My Wonderful Experience at Nur Salam
Assalamualaikum...
This is the original essay I wrote about my trip to Rumah Nur Salam, Chow Kit on the 28th June 2008, and had been sent to the GREEN secretariat. Forgive me if the language is not up to the standard, or some misspell here and there. This essay hasn't been edited in any way since (emm, just one sentence), so here it is:
" On Saturday, 28th June 2008, our company, Sigma Corporation made a trip to Rumah Nur Salam, Chow Kit to visit the children and play with them. The objective of the trip was to build up our sense of lovingness, caring, sympathies and generosity towards these ‘unfortunate’ little kids, who are, most of the time are left out without the supervision of the parents, wandering around without protection, and without the basic needs of living. This whole activity is organized by Khazanah Nasional Berhad’s GREEN programme community, and it is handled by the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) committee members. Being the head of the CSR of my company, I was responsible in managing and coordinating my staff mates’ interaction with the children. I was helped with my trusted and reliable ‘comrades’, Mr. Fadhli, Ms. Norhayati, Ms. Fadhilah and Ms. Suhaiza.
It started two weeks ago, where our first CSR meeting was held at Paradigm Holdings Sdn Bhd, together with its CEO, Mr Shahir. It has been decided that our date will be on the 28th June, and our activities were ‘Snakes and Ladders’, ‘The Mummy Returns’ and ‘Paper Tearing’. A couple of days before the trip, I’ve made an announcement and a bit of briefing on the trip with my staff mates. I’ve also received the allocated budget for our activities and meals allowance from the GREEN secretariat, so we’ve bought the stuffs that has been planned to be brought along there. These were a number of sets of toothbrush, toothpaste and soap, some plastic wrapper, 4 packs of toilet tissue papers, and others. Some of the things were provided by the secretariat themselves like the flip chart paper and markers. We’d also used some of our company’s funding to cover additional items such as snacks and sweets. With all the equipments ready, we’ve wrapped the gifts and made the gigantic snake ‘board’ together. We even tested playing the board itself. It was fun being a child back.:)
On that day after Asar prayer, we departed from Darul Puteri about 5:10pm by bus. There were 37 participants on board, and these include 6 from Group 3 (Greenity) and 1 representative from Group 7 (Paradigm Holdings). It was a 50 minutes trip through the busy road of Kuala Lumpur to Chow Kit.
The secretariats, Mr. Salim and Ms. Afdzan were already waiting for us, the latecomers. To add a bit of my personal misery, I didn’t send the name list of those who were coming that day earlier, so we had to register ourselves first at the counter. This took some of the valuable time for the activities. Anyway, when I got up to the stairs to the second floor, I could sense some of the very familiar faces, as this was actually my second trip here. They were also seemed to recognize me very well. There were about 40 kids, and another couple more whom they went for their tuition. The founder of Nur Salam, Mr. Raja Azizan, known as Ayah Wa amongst the kids was also present. After every of us gathered, I started the introduction. I was not used in giving speeches, especially in front of the children. These kids were so ‘hyperactive’, that they’ve completely drowned out whatever I said, and became a bit uncontrollable during the grouping part. Mr. Salim suggested that we let them choose their favorite ‘brothers’ and ‘sisters’ each, which we did. I never thought that I was a popular figure when a lot of kids wanted to chose me, HA-HA. But one boy did hold me tightly, ‘chartered’ me earlier on, which I happily accepted. Some of us even got to handle two kids.
Since there were three floors and three activities, obviously we divided each floor for one activity. All of the 37 participants has been divided into 3 groups and assigned to each activity accordingly. My first activity was on the topmost floor. This was for the ‘Mummy Returns’ activity. Originally, we’ve planned to select just three of the kids, and let the other wrap them. But we did not anticipate the fact that all these kids, (and I mean, ALL of them) wanted to become the mummy, so we had no choice but to wrap each and every one of them, in the same time, hoping that the tissue paper didn’t run out. But in the end, we thought that it was good this way, as it made the bondage (no pun intended) between us and them stronger. We enjoyed wrapping them and let them scares us with their frightening looks.
Being the activities’ coordinator, I’ve got to go to any floor anytime while the rest stayed at their own floor for the rest of the period. (Of course, I allowed them visiting other floors and made a quick peek on the activity held there). I had to make sure that every activities run smoothly and within the time frame as planned. We allocated 20 minutes for each of the activities, and then the kids will switch floor and continue doing other activity. We’ve only had time for only 1 activity before we had to pause for Maghrib prayers, which was around 7:15pm. Our imam, Mr. Luthfi led the pack for the night.
The activity resumed at 8:00pm. I’ve visited the ‘Snake and Ladder’ floor, which was on the second floor. The kids were in a very tough time, trying to reach the 50th box. Well, it looked like that our ‘snakes’ were really very well-positioned. However, I was told that there were some of them actually reached the finish line. Bravo to them.
Then, on the first floor, the supposed activity was ‘Paper-Tearing’, where an A4 paper will be tear into small, continuous but large loop, so that every one of the children could fill themselves into it. It seemed as the kids ‘did not get it’, as it was extremely hard to keep the width of the paper small enough so they could create a large loop of it, WITHOUT disjoint it. My staff mates then made other kind of activities, like the mimicking the face of Mr. Zhafrie a.k.a. Bob, and mentioning some words in quick succession with the correct hand movement. Sorry, I didn’t know the actual name of the game.
The children switched floors for the last time around 8:25pm. By 8:45pm, all the activities ended, and everyone gathered at the second floor. This was possibly the best occasion for the kids, which was prize-giving ceremony. I gave my final speech of the day (but certainly not the last of my life), before the Nur Salam kids’ had to go home around 9:00pm. Shortly after that, it’s our turn to wave goodbye to this ‘sacred’ place, the sanctuary, the hope for the children of Chow Kit. We reached our beloved Darul Puteri around 9:30pm.
Overall, it was a wonderful experience for me, although it was never an easy task to handle. I considered myself as a ‘lousy’ leader as most of the time, I am not too serious and tend to overlook a lot of things that could be important. But my staff mates, my friends helped me a lot, so in the bottom of my heart, I thank them all. I intend to visit these cheerful little children again in the future, as their happiness is my happiness as well."
I am not allowed to upload any pictures that shows the kids of Nur Salam here, as it may create some tense if other people finds out. However, I'll just show you one shot of our company's staff anyway...
This is the original essay I wrote about my trip to Rumah Nur Salam, Chow Kit on the 28th June 2008, and had been sent to the GREEN secretariat. Forgive me if the language is not up to the standard, or some misspell here and there. This essay hasn't been edited in any way since (emm, just one sentence), so here it is:
" On Saturday, 28th June 2008, our company, Sigma Corporation made a trip to Rumah Nur Salam, Chow Kit to visit the children and play with them. The objective of the trip was to build up our sense of lovingness, caring, sympathies and generosity towards these ‘unfortunate’ little kids, who are, most of the time are left out without the supervision of the parents, wandering around without protection, and without the basic needs of living. This whole activity is organized by Khazanah Nasional Berhad’s GREEN programme community, and it is handled by the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) committee members. Being the head of the CSR of my company, I was responsible in managing and coordinating my staff mates’ interaction with the children. I was helped with my trusted and reliable ‘comrades’, Mr. Fadhli, Ms. Norhayati, Ms. Fadhilah and Ms. Suhaiza.
It started two weeks ago, where our first CSR meeting was held at Paradigm Holdings Sdn Bhd, together with its CEO, Mr Shahir. It has been decided that our date will be on the 28th June, and our activities were ‘Snakes and Ladders’, ‘The Mummy Returns’ and ‘Paper Tearing’. A couple of days before the trip, I’ve made an announcement and a bit of briefing on the trip with my staff mates. I’ve also received the allocated budget for our activities and meals allowance from the GREEN secretariat, so we’ve bought the stuffs that has been planned to be brought along there. These were a number of sets of toothbrush, toothpaste and soap, some plastic wrapper, 4 packs of toilet tissue papers, and others. Some of the things were provided by the secretariat themselves like the flip chart paper and markers. We’d also used some of our company’s funding to cover additional items such as snacks and sweets. With all the equipments ready, we’ve wrapped the gifts and made the gigantic snake ‘board’ together. We even tested playing the board itself. It was fun being a child back.:)
On that day after Asar prayer, we departed from Darul Puteri about 5:10pm by bus. There were 37 participants on board, and these include 6 from Group 3 (Greenity) and 1 representative from Group 7 (Paradigm Holdings). It was a 50 minutes trip through the busy road of Kuala Lumpur to Chow Kit.
The secretariats, Mr. Salim and Ms. Afdzan were already waiting for us, the latecomers. To add a bit of my personal misery, I didn’t send the name list of those who were coming that day earlier, so we had to register ourselves first at the counter. This took some of the valuable time for the activities. Anyway, when I got up to the stairs to the second floor, I could sense some of the very familiar faces, as this was actually my second trip here. They were also seemed to recognize me very well. There were about 40 kids, and another couple more whom they went for their tuition. The founder of Nur Salam, Mr. Raja Azizan, known as Ayah Wa amongst the kids was also present. After every of us gathered, I started the introduction. I was not used in giving speeches, especially in front of the children. These kids were so ‘hyperactive’, that they’ve completely drowned out whatever I said, and became a bit uncontrollable during the grouping part. Mr. Salim suggested that we let them choose their favorite ‘brothers’ and ‘sisters’ each, which we did. I never thought that I was a popular figure when a lot of kids wanted to chose me, HA-HA. But one boy did hold me tightly, ‘chartered’ me earlier on, which I happily accepted. Some of us even got to handle two kids.
Since there were three floors and three activities, obviously we divided each floor for one activity. All of the 37 participants has been divided into 3 groups and assigned to each activity accordingly. My first activity was on the topmost floor. This was for the ‘Mummy Returns’ activity. Originally, we’ve planned to select just three of the kids, and let the other wrap them. But we did not anticipate the fact that all these kids, (and I mean, ALL of them) wanted to become the mummy, so we had no choice but to wrap each and every one of them, in the same time, hoping that the tissue paper didn’t run out. But in the end, we thought that it was good this way, as it made the bondage (no pun intended) between us and them stronger. We enjoyed wrapping them and let them scares us with their frightening looks.
Being the activities’ coordinator, I’ve got to go to any floor anytime while the rest stayed at their own floor for the rest of the period. (Of course, I allowed them visiting other floors and made a quick peek on the activity held there). I had to make sure that every activities run smoothly and within the time frame as planned. We allocated 20 minutes for each of the activities, and then the kids will switch floor and continue doing other activity. We’ve only had time for only 1 activity before we had to pause for Maghrib prayers, which was around 7:15pm. Our imam, Mr. Luthfi led the pack for the night.
The activity resumed at 8:00pm. I’ve visited the ‘Snake and Ladder’ floor, which was on the second floor. The kids were in a very tough time, trying to reach the 50th box. Well, it looked like that our ‘snakes’ were really very well-positioned. However, I was told that there were some of them actually reached the finish line. Bravo to them.
Then, on the first floor, the supposed activity was ‘Paper-Tearing’, where an A4 paper will be tear into small, continuous but large loop, so that every one of the children could fill themselves into it. It seemed as the kids ‘did not get it’, as it was extremely hard to keep the width of the paper small enough so they could create a large loop of it, WITHOUT disjoint it. My staff mates then made other kind of activities, like the mimicking the face of Mr. Zhafrie a.k.a. Bob, and mentioning some words in quick succession with the correct hand movement. Sorry, I didn’t know the actual name of the game.
The children switched floors for the last time around 8:25pm. By 8:45pm, all the activities ended, and everyone gathered at the second floor. This was possibly the best occasion for the kids, which was prize-giving ceremony. I gave my final speech of the day (but certainly not the last of my life), before the Nur Salam kids’ had to go home around 9:00pm. Shortly after that, it’s our turn to wave goodbye to this ‘sacred’ place, the sanctuary, the hope for the children of Chow Kit. We reached our beloved Darul Puteri around 9:30pm.
Overall, it was a wonderful experience for me, although it was never an easy task to handle. I considered myself as a ‘lousy’ leader as most of the time, I am not too serious and tend to overlook a lot of things that could be important. But my staff mates, my friends helped me a lot, so in the bottom of my heart, I thank them all. I intend to visit these cheerful little children again in the future, as their happiness is my happiness as well."
I am not allowed to upload any pictures that shows the kids of Nur Salam here, as it may create some tense if other people finds out. However, I'll just show you one shot of our company's staff anyway...
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