My Game of Life

Sunday, September 09, 2007

Are over...Liek zomg what a surprise, heh. As my MSN nick puts it, 'I need something more cheerful than "Sep hols are over, lol."'

And its surprising how many people actually responded to that. Replies range from shaun's "Sept hols are NOT over yet. =D" (yesh, we have 1 hour left of freedom, rejoice!) to a sneior's more enlightening "in a month's time, you can enjoy all you want for the rest of the year :P" Guess people are feeling the same, hehe.

Anyway, i sorta wasted my saturday morning helping out with the Yellow Ribbon street sales. Not much of a choice though, consideirng letchmi forced us to go cos we had insufficient CIP hours this year (fyi, i already have more than 100 hours in total) and warned us "the organisers will not be happy if you back out on your commitment!"

So Andai, Zhaoxing and I, along with some others, met up at Jurong East MRT at 8.30 am as stated in her message, but the volunteers there informed us that it only started at 9. Smartie Letchmie =.=

It's my first time in such a fundraising event though, going around town collecting coins in a tin can. Being the inexperienced nubcakes that we were, we mistakenly decided to head over to the nearby IMM to ask around for donations, since the MRT and bus interchange were flooded with other voluteers already. Wrong move - the security guard prevented us from entering.

Lesson 1. Asking for donations on private property is not allowed.

So we decided to go over to City Hall, where there were much larger crowds. Walking along CitiLink, we were chased away by Security again, who directed us to "the bridge under Suntec City". At least the security guard who attended to us was a nice guy, he donated $1. =3

Further down CitiLink, we were to later find...dundundun - Dah Wei and Kai Lee, positioned at a couple of spots where there was a bottleneck in the traffic. And we realised that Dah Wei had already half-filled his tin with coins just stoning there, whereas we hardly even had $5 worth of donations. Which means we wasted our time travelling around looking for donations, heh.

Lesson 2. Sometimes, just stoning there and holding out your tin is better than walking around giving lengthy explanations on your cause in fundraising efforts.

We split up as we reahced Suntec City, finding no above-mentioned bridge, intending to go around for a bit before meeting up at the Fountain of Wealth. However, we lost our way and only Andai made it there, only to find out that it was deserted. D: And again, we were shooed off by the dreaded guards.

Lesson 3. Never trust a Zhaoxing's advice, especially if he is hungry.

Dejected, we actually wanted to go to Orchard Road, where there were much more people and the tourists were (presumably) more generous. But then we realised we didn't know the way even though it's supposed to be just a 5 minute walk away, so we went all the way back to the MRT station. And met Dah Wei again, who by now had a bloody heavy tin filled to at least 5/6 of its capacity.

With only 1 hour left, we decided to change tact. Taking the escalators leading up to street level, we camped at the top, which also happens to be the entrance to some-office-building-i-can't-remember. Which means lots of people dressed in business suits hurrying through that area. Which means traffic, though not as much as that of CitiLink, but still significant enough. ;)

And this is where the most memorable part of the entire morning is. Because stoning there DID reap us more donations than running around the place getting chased by Security. And we met quite a few ang mohs and foreigners too.

Lesson 4. Not all white people are as kind as they seem to be. The Aussies are really nice people, but most Americans downright suck, giving you the Eye as they walk past, probably thinking i-won't-give-you-money-you-pathetic-chinese-scum, then simply daoing your sputtering attempts to speak.

A few trainloads of people later, our tins cans were getting heavier. And our hands were starting to ache, too. >_<

Lesson 5. The people most likely the donate are the old aunties who have too much spare change and the mums with their (cute! =3) kids. Not the rich people wearing those posh suits.

Eventually i got bored of actively requesting for donations, preferring instead to just wish everyone who walked by a merry "Good Morning!" It's definitely attention-grabbing (very important considering my hieght) and takes much less effort than saying a mouthful of "Good morning sir, would you like to donate to the Yellow Ribbon Project?" as Zhaoxing was doing.

It does get repetitive after some time though, saying "Good morning" every few seconds. But its definitely much more refreshing than gunning to get as much donations as possible, and feeling disappointed if someone didn't contribute. You stop focusing on the moolah so that at the end of it all, you don't feel that bad if you didn't manage to collect alot. And a greeting can't possibly be rejected, whereas a request for donations is easily rejected.

Besides, even if they don't donate, you know that you have cheered up someone's morning if he turns around, nods and smiles. It's even better if they return the greeting, like what some foreigners did. It's amazing if they spare you a bit of cash. It's life-changing if they put in $10, and tell you "You are a kind soul. God bless you." as a lady did when donating to Zhaoxing. (It's real, im not joking!)

Dah Wei & gang joined us afterwards too; we found out that Security had banished them from their spot as well. Turns out that they had already had more than enough of their share of donations though - Dah Wei even ran out of ribbons to be given to donors (they gave us 100 at the start). I had 86 left at the end of it all.

Lesson 6. Most people don't even want the ribbon, sticker, pen or whatever that they're supposed to get in exchange for donations, they just want to get rid of their small change. =P

Having stood for those 5 hours though, i must say that i will never voluntarily do that again. I had an ache in my back and legs for the rest of the day thanks to that. =/

Lesson 7. (From Andai) Only girls or really enthu boys would involve themselves in flag days. Girls, because people usually donate to them, especially if they're chio; and enthu boys, because their sincerity is priceless. xD

Gotta pity those St. John people who have to take part in flag day every year. =X

'Twas teh winnar at 11:04 pm.