A gap of 60 years separates 87-year-old grandmother Chen Shui-yin and 17-year-old high school student Tseng Pin-chien. They do have one thing in common however, and that is their interest in doing volunteer work.
The Hsinchu City Government held a special ceremony on Thursday last week to thank volunteers for their contributions, and the room was packed with over 100 volunteers. Chen and Tseng were the oldest and the youngest of the people collecting awards, and were the focus of attention because of the two generations’ difference in their ages.
Chen, who has 11 grandchildren, started doing volunteer work in 2002. In the decade or more since then, she has clocked up around 14,000 hours of service.
Photo: CNA
照片:中央社
She recalls how, when SARS arrived in Taiwan over 10 years ago, very few people were willing to volunteer in the hospitals, but she wasn’t worried about becoming infected, and volunteered to look after patients in the Hsinchu Armed Forces Hospital. As a result, she was asked to be a long-term volunteer by the hospital’s medical team. Since then she has served in various departments, such as the emergency room and the maternity ward, pushing patients’ wheelchairs and reassuring the relatives of injured patients. She says, “Helping others makes me happy, and this keeps me healthy.”
Tseng says that her grandmother also does volunteer work, and she was influenced by her and started volunteering from when she was a third grade elementary school student. She says that she has a lot of pressure from her school work, and volunteering in her extracurricular time after school is a great outlet for relieving stress.
She said that her heart lit up when she saw the smiles on the faces of the disabled friends she once took on a trip, and this gave her a sense of immense achievement. Even though she is now in the third grade of high school and has a lot of pressure with her studies at the moment, she still wants to take any opportunity she can to do some volunteering.
(CNA, translated by Paul Cooper)
八十七歲阿嬤陳水銀與就讀高中的十七歲少女曾品千,兩人年紀雖相差一甲子, 卻都有著同樣的「興趣」,那就是當志工。
新竹市政府上週四舉辦志工表揚活動,上百位志工齊聚,其中,陳水銀與黃品千是全場年紀最長與最小的獲獎模範志工,兩人也因年紀相差約一甲子而成為全場焦點。
有十一位曾孫的陳水銀從民國九十一年開始擔任志工,十多年來,已累積服務時數約一萬四千小時。
陳水銀回憶,十多年前台灣發生嚴重急性呼吸道症候群時,很少人願意進到醫院服務,當時她不畏傳染病,自告奮勇進入國軍新竹地區醫院服務病患,因而受醫療團隊延攬成為長期志工,後來輾轉到急診室、婦產科等單位服務,協助病患推輪椅、安撫傷患家屬心情,直呼「幫助別人,讓我的心情保持快樂,身體自然健康」。
曾品千說她的阿嬤也是志工,因從小受到阿嬤的影響,小學三年級開始投入服務。她說,平日學校課業壓力大,利用課餘時間做志工,是她紓壓放鬆的最好管道。
曾品千表示,她曾帶著身障朋友旅遊,看到朋友愉快滿足的笑容,心裡感到非常快樂,而且很有成就感,雖然目前高中三年級,正面臨升學壓力,但仍會把握機會服務。
(中央社)
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