Love reading? Join us at our book fair!

The few months of hard work to select, sort, price, pack, count, stack, etc, is going to be paid off. We are all packed for the upcoming second-hand book fair happening next Saturday (12 June 2010) at Bishan Community Club. This book fair is jointly organised by Salvation Army and Bishan North CC Youth Club. Proceeds will be going to Salvation Army's beneficiaries.



We have packed a wide range of books, from non-fiction to fiction, and children to adults. And they are all going 'cheap cheap'- mostly ranging at $1, $2 each. Here's a sneak at what we have packed:


Some examples of fiction titles we have prepared.


It's piling to the ceiling!

Thus, do stock up your books with us, and meanwhile contribute to charity and the green cause at the same time. Remember to drop by to visit us next Saturday, if you're in the vicinity of Bishan. I'll be volunteering in the afternoon shift :)

Here's how to get there:


If you are helping to tweet the event, pls use this hashtag #salebkfair :)

Sidetrack: our volunteer group is known as SALE (Salvation Army Library Enterprise :)

And if you're interested in contributing your old books, check out this post.

真情无障爱

Last Sunday, I had the 2nd opportunity to watch a live TV show being recorded. Hence, I immediately jumped on the idea and looked forward to watching the video guys at work. I was rather fascinated by them when I went for my first TV studio a few weeks before to watch the Singapore Idol- World AIDS Day special. I wondered how they know which screen grabs/ angles to use, since there are dozens of cameras at work simultaneously. And the recording is live!

Yup, so there I was, excited about the intricacy of live TV recording.


动力火车

Little did I expect, that I actually returned rather inspired by the show, 真情无障爱 (The SPD Charity Show). SPD stands for the Society for the Physically Disabled, and this show aims to raise $2.8 million from its flagging donations. Donations has been affected with the poor economy, and SPD's reserve can only last for another 7 months more.

From the show, I start to learn about the various programs that SPD runs. Not only does it offer rehabilitation services, it also offers job opportunities, day care, children and youth services, financial and bursary assistance, etc.

In addition, in the various segments, I was also very touched by the perseverance of the physically challenged friends.

For example:

Eva's and mum's 母女情深. Watching Eva's struggle to put the blocks in place to give her mum a gift on stage.


Yoo Ee Yun, the child pianist from Korea.

She's blind, but has extraordinary music talent. She is able to listen to the tune and play it next. And the amazing thing is: she did not have any formal music training before she plays on the piano. However, she has a sad past, her parents have abandoned her when she's young, but her foster mother loves her a lot. Thus, indeed:

赛翁失马 焉知非福

天生我才必有用

Can you see Bryan Wong's expression? This is the shot right after they announced the auction amount for his painting which he drew using his mouth. It has raised $40,000.

And of course, the charity show is not complete without star-studded performance from various artistes.


Stefanie Sun


Zoe Tay and Kym Ng.

We were so glad that we managed to reach the target of $2.8 million of funds, after the help of corporate donations. In fact, $3.3 million was raised. Thank you all, for your kind donations!

And thanks, HH, for offering a ticket to this charity show! :)

Once a lifetime experience... YOG

The Youth Olympic Games - YOG is organised once every 4 years, and there are 5 continents, so after rotation, the next time YOG is going to be held in Asia, it will be 20 years later.

And there are 43 countries in Asia, let's just assume only 20 countries bid for the games, and by rotation again, the next time it will be Singapore may be 100 years later?!

So unless, we can live till 200 years old, we probably will not be able to participate in another YOG in Singapore again. And of course, I doubt the Organising Committee will want a 200-year-old volunteer, too even if we can live to 200-year-old.

That quote by the SYOGOC totally etched in my mind.
Yup, it is an once-in-lifetime opportunity.

And thus, here I am.
I am at the briefing for the recruitment of volunteers for Language Services. :)





There are about 150-160 of us, eagerly to find out the opportunities for us at YOG.

For those who have studied a third or fourth language (out of interest, of course) will understand this burning desire to put what we have learnt into use. And that's probably what is driving most of us in this lecture theatre.

The SYOGOC (they call themselves "Shiok" btw, instead of "SYO-GOC" :P) shared with us the various opportunities to volunteer as translators at media centre, Youth Olympic Village, Cultural Education Programme, behind the scenes as the Multi-Language Switch Board (where you can dial a number and ask for instant translation), or at information counters, or as NOC assistants, Protocol assistants, etc.

There are 34 areas we can volunteer in, Language Services is just one. And there are many many roles we can try out as well. Some would require additional interviews (for instance, the translators, the NOC assistants, Protocol assistants, etc).

Nevertheless, I am very eager to participate. Hope they call me up for an interview soon! :)

P.S: Wanna join me? Find out more!

I'm in... Are you?

Here's a photoblog experience of the YOG 2010 Volunteers Open House, which I went yesterday:

Held at Singapore Expo Hall 2 yesterday, the Open House was a carnival of activities- exhibition, games, stage performances, etc.
But first we had to collect our 'passport' at the registration booth:



and I received this... my name tag for the day:



And next we went through the exhibition, which shows volunteers-to-be the background of YOG, what we can expect from YOG, and most importantly, the requirements of volunteers (time commitment) and this... (one of the important reasons why I visited the Open House) - positions available:



There are a lot, a lot of posts, including Assistant Manager post for finance, IT Helpdesk, and of course, not forgetting posts which I'm interested in, such as translator, tour guides etc. But do note, they are all volunteer positions. No monetary payment. And if I'm not wrong, they require about 20,000 volunteers in all.

A volunteer-to-be needs to put aside time for training (likely a few days and the commitment level is dependent on the post you've volunteered for) to commerce in September 2009 all the way to August 2010, and at least 4 consecutive days during the 2-week YOG period.

Thinking that more information may be made available in the Resource Pack, we went to queue for the pack, and were very surprised to find an extremely long and winding queue. It's almost like reliving the day when I queued for bak-kwa during Chinese New Year years ago :P

A bit disappointing though, the pack did not have the details which we were looking for. Perhaps more details will be disseminated at a later stage, and we will have a clearer idea on which positions we can volunteer for.

And lastly, we ended the day with a photoshoot, and plastering our photos on the pledge wall. It is made of 3 pillars, showing the Olympic values, namely Friendship, Excellence and Respect.



Nice? The photographer has taken a really nice shot of my friend. :) If you're looking for me in the picture above, mmm.. sorry, I'm not there. :P

I'm looking forward to volunteering at YOG 2010 :)
Hope that my work commitments will allow me to participate in this possibly once-a-lifetime event. :)

P.S: Going through the event did bring back lots of memories when the team worked on the bid for YOG. Time really flies!

Pass it on! :)

After one-month break of activities, I am finally back to SALE last Saturday, and was pleasantly surprised to hear of a new collaboration:

A couple has donated money to a Community Centre to start their reading programme for their under priviledged children, and this money would be used to set up a library for the children to borrow and read, and for volunteers to to conduct story-telling sessions.

Where do they buy the books from? Instead of turning to the commerical book stores (first hand/ second hand), they'll be using the funds to buy books from the Salvation Army Family Thrift Shop.

That's killing two birds with one stone! Smart move! The same sum of donation is being used to help 2 charitable organisations :)

I heard from a fellow volunteer-friend, that this is now the trend, using a donation to help a few charitable organisations, passing on the deed. That's really neat!

Pass it on! :)

Troubled over the leftovers from the spring cleaning exercise you've just completed?

It's the time of the year again. CNY! And of course before we start to indulge in the 2 public holidays with great food, hongbao, visits and well-deserved rest, we have to do spring cleaning.

As the chinese saying goes, 旧的不去 新的不来, are you cracking your head over where you can donate/ give away/ dispose of your old stuff?

As many of you would know, I volunteer at Salvation Army, at the Upper Serangoon Family Thrift Shop, as part of the Salvation Army Library Enterprise aka SALE.

Thus, I often receive offline and online enquiries on donation of stuff to Salvation Army, and I decided, why not have a FAQ on this topic. Hope this mini FAQ will help you answer your initial queries. :)

Q: What can I donate to Salvation Army?
A: Anything! At the thrift shop, they sell clothes, books, electrical appliances, furniture, crockery, etc etc. Almost anything you can think of, are available for sale at Salvation Army.

However, do be considerate and only donate those working items, instead of items which are already spoilt and just need discarding.

Q: How do I go about donating my old stuff?
A: You can drop your stuff at Salvation Army collection points, or you can email to donor@SMM.salvationarmy.org for bulky items.

Personally, I have packed my old but workable items (clothes, books, electrical appliances) into boxes and arranged for a collection by the Salvation Army before. They would require a list of items you are donating, so do prepare your list.

Disclaimer: that's about 2-3 years back, so I'm not quite sure if there are now other SOPs in place. :P

Q: Where do my donation of old stuffs go to?
A: Generally speaking, they will be distributed for sale at the thrift shops. And as Upper Serangoon Family Thrift Shop is the biggest 2nd hand book store among the thrift shops that Salvation Army has, most of the donated books will arrive there.

We would then price, sort and display them for sale. Proceeds will go to the beneficiaries under Salvation Army.

Q: Will the books go to the less priviledged in children's homes/ poorer countries overseas, etc?
A: I'm not too sure about that, but we do hear of cases whereby student groups work with Salvation Army to select books which they intend to bring overseas to set up libraries/ help the poor. We also have regular buyers who select books for other volunteering activities, such as story telling for the less priviledged children in Singapore.

Q: I'm interested to buy books. How's the collection like?
A: The collection is really wide. We receive fiction, non-fiction, comics, Chinese. English, even foreign language books like French, Japanese, etc; even medical books, law books, Geographical Magazines, Archie's comics, recipe books, text books, assessment books, etc.

Q: I'm looking for a particular series. Do you have the complete series?
A: As it's on donation basis, we can't control the supply of books that we receive, so sometimes, the series don't come complete too. We will try to keep a lookout and place serial books/ comics together though, when we spot them in subsequent sessions.

Q: What do you do at SALE?
A: We have our regular SALE activities on Saturday mornings, from 9.30am - 12.30pm.

From the boxes of donated books which we receive, we will sieve out books which are torn and tattered (non-saleable conditions), sort books by categories (eg. Fiction, Non-Fiction, Children, Comics, etc), price them and shelve them.

Occasionally, we also have book fairs, depending on Salvation Army's tie-ups with other organisations. Visit us on facebook or read about us on Salvation Army's blog.

Q: That's interesting! Can I join SALE too?
A: Yes! If you're interested, you can email Salvation Army at volunteer@smm.salvationarmy.org The Salvation Army staff will liaise with you following that.

P.S: Nevertheless, if you're a friend of mine, I don't mind showing you the way around on one of those sessions I am going. :P

Disclaimer: The above is drafted purely based on my personal observations as a volunteer of SALE, thus if you have any further enquries, or need more detailed, confirmed SOPs of how things are done, pls contact the Salvation Army directly. :P

Hope the FAQ helps!