Contact Us             Donate               Advertise                                                 OCT-DEC 2008


Meet RAS volunteers

The volunteer gathering on the 26h September, Friday was my first meeting with members and volunteers of the Restroom Association. I was eager to know more about RAS, because as a student, I only knew of organisations for the disabled or children. The enthusiastic and vivacious volunteers and coordinators gave the small and humble function room of Kallang CC a lively and light-hearted atmosphere. In the course of the short briefing, I came to realise that volunteering at RAS would engage and challenge me on a whole new level. I probably wouldn’t meet needy groups of people, but I would have to learn about social and economic factors that contribute to the state of a toilet.

 

On the 19th November, the day everyone has been waiting for – The LOO Campaign. The special venue of the event made it more exotic. The highly anticipated event held at the zoo was very significant to us because it marked the start of the quest to make at least 70% of all toilets in Singapore clean and well-equipped. I took this opportunity to get my sister involved and interested in RAS and its work. I certainly made the right choice, for volunteering with my sister couldn’t be more fun. I later realised that we were not the only siblings helping out in the event.

 

The speeches given by Ms Tan, the President of RAS and the Guest-of-Honour Dr Amy Khor had inspired me to help RAS achieve their goal. A friend of mine questioned me on the necessity of RAS’ work, since Singapore’s toilets are by far cleaner than that of other countries. This is certainly a valid comment, and after much thought, this is my response: Singapore may already have relatively clean toilets, but improving them serves to increase our standard of living from the most basic local, tying in with the national goal of a better society. At the same time, RAS emphasizes good hygiene that should accompany the affluence of Singapore. That is why I have just registered to take part in the Volunteer Eco-Assessor workshop, and sincerely hope to work with RAS in many other activities to come.

 

- Lin Zhiyi, volunteer

 

 

5th and 6th November were the 2 days of the schools carnival at Suntec City. My friends and I from Victoria Junior College ODAC were helping out as volunteers for the Kinderland activity, under RAS. We were displaying a booth for primary school and kindergarten kids to educate them about sanitation and hygiene. Among the many activities was a large snakes and ladders game where the kids were taught about what should and should not be done in the toilet as well as a worksheet where the kids were supposed to spot the bad toilet habits as depicted in the pictures.

 

As volunteers for this event, we were given the opportunity to interact with kids and to actually teach them about sanitation and hygiene. This experience was very valuable to us as we were preparing to go to the village Yuksam in Sikkim, India from 8th to 24th November to carry out our Youth Expedition Project to build an eco-toilet capable of converting waste into manure which can then be sold as fertilisers or used by the community as well as to educate the students of the public school about sanitation and hygiene. Therefore the experience allowed us to be able to better interact with the kids over in Yuksam and engage them.

 

Going all the way there to help improve the lives of the people was really meaningful especially since sanitation and hygiene is a basic necessity for everybody. The gratitude that the people of the village showed to us was heart warming. From our experience we learned that much more can be done to improve the sanitation and hygiene around the world. We are very lucky to be living in Singapore where we have proper toilets and adequate information on sanitation and hygiene and these should not be taken for granted especially since other people around the world might not have these luxuries.

 

- Loy Teck Boon, volunteer

Meet RAS staff

 After a very long time serving in the manufacturing sector, I was finally given the opportunity by RAS to learn something new. The new tasks are actually a challenge for me because previously in manufacturing, I do not have to meet clients, give talks, conduct trainings or even doing recruitments. I feel honoured and proud as the tasks I am doing now, is actually educating and promoting toilet hygiene and health awareness to the public. So I am anticipating more new things to learn in the near future.

- Rosmahwati, Project Executive

 

 

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