Month: February 2018

My experience at Fresh Fruit Friday

Fresh Fruit Friday is a college service that I’ve been doing since Grade 10. The environment is undoubtedly different, but its core and routine remain the same. Currently, I have, recently, begun to pick up fruit every Friday morning, which is then delivered to the service room. During Friday lunchtime, other Fresh Fruit Friday members and I will pack all the fruits into boxes so that it can be provided to the organization’s location, HealthServe, who assist Migrant Workers during times of unemployment. So, what’s it like to be in Fresh Fruit Friday? Fresh Fruit Friday has been an educational experience that has helped improve my understanding of what a migrant worker suffers from, and how an organization helps these, underprivileged, individuals through tough times of unemployment. Because of this information, I’ve developed a sense of sympathy for migrant workers. Because of this, in the future, I wish to develop my involvement with migrant workers through working with NGOs who aim to aid migrant workers during times of difficulty.

What have I done in Service?

During service, we would fluctuate from different ideas, Healthserve to Migrant Workers Association. I would say that my participation has been limited; this includes a lack of communication and a lack of paying attention to those who are presenting something. It’s something that I’m not proud of, and there are always more opportunities to improve. I plan to utilise the downfalls I’ve experienced during service, to come back more mature and active in what this service stands for: helping the community.  I have to increase respect, communication, and active listening, helping me become more involved in the service. In the end, it’s all a learning experience, helping me mould into a better person for the community of, not just Singapore, but the world.`

What do I hope to get out of this Service?

I hope to become a more active individual in supporting a community, which allows me to become more engaged in the UWCSEA mission; this allows me to push myself into areas that I am very unfamiliar with, such as service. Hopefully, this will contribute to my ability to become a, generally, better person. Hopefully, this will increase my ability to socialize and become more responsible, which will help me become efficient and reliable.

During one of our Global Politics class, all students participated in a board game that required the following concepts: globalization and interdependence.

The outline of the game is to play as different individuals who have special abilities, where from Georgia, Atlanta, they are dispatched to prevent the outbreak of disease by traveling all around the world. Mainly, it’s the idea that expertise from different countries is sent to benefit other countries, who may not have that skill of one of our roles, to defeat a disease.

Globalization, which is the ability of one country to influence another was present during the game. How? Once the roles would eradicate the disease, it would never come back, thanks to a cure. But, perhaps the skills of one individual benefited a nation. Nations affected by the disease would solidify their ability to be more prepared for any epidemics that would arise in the future, thanks to foreign expertise. Hence, those specialists who aimed to combat the disease managed to influence the way a nation approached an epidemic.

Interdependence, which is where actors come together to work towards on a situation together, was key in this game; this is because a single player could not have done it by themselves. In real life, it could be down to a lack of expertise, capital, or resources. Without additional support, it would be extremely ambitious for one individual to take on a disease that aims to infect the entire world. Hence, when there were more players, there was an ability for players to move around the board, fighting the disease in different countries, while we all stayed in communication, ultimately increasing the efficiency of our method to eradicate the disease.

What this board game demonstrates is how important interdependence and globalisation is. Without it, the difficulty to tackle the issue would be immense.