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ICDF aid workers say the experience is worth the pain

"When you see those you've helped heal from sickness return to you with smiling faces, you are really filled with a strong sense of accomplishment and satisfaction that all the hard work was worth it."

Judy Wang, aid worker

Can you imagine a life without the convenience of buying a can of Coca Cola or a box of your favorite cookies at a family mart just around the corner -- at any given time?

Or imagine a life without the luxury of taking a warm bath at home, dining out in nice restaurants and watching newly-released movies every weekend night?

While the thought of giving up such a comfortable lifestyle might be hard to imagine for some, those individuals who take part in the International Cooperation and Development Fund's (ICDF, 國際合作發展基金會) overseas development programs, the pleasures and conveniences of materialist lifestyles are nothing when compare to the happiness they experience while serving in ICDF missions abroad.

In short, as Judy Wang (王秀珠), a current member of ICDF's medical team to the Republic of Malawi, put it this way: "My time in the ICDF's overseas mission has profoundly enriched my soul."

ICDF, a branch of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, is the single body in charge of Taiwan's cooperative overseas development programs.

"The mission of the ICDF is to strengthen international cooperation and foreign relations by sending well-trained Taiwanese professionals to help other nations. These nations are usually in some stage of the developing process. Our professionals help to promote these countries' economic development, social progress and the welfare of the people," said the ICDF's Secretary General, Yang Tzu-pao (楊子葆).

Yang, who recounted to the Taipei Times the history of Taiwan's overseas assistance projects, said that Taiwan had sent its first agricultural missions to Asia in the late 1950s when Taiwan was itself still a developing country. These were followed by a batch of agricultural technical missions to Africa in 1961 to help expand and modernize fruit and vegetable production.

"Then, as Taiwan's economic strength started growing during the 1980s," said Yang, "Taiwan expanded its cooperative international development programs, increased its number of overseas missions and also furthered the various types of assistance projects."

"Taiwan was poor back in the 1950s and received assistance from others," he added. "Through the ICDF's overseas missions, Taiwan is giving back to the international community what it can to help others.

According to Yang, the ICDF currently has 38 missions serving abroad in various parts of the world. Those include missions in Africa -- in Burkina Faso, Chad, Gambia, Liberia, Malawi, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal and Swaziland.

In Asia, the ICDF has missions stationed in Fiji, Indonesia, the Marshall Islands, Palau, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands and Thailand. In the Caribbean, there are missions in Dominica, the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Haiti, St. Christopher and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

Missions to Central America include those stationed in Belize, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama and El Salvador. In South America there are missions in Ecuador and Paraguay. There are also missions in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

"These overseas missions are categorized into various assistance projects: technical, medical, agricultural, investment, humanitarian, educational and training projects," Yang told the Taipei Times.

The tasks of various technical missions include teaching skills to the underprivileged and developing and implementing projects such as growing crops on what was originally barren lands, building dams and laying irrigation, just to name a few.

Yang said the ICDF's investment and lending projects include providing small amounts of credit in rural communities to help them develop small businesses.

Aside from trained professionals, Yang added that volunteers and men who served in the Overseas Alternative Service -- as an alternative to military service -- are also among the individuals stationed at these missions abroad.

"Life in Africa is relatively uncomfortable in comparison to that in Taiwan," Wang said, pointing out the extreme scarcity of food supplies, medicines and living condition.

"But when you see those you've helped heal from sickness return to you with smiling faces, you are really filled with a strong sense of accomplishment and satisfaction -- that all the hard work was worth it," said Wang, who, prior to missions to Malawi since last year, spent four years, 1994-1998, in Guinea Bissau as a member of the medical mission.

Wu Shueh-ru (吳雪如), who served in the mission from 1996-1998,echoed Wang's remarks.

"My experience as a member of the ICDF's medical team to the Republic of Guinea Bissau had given me a whole dimension of what happiness means," said Wu, who explained her sense of deep satisfaction after her time of serving abroad.

She says she saw the scarcity of means and the difficult situations where bony-skinned children are threatened by malaria and other fatal diseases day in and day out, Wu commented that people in Taiwan have no idea how luck they are.

"I've learned to appreciate what I have so much more," she said, adding that if opportunity allows, she would like to go back and serve again.

Both Wang and Wu were not alone in expressing the sense of profound satisfaction that engulfed them after serving in the ICDF's overseas development programs.

As accounted in the recently released book entitled Sharing Our Fortunes with the World: Eight Stories of the Taiwan Spirit, individuals who take part in the programs, more often then not expressed their experience with the overseas missions as the most memorable experience in their life.

Indeed, emotional and spiritual lessons from the experience are so rewarding that many of those who had completed their service term expressed a desire to serve again if the opportunity allows.

For example, Fu Chen-chung (符振中), who was first dispatched to Liberia in 1989 and later to Guinea-Bissau as a member of a medical team to help treat locals as well as helped renovate and modernize local hospitals, said that, although he has now returned to Taiwan and is the deputy director of Chenghsing Hospital, he would one day love to return to Africa to serve again.

"To be stationed abroad means they run the risk of disease and other dangers, as well as the pain of being far away from their loved ones back home," Minister of Foreign Affairs Eugene Chien (簡又新), who is also the ICDF's president, was quoted as saying when speaking about the deeds of these overseas-mission members.

"Their courage and deeds are indeed impressive. They are anonymous heroes."
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