one of the poorest province in China. In hindsight, I am glad that my plan did not work out. The reality and environment are so much harsher than I can ever imagine, I need a lot of preparation and support. More importantly, without reliable connections in China, it is extremely difficult to find such opportunities online. Knowing the dark side of the China, I am careful on putting myself over there without gaining enough confidence on the organization and the people. Thus, I held my judgement on the Hong Kong non-profit organization.
For a few years, I has been checking out non-profit organizations in the States that sponsor children: such as World Vision,
Christian Sponsor a child. I am either not satisfied with their internal expense allocation or their geography of sponsorshil. I want to look for organization that has minimal internal administrative expenses, which mean my donation will be spend on the child. In addition, I would like an organization that sponsors children from mainland China. I knew this should not make a difference in my decision, but because of my Chinese background, I felt more connected with people in China. More importantly, I have more insights on the country, the society and the language. This is also the reason that I considered Volunteer Space in the first place.
On June 1, we had our first meeting. It is a meet and greet, an opportunity for us to meet people from the organization and other volunteers. I learned that Volunteer Space has been in business for more than a decade, it core goal is to sponsor children in poor rural area in mainland China. Volunteer Space has only two full time employees who take care the daily administrative responsibility. All the events and activities are organized and executed by its volunteers. Due to its extreme linear structure, Volunteer Space's administrative expense ratio is
less than 10% of budget. Each sponsored child receives 80yuan to 100yuan every month, it is 2/3 of the donation amount. The rest is put into reserve and use for special cases. Learning all these, I am much more at ease with the money I contributed (4000HKD). More importantly, I like the people I met from the organization. There are seven other volunteers. Other than one of them being a student from HKU, they are all my ages. There are lawyer, IT company owner, phamacist, teacher. Some of them are taking time off for the program, couple of them also quited their job like me. We were asked during this meeting why we are doing this and what we trying to gain out of this experience. Listening to other volunteers, I am very happy to see that we all share very similar thoughts. We all want to help!!
In the subsequent three meetings, we discussed our itinerary, activities and games that we are going to do with the childrens, how many family visits we are going to do in each place, timing and rules. One thing that is emphasize is that other than the supplies that we are bringing, we should
not give anyonee cash. We don't want them under the impression that we are there to throw away free money (there are many cases in China that a good heart causes bad consequenses). We also have to prepare mentally for the tough local environments. On July 21, with a lot of pencils, T-shirts by another organization, socks by relatives of one of the volunteer, pencil bags, total to about 100kg (we are carrying 10kg of supplies each), we are flying to GuiYang.
The way sponsorship work with Volunteer Space is that they either have local individual volunteers (including the local teachers and principals) or work with another local non-profit organization. These local individuals and organization will collect the child's information and perform the first review base on guideline given by Volunteer Space. After their evaluation, list of name and information will be submitted to the HK office and arranged for sponsorship based on the number of sponsor rececived. This way, many untrue and fake cases can be prevented, because the local teachers and principals would know about the kid's family situation and make appropriate recommendation. There are cases before that people lied to get free money. = / These local volunteers
and organizations will be the one setting up the family visits and taking us around.
After about two hours of flight, we landed in GuiYang, the capital of GuiZhou province. With bags of suppplies, we met up with our local volunteers and drive toward our first destination. The drive is for another 6 hours, by the time we got to the hotel, it is already 10pm and we have not even got dinner. We start with our daily meeting right away, we have a meeting every night to talk about the day and plan for next day. Before anything, the local volunteer answered the question I had in mind for the last few hours. Along the the road on our way here, all the houses I saw along the road is very nice. When we drove into the center of town, there are so much nylon light it is like Manhatan. Fancy hotels are everywhere and expensive shops. I asked out loud:"It does not look poor at all. I think they have more money than I do. Why are we here?" The local volunteer said: "You must be thinking that why you are here. Everywhere you look, it is nice and
show money. This is because of the face project (面子工程) initiated by the local government. In order to change its perception of being poor, the local government gave the owner of the house/business 2000yuan and mandate them to fix the house up to certain standards. The 2000yuan is not sufficient to cover all the costs, which mean the family has to borrow. Involuntarily, they are forced to get into debt. So to outsider, it is nice and new. But inside many of those house, the family is starving. But if they don't comply, they will be force to leave their home." With that said and brief introduction, we dived into our plan for tomorrow. The local volunteer told us the itinerary for the next day, how many students will be there and the number of families we will be visiting. With these info, we sort all our supplies and take a share for tomorrow. Since it is our first day tomorrow, we left for learning. By the time we got to our room, it is already midnight and we are meeting up at 7:30 the next day.
After a quick breakfast, we are ready to go. After about an hour of
driving, we got to the first school. It was a school built by Volunteer Space, but it is closed down by now due to combination of school in the local area by the government. It is such a waste of money, it costs more thousands of yuan to build the school and it was only used for two years. How wasteful!
Our local volunteers, a couple, used to be teachers in this school. After hearing their story, they became my idol. The husband has always been into helping other people since young because of his own childhood of growing up poor. The wife grew up in a well off family. The husband volunteered in the school before, and got invited back to teach for the next school year by mistake. He does not want to disappoint the kids, he accepted. The first day of school happened to be the same day as their planned wedding day, hence they change their wedding day to earlier. Right after the wedding and without a honeymoon, he packed their belongings and moved into the mountain. There is no hot water, not modern toilet, no internet and many other modern facilities. During summer days, they would
wake up covered in bugs. The transition a city life to life in the mountain, I don't know how the wife had handle it. But they stayed for a year and became teachers loved by the students. Even after they left, they had helped to recruit college students to continue their work. As time went by, the local government started playing tricks to scare away the teachers, like breaking window with rocks in the middle of the night. It became unsafe for people from outside to stay, they have to call it off. The wife is a hero to me. I asked how did she do it, isn't it hard to adjust to the local life. Her answer is that of course it is tough, but I always knew my husband's passion in this. I married him for the good and worse.
When our bus pulled in front of the school, there is already a crowd waiting for us: students, parents, local villagers. They greeted us warmly, especially the kids. The students glued to their beloved teacher for the whole time, you can see how much they like them. The plan for the morning is to play games with the kids,
give them the stuffs we brought as gift. We had a great time playing games. They are very basic games like passing the balloon, passing the rubber band with straw in their mouth, making paper airplane. They are games that city kids would despite because they have so much other better toys and games to play with. While we are having a lot of fun playing, suddenly I heard a commotion from the side of the school. A woman was walking toward us and asking loudly what we are doing here and who approve us being here. She is from the local government and suspicious us of our intention of being there without notifying the proper people in the government. We got nervous and not sure what to do. Our local volunteer explained to her that we are here just to play game with the kids and they taught in the school before. But regardless, our local volunteer got“asked” back to the office to better explain the whole thing. = / We were concern but there was nothing we can do to help other than continue with the kids. After about 1.5 hours with the kids in the school, it
The warm welcome
All the cloths are new, special for usis time for our next activity: family visits. We divided into three groups: difficult, moderate and easy based on the distance of the family from the school. I volunteer for the difficult one. With backpacks full with gifts and a local guide with each group, we started off. After walking along the muddy path along the field for about half an hour, we arrived at the house of the first family. It is single parent family, the mom raising two kids on her own. The condition of the house is bad, the inside is dirty, empty and dark. On our way here, we learned that single parent household is not common in this region due to its culture. Many men die young due to the tough conditions, hard labor, poor medical facility, etc. The widow usually remarried and many would leave their kids behind. It is extremely tough for a mom to take care the household and the children on her own. The lack of labor to work in the farm means poor income for the family. We sat with the family and chat with the mom and kid that we sponsored for a bit. The mom was very nice
and offered us lunch, but I felt a bit awkward. I want to know more about how they are doing and any difficulty that we can help, but I don’t want to ask questions that cause them embarrassment or pain. = / After about 15 minutes with the family, we have to go to the next one. In the middle of our family visit, it started pouring. The saying about GuiZhou is “无三寸平，天无三天晴”, which mean there is no flat land for more than three inches and there is no sunny days for more than three days. This is also the main reason why this province is one of the poorest in China. This nature environment makes it very tough to build the basic infrastructures. Without good infrastructures, it is hard to kick off on the economy. We came prepared with rain boots and rain gears, so we continued on.
I visited about 30 to 40 families in this week, and every family made my heart heavier a bit. As basic as how long it takes to get to the school, it varies a lot. Some kids only need to walk half an hour, other might need two hours on way. And
it is not walking on nice paved road, they have to walk among corn field, hike up muddy hills, roads cut off by mud slides. A couple time, I almost slipped. But you don’t see that on the faces of any of these kids. When we give them the gifts, the smile on their face is the better reward I can ask for.
There are few families that I don’t want to forget:
- It is a family of three: parents with one son. The house is build out of mud and it is in poor condition and the size of a big box. When we stepped inside, it is pitch dark and empty. There is a twin size bed at the corner and a stove in the middle of the room for cooking. That is all!! When I sat down on the bed, I can feel the uneven board under the thin layer of blanket and hole in the middle. The dad is deaf due to a sickness and the mom is illiterate, which mean they can’t get a job in the city. What made is worse is that they are from any village, which mean they are not entitled to
government help and subsidy. I asked our local volunteer is there any hope for this family? What we can do to help them? His answer is harsh but realistic: it is hopeless for this family and there is not much we can help. His guess is that the kid will eventually quit school and go to the city and find a low-end job trying to support the family. Hearing this, I feel so sad and helpless. It is a known disaster, but nothing we can do. = (
- Kids in GuiYang: GuiYang is the capital of GuiZhou, also the city where many people from the mountain came and look for jobs. We visited the outskirt of the city, where most of the immigrant families live. It is so different from the modern city that you can’t even imagine. The population density is extremely high, you can feel the air not much and the odor made our eyes watery and nose running. We can’t even catch a taxi into the neighborhood because the drivers were not willing to go inside. Within this community, they have their own motorbike transportations. Many of the kids are key chain kids, which mean their parent
are out working the whole day from dawn to dusk. At age of 10 or younger, the children have to cook, clean the house or taking care the younger siblings. I saw young kids being locked at home on their own because their parents have to work. One young boy about age 12 is living on his own because his dad is out working in another city for an extended amount of time. But the house is so neat that you can see he takes good care of everything. The main business for this group of people is recycling and garbage collection, which worsen the living condition. We brought the sample bathroom set we got from the hotel with us and gave them to the children. Immediately, one girl started brushing her teeth and she brushed so hard, her teeth started bleeding. Even basic hygiene is a luxury in this area. = / From the top of the hill, you can see the high rises in the city center. There are people few kilometers away driving fancy car, eat fancy meals with plenty of leftover, high end shops. This seems so unreal that it is like another universe. When we
are in the mountain, the conditions are also extremely tough, but most the kids we visited are staying with their parents or relative. In the mountain, there is no job opportunity and people live with what they grow in the field. In the city, there are job opportunities but the kids are usually left behind on their own. Which one would you pick? City or stay in the mountain. Which kids are“luckier”?
- The boy living in a tent with his parents on the roadside: The family moved to the town to assist their relative with their business. But without residency and money, they can’t find a house in the city. It is a tent build out of plastic, a twin size bed inside and a draw, nothing else. The boy does his homework on the bed sitting on a stool.
- Can you imagine one adult and four kids fit into a twin size bed? It is true.
- The sister and brother: on one our ride, our local told us the story of the boy we took on our first day. The boy and his sister lost their parents and was taking care by their grandfather. The grandfather was drunk and
gambler, so our local volunteers were cautious about giving cash to the family. Instead, they give the money to the kids’ school to make sure they are taken care of. One day, the grandfather took the kids into the city and disappeared. Knowing the grandfather’s condition, our local volunteer is very concerned about the well being of the kids. He and other volunteered searched the city for months for them. Finally, he found them. By them, the grandfather had spent all the money and they were homeless. The volunteers took the kids in and tried to find better arrangement for the two kids. The sister has a good friend and her friend’s family is willing to take her in, but not her brother because he is too naughty. Given her options, the sister decided to stay with her family’s family and left her broker. The volunteers tried to talk the sister into staying together with her younger brother, but she chose the family who can provide her food and shelter. With no one willing to take the broker in the city, the volunteers tried to locate relatives in the villages. With much effort, they were able to find a distant
relative in the village who is willing to take him in. What do you think about the sister who ditched her broker? Heartless? Cold? But if you are in her shoes who been through hunger and homeless, what would you give to have a home? One of the volunteer said when they visited the sister for the last time, he heard her murmured that she would give everything to stay with her brother. Can we blame her when she is fighting for survival? When we first heard the story, we are angry with the sister’s selfishness. But after further thoughts, is she wrong to put herself first? We felt silent. Reality is harsh!
- 教学点：This is a join partnership between volunteer space and a retired principal. For young kids in first and second grade, it is not safe for them to walk the long way to school. And the parents do not have the time to walk their kids everyday. The retired principal put in thousands of dollars to build a school in the village and hire a teach. The young children will study in this school for the first two years until they are old enough to go to the
school on their own. It is such great idea!!!
There are so many things I wanted to remember from this one week, but at the same time, I don’t want remember too much. My heart is heavy every time look at some of the photos and remember many of the families I visited. I felt helpless. What we saw is only the tip of the iceberg. Corruption in the local government, tough environment and lack of education are the main reasons for all these. It is out of our hands to change many things, the only things we can do is to do our best to help the children to continue their education. Hopefully education can give them a better future.
Local tradition: There is this very interesting eating tradition in the region. It is an unwelcome sign to have the bowl empty. During the meal, the ladies of the house will be walking around with the rice. If they see your bowl close to be empty, they will sneak in and fill your bowl up. It does not matter that you told them you are full, if they see the empty bowl and you are not paying attention to block it,
it is fill up again. You just have to finish it again. = P
Through this program, I also met a group of great people. This is a group of people with heart, determination and love for other people. We went through rain, long bus ride, hunger, bumpy rides and happy time with the kids playing games. One thing I need to learn from them is how to relax and have fun. One of the nights we got to the hotel early (9pm), someone suggested karaoke. We have a great time singing, drinking beers, playing drinking games and laughing at each other. We get along so well, which contributed to the success of our trip.
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