After 4 days of service at A Linn Yaung nunnery school, we bid farewell to the children there and went on to meet the children of the Mary Chapman School for the Deaf!
For this 2-day segment of the trip, the programmers have planned for an excursion out of school as well as interaction within the school itself.
The volunteers were VERY excited when they knew that they were going to be paired up with a buddy each!
Here's a little background of this school we were working with: Mary Chapman is a school that focuses not only on teaching deaf children and equipping them with essential life skills, the school also provides a safe space and roof over the heads of many of these children (most of whom are orphans). Moreover, the school also trains teachers especially in teaching deaf children.
Our first stop of the day was to the Zoo!!
We all lined up before entering the zoo. I must say, the children were really well-behaved and cooperative!!
These were just some of the animals that were in the zoo! The children even had the opportunity to feed the elephants there!
Here's Cairo and Atlantis with our buddies at one of the iconic statues in the zoo!
Next, we proceeded to the Shwedagon Pagoda. The views were magnificent, kinda hard to believe that these were created before the invention of machines! In the temple, since it just rained, the floors were really slippery, so we held hands with our buddies while walking! A pretty cute scene indeed!
At the temple, there are binoculars for people to see how intricate the designs of the pagoda is! The children weren't tall enough so the volunteers took turns to hold them up. Obviously, some of us had an easier time holding our buddies up than others.
Here's Lacedaemon and Atlantis at the pagoda! It was so huge that it was impossible to fit everything in-frame without a better lens!
Before we knew, it was already in the evening and we had to send the children back to the school.
Personally, I found the interaction with my deaf buddy in the bus to be the most rewarding. You have to understand that not only were the children deaf, the sign language they used were totally different from SgSL! Some of the children could not even sign as they just joined the school!
However, despite of all these obstacles, we still found ways to converse, mainly by gesturing.
For me, I took out a pen and paper and draw out what i was referring to, which helped a lot!
From there, i learnt the variations (or similarities) in our signings.
I asked my buddy about his family, and from his gestures, I figured that he was trying to say that his family lives in a place far away from Yangon. Which led to the realisation that, this was what the teacher tell them as a form of euphemism of reality.
I do miss my buddy but he seem to me like a very obedient and smart boy, so I know he will do just fine! He gestured to me that when he grows up, he wants to be.. guess what.. a clothes washer! I was a little shocked because in Singapore, that would be considered absurd! As simple as this story may sound, he taught me to follow your passions and not conform to societal perception of various occupations.
Click here for more photos of our Deaf School Excursion!
Day 2 and we are back at the school again!
The school has kindly allowed us to interact with a group of children and we've got our Deafies EeWun and HaiShu to make a presentation about themselves! The school hopes that through these presentations and interaction with other Deaf people internationally, they can get inspired and realise their own potentials!
If you can see what is reflected on the screen, it is a slide of 'Successful Deaf People'. This was when Haishu was showing them successful deaf people around the world to inspire the children and their own teacher was helping to interpret/translate. And as she signed, we could hear her speak as well. From her tone and actions, I could feel her passion and earnestness to convince that despite being deaf they can do great things in life.
After the presentations, our team showcased a performance that depicted Singaporean history to the Deaf children there! We even had Sir Stanford Raffles in his costume!! (if Raffles were asian)
The children had so much fun watching the performance!
Next, COR'17 put up a performance not only for the deaf children, but more importantly, for our Deaf volunteers who came along with us on this trip to Myanmar! The formation above was supposed to be a heart~ I am sure each of us is grateful for all the experience we gained throughout the entire year, and working with the Deaf community in Singapore!
Saving the best for last, our Deafies also put up a stunning performance with many different skits that had us laughing to the ground. It was indeed so funny and well-acted out!
The sign for 'Applause' is the same for both sign language and yup, the children are all applauding after their performance!
We also gave out our stationery supplies, kindly and generously provided by our sponsor, Pilot!
Thank you Pilot!
A group photo to mark the end of this interaction, before we had free time to interact with the children!
We also had the honour to meet the principal of Mary Chapman, Mdm Nyunt Nyunt Thein (yup thats her name)! And here is Haishu presenting a token of donation to the school along with Chair and Vice-Chair Sadrina and Eeva!
She was so grateful, and tells us we can visit again anytime, and even urges us to send photos to her via email if possible!
Meanwhile, the volunteers went about to find our own buddies, most of us managed to find them and had our photos taken for memory sake! They were so happy to see us and without a doubt, it was same for us too!
Before long, it was time to leave, and as we were walking out of the school, the children came rushing down to send us off.
You can see our vice-chair Eeva with two different children.
This was because some of us were paired with 2 children and evidently, both of them could not bear for her to leave.
Although it was only a short 2 days of interaction, it was clear that the children became really attached to their respective buddies. In this aspect, volunteerism may not be as beneficial because we may never see these children again although they felt a certain bond with us. But looking at the bright side, we really hope that the children get inspired and empowered to know that they can do what they want in life! As for the volunteers, the genuine experience we got here was definitely invaluable.
Click here for more photos of our Deaf School Interaction!