MUN DRY RATIONS DRIVE

Because of the recent floods that have devestated the North of the country, the Organizing Committee for MUN has decided to have a dry rations drive to support those that are in desperate need. We will be going through the Red Cross in our drive. As a Model United Nations Conference Organizing Committee, we wanted to better mock the United Nations by also involving ourselves in service work. In our drive, we approached all the schools, reaching out past the 450 delegates that will be attending the conference, and asked them to donate as much as they could for the drive, which was collecting basic things such as saris, toothbrushes, rice, soap, etc. so that they are able to support themselves in this harsh period.
We managed to collect boxes and boxes of equipment, as well as some money, to be donated to those who are suffering in the North. Overall, this drive was a huge success, because of the people that were involved.

VERSUS CANCER CHARITY CONCERT

18th September 2010.

Hope for Kids, the community service group I am part of, held a charity concert. There were many different acts from different schools and people from around Colombo that signed up to perform. All proceeds of the event were to go the Children's Cancer Ward at the Maharagama Cancer Hospital, the only government cancer hospital in the country. The purpose of the charity group is to raise money to maintain the children's play room which we built there.

Goals:
-Carry off a concert that runs smoothly.
- To make a lot of money.

On the day of the concert, there was a dress rehearsal, where we had a full run through of the show and who is going where. I was the backstage co-ordinator and I had to co-ordinate when people had to go on. My idea was to have people be backstage 2 shows early, so that everyone would be ready to go on, with as little air time as possible. However, many people did not come for this rehearsal, and some of them ended up singing 3 or 4 songs, and taking up half an hour on stage, so people were waiting to go on for nearly an hour. Tickets sold out fast, and people ended up having to buy a ticket by the seller writing on a piece of paper. Other than that, I think that overall it turned out well, and it made a lot of money, and also joined a lot of people together so they made a lot of friends.

5K RUN.

The 5K run was organized by Habitat for Humanity and the Alzeimer's community service group. Each runner had to pay Rs. 500 for a cap and some water, as well as access to the water and food that will be served at the end. All profits were split between the two groups.
Somehow I was thrust into it, and I ended up having to do music while people were around the pool at the beginning and the end of the race, and also helping to serve food and juice to the returning runners. It was a hot morning, but it turned out well, and made a lot of money for the groups. Overall, it was a great succeess.

SAISA GIRL'S BASKETBALL EVENT CREW.

19 - 22 February 2010.
SAISA Girl's Basketball was hosted in Colombo, in our brand new gym. The tournament drew in eight schools from across the region, each team with nine or ten girls. An Event Crew was required to co-ordinate the event, so that everything could run as smoothly throughout those three days as possible. Everyone had different duties throughout, ranging from taking pictures of the games to updating the scores on the website. I was in charge, along with Grace, of the music, however, I spent much of the time doing other jobs as well, so that the tournament wouldn't have any hiccups, which in the end it managed to do, except for a technological error at the closing ceremony, it all went well:)

WEEK WITHOUT WALLS.

25 - 29 January 2010.

Hambantota, Sri Lanka.
We spent three days working in a pre-school in the area of Hambantota in the south-east of the island. There, we painted everything from the playground equipment to every wall that could possibly be painted on this one-room school; no wall was too high for us. We also spent the first half hour of each day playing with the children. On the last day, when all the work was completed, there was a performance, where we performed for them and they performed for us.

Goals:
- to re-paint and clean the school, so as to make a better environment for the children to learn in.
- to re-paint all the playground equipment outside, so that it looks almost new.
- to play with the children.
- give the children art supplies - books, crayons.
- finish the work and then come up with a performance for the children.

OUTCOME:
We managed to achieve all the things that we aimed to, and more. When we were first introduced to the project, I thought that it would just be another paint job, go in, go out. Three days of hard-work. I felt that we worked brilliantly as a team - we managed to get the majority of the walls done on the first day as well as most of the paint on the equipment. I think that also, through this teamwork, we became, to some extent, closer as a grade, having to work with people that we had never worked with before. However, the one outcome of this project that I had not thought through fulIy was that I never really thought about how happy it would make these children. I never imagined the smiles on their, as well as their parents' faces at the crayons, the paper, the clean walls and floor, the paint on the equipment; the giggles and the astonishment at the performances; the work that they put into their performance; the way that they waved us good-bye at the end. This was when I realised: this is what it feels like to change a small part of someone's world. Possibly the most amazing feeling. Something that I had felt before, but never truly understood until that moment.

IB ORIENTATION - MAMA AND PAPA HOME.

As our first introduction into Service, we visited the Mama and Papa home in Kalutara, near to where we were having our IB Orientation. We spent a couple of hours playing with the children at the Mama and Papa home - a home for children whose parents could not cope with the responsibility of raising a child, also, many of these kids are differently abled, further adding to the responsibilty that many of these parents would not be able to support. We took art supplies for the home, and so we spent a couple of hours drawing and painting with the children. Seeing that look of happiness on their faces as they are determined to make their paintings a masterpiece. Every stroke of the brush and every line with the pencil, reveals a look of gentle satisfaction on their faces. That we were able to supply them with this and be able to give them the supplies to give them some amusement, even if it would only be for a few hours.
After we finished with the children and the art supplies, we went to the grounds of the other orphanage, where we played with the children. Some of the students in our grade played cricket and basketball with some of the boys. However, I played along with some other of the girls in our grade with some of the younger girls, they wanted to play tag and catch. Although there were a few injuries, I think that we all had a good time playing and running around. It was a lot of fun, and I am glad that we had the chance to do this on our trip.