Up til today. Just now, in fact, I've never really thought so in depth about poverty. Oh sure, we usually just associate poverty with like, Mother Teresa, and dirt and no food.

But today, things changed. Yes, poverty is about those things. But through our stimulus at Crossroads (They really should have one in Singapore), I've gained so much respect, and a whole mass of sympathy for 2 billion people, i've never felt before.

We arrived at the Crossroads Organization going all huhhhhhhz what's this. But it got off to a good start, because our 'guide' or facilitator was really friendly and funny. He had this really passionate look in his eyes. And he sort of reminded me of Glenn.

He told us of how Crossroads started out, and how they put resources and needs together, and somehow it was just darn amazing. We were split into families, and we were grouped with people we barely knew. Sam and i were together, and we didn't even know any of the dudes. But we just worked really well together.

I mean, it was just a simple game, which all of us knew, really, that after a few hours, it wouldn't really matter. It didn't only open my mind to the objectives of the game : to stay alive, but also it opened up this window to a whole new perspective on things. I guess i can't really speak for everyone, but for myself at least. And i guess you really just have to be there.


So Crossroads is this charity (QI SIN!) organization, where DJ(David James and gang) are a helping hand to those who need it. The way it works is amazing, people may say its a stroke of luck, that it started out with 2 million people in China who suffered from a flood. But i know otherwise, and i guess you all know what I'm going to say, but i'm going to say it anyway: God's timing is perfect.

2 million needy, homeless people, with nothing. A family of four? a visit to the hospital and unintentional eavesdropping? 19 boxes of clothes? 48 boxes of clothes? 72 boxes of clothes?

Where can you get that kind of 'luck'? No where. Because its not luck. And not just once. Computer lab in Afghanistan, with one less computer than one : a picture of a computer. World Bank upgrade of computer system? 300 discarded CPUs. With no monitors. And a sudden find of 300 (fat) monitors at another bank, two weeks later?

No way that's luck.

Furniture for two empty apartments, where do you get that?! surprisingly enough, some rich family calls up and tells Crossroads that they own too many houses, and want to close down two.


No way that's luck.

the list goes on.

We visited the stimulated slum, and in our families, we sat in a 2m by 2m canvas sheet and started folding paperbags. our paper bags our life. 10 minutes represented a week. And so many other factors contributed to the saving of our familie's life.

There was flurry and activity throughout the whole field, it was really really... different. To see students strip themselves of dignity(Okay, i think we were having a good time doing that) by kneeling or lying down and begging the 'shopkeepers' to buy their bags, no btw it was nothing like the leadership game we played in school.

These things, we realised, are real life. People actually do these things. We didn't even have to go through the motions of picking up other people's crap from the rubbish bins and bringing it home for dinner. And we only did this for thirty minutes. These people don't take a break, they don't rest, they work for hours, they pay money for the toilet that they have to to wait 3 hours for.

These people, they don't know anything, they survive on less than a US dollar a day. They don't earn 70 fake dollars for 10 crap paper bags. They earn 99 cents for 22 bags. They don't get free paper from the shopkeepers by giving them a two-squeeze shoulder massage. They obviously cannot trade iPhones or watches to pay rent.

These people, they actually work for hours long just to make about a dollar. These people, their rent is probably paid for by means of a limb or kidney. They suffer from HIV, they don't go to school, they use flying toilets(your excretions in plastic bags), they live like this every single day.

They sell themselves for 50 cents. These people, they're so beautiful, and they don't even know that they're just as valuable as each and every individual on this planet. They don't know, that no money in the world can buy them. They don't know.


And we don't know that.
i think the only way that we can see how these people live is to experience it for ourselves. Thirty minutes, just thirty minutes opens up your doorways and lets you see poverty in depth. It makes it real.

As we sat in the grass, sharing what struck us most, while plucking corn starch off our hands, what was moving was that everyone had something to say. The words that came out of these people, these people i barely even knew, they were words of humility and sympathy. Maybe its got something to do with the St Paul's culture, which i really admire.

Everyone participates. Actively.
It also makes me extremely glad to be in a Convent school, where we are more aware of things like these. Where we know more things beyond the books. But today, I was just really glad for once, that i was able to share it with someone else. The most powerful thing was that these were people I didn't even know the names of.

These were people that barely knew me. These were people being open about their feelings. These were people I knew were city kids. These were people who seemed to transform in thirty minutes. These were people that I'm sure will definitely be pioneers and donors for the poor.


And here I am sitting in front of this computer screen, thinking about what this monitor will do for someone else. In a land not so far away.
People in the slums, if they see 5 tourists with giant SLRs, the things moving through their minds is this.

SLR = education for my children + money for food + money for rent + money for medicine + money for clothes.

Its strange, isn't it. How on one extreme, people own about 7 houses or something, in the city, summer home, winter home, autumn home, sprint home, giant condo with a rooftop garden, houses in the maldives.
While on the other extreme, we have people living in cardboard boxes, or wooden huts held together with nails the size of a king size bed.

Funny isn't it, reality.


Well. its like 12:42. The latest i've ever blogged. rachel's kinda sick.

I haven't even talked about the second crossroads activity and after.
But tooodles anyway.

Love you guys, you know who you are (: