By Max Huang
A friend once told me this story: He was on a cab to the Padang, to pay his respects to the late Lee Kuan Yew. Naturally, the cab driver started talking about Lee and how he would love to pay his respects too. When asked why he hasn’t, the driver simply said that every hour spent waiting in line at the Padang meant another hour lost ferrying passengers, and his family relied upon him to bring the bread home. The point was simple – simply having time was a privilege.
And I had the time to travel around Vietnam, attend a symposium for free, and pen my reflections. To say that I am privileged would be an understatement. This symposium has taught me many things, and if I were to summarise:
The world has many problems, and we are in such a position of privilege that it is somewhat an obligation for us to try to do something about it. While one person may not be able to solve everything by himself, we eat an elephant one bite at a time.
The world has many problems, and we are in such a position of privilege that it is somewhat an obligation for us to try to do something about it.
We know this. I know this. I know the world has many problems out there but I have always told myself that someone bigger, wealthier, there will be someone else who will solve such problems. It is the easy way out. But this symposium triggered a certain paradigm shift in me – I AM the bigger, wealthier ‘someone else’ to many others out there.
As one of the speakers said, most of us are convinced in our heads, but our hearts aren’t, and so our hands don’t feel the need to do something about it. But if we aren’t the ones trying to make a difference, we need to know that there are few out there who can even make a difference.
Shandra Woworuntu, a survivor of sex trafficking, spoke to us about the helplessness she felt when she managed to jump through a tiny bathroom window but she couldn’t help the other victims escape. Even then, naked, penniless, homeless, powerless and without her passport, she promised that she would come back to save them. The police wouldn’t help, her national embassy wouldn’t help, and so she slept on the streets, begged for food, until one day someone connected her to the FBI. They worked together to save the rest of the trafficking victims.
Ian Olson and Sam Brantingham, two nine-year-olds, decided in 2012 that it was not okay for kids in Liberia not to have playgrounds. So, despite the initial hesitation from friends and relatives, they contacted a Liberian Senator, contacted a few American NPOs, and raised 56,000 USD for the nicest playground they could imagine. A year later, they flew over to Liberia for the opening ceremony of their playground.
They come from positions where we would deem as not being ‘big enough’ and yet they did something. We live in comfortable homes, we have sufficient money to own a screen to be reading this article and yet we doubt our ability to contribute to this world. I guess this leads us to the next question – how can we help?
We eat an elephant one bite at a time.
Sure, the problems of the world may seem insurmountable, but no big problems were ever solved at one go. To build a computer, you need a hard drive, a keyboard, a monitor, a motherboard, etc. And each piece comprises many even smaller pieces. As the saying goes, the only way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time.
Another great part of the symposium was that it brought together many delegates who were concerned with humanitarian affairs and while we were sharing how we wanted to change the world, I was lucky enough to sit next to a delegate from California who was very interested in research. She shared that she too, felt inadequate to solve the problems of the world. But she felt that research was all about connecting the dots, putting multiple observations together to draw a deeper conclusion. She saw that she could make use of this expertise to help people assemble bits of a solution to form a more holistic approach, much like how a computer is only a computer after you put the hard drive, motherboard and monitor together.
Not all of us are researchers, or are that good at bringing people or ideas together, but all of us are unique. Each of us brings our unique perspective to this world, our unique skillsets, our unique backgrounds. Imagine if each of us did something, any small thing, for the world – the world would indeed be a better place. Many charities lack adequate marketing/communications teams, many charities lack funding, many charities simply lack manpower and brainpower.
Even simply raising awareness is a good first stab at solving problems. Education is often mentioned as a solution to problems and if you only had one takeaway from this rambling article, I would like to ask you not to wait to be educated, but to educate yourself about the world’s problems, and from there, perhaps something will take root and grow in your minds.
Lastly, let me leave you with this video of one of the speakers at the symposium, David Begbie. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tafPh0TTPgI – just watch the first half hour) He inspired us to begin with small steps and know that we are enough for this world.
