Friday, 18 January 2013

Cancer Awareness Forum



Date: 20th October 2012
Time: 9am - 12pm
Venue: SJKC Desa Jaya, Kepong
 
This is our very first forum that targets the teachers; we hope that teachers may share some of this information with young learners and the parents, and we would able to get bigger crowd for our future forums.
 
On October 20th, we invited Oncologist Dr Ho Gwo Fuang to share with us what is cancer? He also touched on causes of cancers, diagnosis and treatment of cancer, some statistics on cancer, some myths and facts about cancer.
 
Dr Ho advised us to lead a healthy lifestyle, proper working-resting-eating-exercising schedule. He stressed that the quality of life of a cancer patient is of utmost important. Give the patient the respect he/she deserved. He cited an example that family members of a cancer patient restricted all the favourite food of the patient; he felt that the patient could have been happier if his feeling be shared and made known to all family members, and his favourite food be allowed in moderation. So we should let the cancer patients lead a happy lives, the state of their mind could be helpful to them in fighting the illness.
 
When a patient is terminally ill, both the patient and all the other care-providers, normally the family members are equally suffered. Hospice is an organisation that covers this aspect with no cost. Hospice provides palliative care, loaning required equipment like wheelchairs, ripple mattress, oxygen concentrators and so on. And most importantly educate patients and their care providers on basic nursing skills.
 
Mr Wong Koei Onn, the Director of Kasih Foundation was shared on his journey with Kasih Hospice. How he managed to cheer some patients. How did Hospice help to ease the care-providers of patients?
 
We have put so much emphasis in welcoming a new life; don’t we hilarious in welcoming a new-born baby? Could we put the equal effort if not more in taking care of someone who is in the final journey of his/her life?
 
Of course it is never easy to take care of the terminally ill patient; hence the awareness of Hospice service is of paramount important, and please bear in mind, the service is totally Free Of Charge!
As a retired accountant who worked in English speaking environment for years, Mr Wong did his sharing in fluent and beautiful Mandarin.
 
The last speaker was Mdm Connie Wong, 46, a fourth year stage four lung cancer patient, a single mother with two young children of seven and four. I always get her on stage to share on her journey. She had gone thru four chemotherapies. I told her that her sharing would cheer up many others, and she was in fact helping others. I told her mother and two young kids to be proud of Connie. 

Connie Wong practises qi-gong, as a Buddhist she prays, as a mother of two, she is just like others, sending her kids to and fro schools. Of course, she has got strong support from family members. She was grateful to have few charitable people to donate some money for her last chemotherapy. She was also grateful to have CNI Foundation to support her with few months’ food supplements. She is willing to go on the stage so long as her health allows.

Even though the crowd was not big enough, we were still happy as the teachers were active in the Q&A session. We would continue to hold forum of this kind so long there are listeners. 

Wednesday, 2 January 2013

Peace Poster Contest – It is more than a contest!






Project :  Peace Poster Contest – It is more than a contest!

Date      : 22nd September 2012 (Saturday)
                       6th October 2012 (Saturday)
Time     : 9:00am - 12:00pm

Venue   : SJKC On Pong 2 School, Pandan Mewah, Ampang, Selangor 
               SJKC Desa Jaya 2, Bandar Sri Damansara, Selangor


We quite like the theme of 2012 - 2013 Peace Poster Contest (PPC) “Imagine Peace”. All of us agree that embracing, mutual respecting and equality are the key factors to achieve peace. It seems so easy and simple, yet peace seems so distance to many of us. There are still wars, racial conflicts, religious conflicts and many other conflicts around the world.

Our club organised two PPC contests at two different areas. On September 22nd we did it at SJKC On Pong 2 (On Pong National Type Chinese Primary School 2), Pandan Mewah, Ampang,Selangor. We invited two other Natinal Type Chinese primary schools and three National primary schools around Ampang area. There were Chinese, Malay and Indian pupils took part in the contest. In the event three best posters were selected.

On October 6th, we did it at SJKC Desa Jaya 2, Bandar Sri Damansara, Selangor. We managed to get one private school, one National Type Tamil primary school and two other National Type Chinese schools around the area to participate in the contest. The participants were come from different cultural and social economic backgrounds.

On the Oct-6th PPC, we wanted something different, as we notice that the so called winning posters are seemed to share a similar idea; dove, rainbow, globe and flags, perhaps the difference could be the colouring skill.

Our judge Mr TanPoh Chuan of Poh Chuan Art Centre, an experienced and committed art teacher, also teaches art for special need children, suggested to us that judging the product of any contest should not neglect the potential of others; peace is embracing and giving other the equal chance.

For the Oct-6th PPC judging process, we followed Mr Tan Poh Chuan’s idea. At the end of the contest, posters were divided into three groups:

First group, the completed product of good colouring and drawing skill but low creative skill.

Second group, the completed product of moderate colouring, drawing skill and moderate creative skill.

Third group, incomplete product, moderate colouring and drawing skill but good creative skill.

Another judge, a class assistant in an International School, a peace lover, a yoga instructor who majored graphic design in her varsity study, Miss Tan Li Xuan, suggested to interview each and every participant about his/her product.

The first group would tell you that that was the peace poster his/her art teacher wanted.

The second group would tell you that they are trying to get close to the norm, but their idea of peace could be different from the norm.

To our surprise, the third group’s answer reflected our negligence; there are other views on peace, their views would not be accepted by teachers, judges and other adults. It was a touching moment, few pupils were in tear.

We then selected the best from the three groups, an embracing outcome. Of course it was not an easy process. We believe that it would not be well received by others, as most of us are comfortable with the norm and the presence.

I would like to suggest to Lions International HQ, instead of having Peace Poster Contest annually, could we organise Peace Poster Exhibition annually at all levels? There is no winner, but allowing our children, our youth to have their views of PEACE to be shared by others, the local level and the international level.

Let the people from all over the world; with different social economic and cultural backgrounds share their views of PEACE.