"Live to Love"

DRUKPA PENANG ON 20 APR 2008

A group of us from Drukpa Penang again carrying out another meaningful Live to Love activity by visiting Yee Ran Jing Handicapped Children Home in Bukit Mertajam. The home was established in 2003 and at present it has 62 physically and mentally retarded individual ranging from the age of 5 to 47 years old. The home is made up of a double-storey terrace house whereby male and female are housed separately. The operation of the home is privately funded by a group of charitable individuals and public donations. The children mainly came from very poor and broken family who cannot afford to take care of their needs. There are 8 voluntary workers which help in taking care of these children and the cleanliness of the premises. At present there is no government subsidies but the Ex-Health Ministers had earlier helped on their behalf to apply for government aid but approval has yet to be granted.




Prior to the visit, we were informed of their needs, so we bought them some food supplies like vegetables, meat and some daily needs, hopefully it will provide them with better nutrition and hygiene. We felt immense sympathy towards these physically and mentally retarded children, they are really in need of love and care of from the society and we hope that through our activity they are able to feel that.

We arrived during their lunch hour, we noticed that some of these children, if not too restrained by their handicap, could actually eat on their own, but there are a few which needed assistance. The six of us there also volunteered to help out in feeding them. The children, no doubt were not able to express, but they could sense our kind intention and the process of feeding them went very smoothly as all of them were well behaved.



Some of these children looked sad and kept crying, some are cheerful, some are bad tempered and may scream out of a sudden as if they needed attention, some were hyper-active where at times when they got out of control, they would be tied up in order to subdue them. Although they are retarded, they have feelings and temper just like us, only that they expressed them in a different manner. When we were leaving, some of them were happy and even shook hands with us to say goodbye, as if they know that we would be coming back to see them again.

Buddhist sutra stated “Suffering is everywhere". From this activity, we were not merely seeing the sufferings as described in words but having the real life experience of seeing such actual happenings, which certainly has a different impact on us. Looking at so many of such children who go through so much suffering, we may feel helpless, but how could we bear to ignore them? We should indeed show as much concern and love as we could in an effort to lessen their sufferings.
 
This LTL activity, apart from being meaningful, provides us another lesson in life. Again, thank you Holiness for the blessing and leading us to the path of realization.