Reality Check

After having spent a long weekend in a rural village volunteering to paint school walls, it got me thinking about what ‘poor’, ‘rural’, ‘in need’, ‘volunteer work’ really mean.

Our office donated a big sum of money to build walls around a new school called Hope School for the children and orphans of Xu Wan village in Henan province. A group of us volunteered our time to help design/paint those walls together with the children. We were told about the destitution and extremity the children face, especially for orphans who have lost their parents from being abandoned or to accidents, therefore leaving them with no hope and guidance for the future. Given this type of background information, one gets the idea like everyone else who have seen poverty on TV, that this volunteer trip will be an exciting one, because you’re there to make a change in a village that needs it most.

With this sort of expectation in the back of our heads, we carried excitement, hope, and utmost intention of goodwill with us as we hopped onto the plane, and then the bus, and then another bus that lead us to Xu Wan village. When we arrived, we were greeted by all the children in the village on both sides of the school entrance, wearing probably the best outfit in their closet, looking excited for what is to come. They were sweet, friendly, and somewhat timid to begin with.

However, as hours went by, we began interacting and conversing more with the children and found that what they were saying and how they were behaving are completely rehearsed. We later found out that the entire Hope School project have been exposed by media to the public, and that several government officials and other charity programs have visited this village way before we had. This is when I felt what we had expected was not what we should have expected.

This is when I woke up and realize the reality of what charity work can mean, and how, with the effect of media exposure, kids who were deemed ‘poor’ and ‘in need’ (by media) would have been equipped with the right things to say, the right type of image to put up, etc. I felt a lack of authenticity, but at the same time I felt sympathy. When poverty meets society, expectations and reality become blurred. A friend of mine also mentioned that when she visited an orphanage in India, where children were taught to sing, perform, talk and behave to their visitors where she felt similar lack of authenticity. Not that the kids were pretending, but that’s what the institution as well as media had taught them to do. A year later when she went back to the orphanage, she received exactly the same treatment and performace.

Charity institutions no longer serve as a place where you can really ‘help’. They are there as an act to draw sympathy from you. Children in poverty doesn’t mean they are in need, they are happy the way they are, and it’s not money that they lack, it’s tools and knowledge for survival that they need most.

My time at the village was wonderful nonetheless, but now I am more careful with where my good intentions can best be utilized.