The Volunteer Bug

I recently rediscovered my love for volunteering in the past couple of weeks. It all started out with a small fundraising brunch event for a missions trip for a team that will be departing to Amsterdam in a couple of day. An email was initially sent out asking for volunteers, but I chose to ignore it. A second email was sent out again with the messenger desperately seeking for volunteers. At this time, I decided that it would be nice to help out for a couple of hours. I responded to the email saying that I would help with serving the food.

On the day of the event, I was an eager beaver; the first to report to the person responsible for the serving team. After getting all the cutlery ready, I was prepped at helping out. During this event, I was reminded why I love volunteering. It's the fact that I get to meet different people and interact with those who are also trying to achieve the same goal -- making sure the event runs smoothly and successfully. On top of that, I get to learn new skills! Although my task was simply to pass out plates and use tongs to take two pancakes and put them on the person's plate.

After volunteering with this event, I decided to help out with the Christian and Missionary Alliance in Canada's biannual General Assembly, Run 2008. Like the above mentioned event, a call went out looking for volunteers and I passed, thinking it would be too time consuming. As the event approached, something was tugging at me to volunteer at the event. And so I responded, helping out with ushering during the Healing and Communion Service on Sunday. I didn't know what I was getting myself into, having never done ushering in front of such a large crowd. I think the last time I formally ushered (the filling in for late people at OCAC on Sunday mornings to hand out bulletins do not count) was in Grade 5 or 6 for Junior Worship at my home church.

While I never had any "training" as an usher, I quite enjoyed myself during the service. Although the job took me away from concentrating on the message (I missed the sermon because I was cleaning up) and theme of the service (I was too busy guiding people to empty seats or counting attendees), I learned that helping out with such an event is very gratifying and satisfying. After ushering this event, I think I'm ready to tackle other events. I like being an usher! Just don't make me count the number of attendees again.

Oh yes, and I volunteered, well, more like registered for a 5K Walk/Run in support of the Alliance Compassion, as part of Run 2008. I woke up bright and early on Saturday and walked 5k with a couple of other people. It took about 58 minutes to walk the 5K because we were walking at a leisurely pace towards the end. I wasn't in much pain afterwards because I think I've been doing some exercise recently and well, walking isn't very bad considering I walked around HK and Beijing! Here's a picture of me and my fellow walkers for the route!


At the closing ceremonies for the 5K Walk/Run, awards were presented to the fastest male and female runners, as well as a Spirit Award. And to our astonishment, the Spirit Award went to Ottawa Chinese Alliance Church! We had over 20 runners or walkers come out and a lot of them cheered on other runners at the finish line. And for that, we won.

After the walk, a bunch of us went to Eggspectation for breakfast (or brunch). Afterwards, I needed to walk off the meal because it was quite large (I ordered the "Cabane a sucre") so a few of us walked back to the Rideau Centre to check out the display booths at the Congress Centre for Run 2008. Then we were so tired we just on the couches and started singing Starfield songs until they had to leave for a meeting. All by my lonesome self, I walked around Rideau Centre and then off to my domicile to rest.