Volunteering

When one takes a lot, they are expected to give back out, lest they be a rapacious hog. When one volunteers, it benefits both the community and the volunteer. Being a volunteer is beneficial by providing the volunteer both invaluable experience and a piece of mind that someone who is not as fortunate had benefited because of their volunteering. I am very fortunate to have a good life, and to be able to receive most of my things without needing to think about where it came from. However, through the volunteering process, I learned that the world isn’t as simple as that.

One example of my volunteer work is a seminar on web design and science I gave. I had always thought that few children did not appreciate the value of science, with my experience in my gifted class where all my classmates have fun with science and appreciate its value. However, through the seminar I gave, I was surprised to learn that many young kids were unable to comprehend why science is both fun and useful. I was more than happy to give out methods for people to be more involved in science, why it could be very fun and valuable, and to be equipped with more resources to explore further. I was happy to notice that after the seminar, a lot of the students and parents came to thank me for the knowledge.

Another volunteer job that I worked in was tree planting in Markham. I used to think that the government was capable of planting sufficient trees for the community, but I realized otherwise. I was aware of the Asian Longhorn Beetle via books, but the extent of the damage it caused was unimaginable for me. I was glad to help the Markham community regain part of the foliage that it lost due to the beetle, and it provided me with an experience I would never forget.

A more recent volunteering job I did was sorting food at the Daily Bread food bank. The organization sorts and distributes over 4 million pounds of foods each year. That’s over 11 thousand pounds every day! Our duty was to sort and pack a lot of the donations from various sources. Before this activity, I couldn’t imagine how much work is needed to sort and distribute the foods to those who need them. Even though the food was donated for free, a lot of labor is needed to filter the expired or damaged food, put them into different categories, pack them into boxes, and ship the boxes to designated areas waiting to be transported.