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Volunteer Work with Children Takashi Shii from Japan
I devoted myself to looking for someone who needed help. I often went to the Information Center downtown carrying a map and asked a worker there if anyone needed some volunteers or not. There were lots of people, however, most of them wanted someone who could stay more than two or three months. Unfortunately, because I had to go back to Japan for the new semester at college, I couldn't stay there that long. The volunteer work which I found was an after school program at the YWCA. My work was disciplining students. After their classes at elementary school, I and two other co-workers went to the school to pick up those kids who were supposed to study in the program. The reason why these kids come to the program was their behavioral problems. They had difficulty in adjusting to teachers and friends at the school. They never listened to what teachers said and often fought with other classmates. On the first day of my volunteer work in the program, I was shocked to see the rudeness of the children. They didn't even try to remember my name just because it was difficult for them to pronounce it. They called me "Chinese" or "Korean", not "Japanese" even though they knew my nationality after my introduction. In the program, two other co-workers and I established a timetable and let them play, study, clean rooms and so on. Since these students didn't listen to what we said so seriously, we made a rule, the so-called "Three strike system". Once they did something wrong, they got one strike. And when they got three strikes, they had to get out of the room, which is the same system as in baseball when batters have to leave the batter box when they get three strikes. Then we called their mother or father and told them how badly their children behaved so these children would behave properly. Sometimes we played some sports like soccer and tennis. Since I had some experience playing tennis, I could teach tennis to those who were willing to learn. As I talked or played sports with these children everyday, they gradually became familiar with me and finally remembered my name, which I never expected. Unfortunately, by the time I really felt close with them and they pronounced my name very well, it was already at the end of February and I had to go back to Vancouver. Sometimes I had to give these students a good scolding when they didn't behave properly, and they swore at me at times when they got upset. But, even though lots of incidents made me have stress, I was so sad when I had to part from them. They asked me when I was going to visit them again. All I could say was "I would like to call on you again when I have time and enough budget after I graduate from college". I couldn't say honestly , "Probably I will never have a chance to visit you because it costs money to come here again." I almost cried when some students at the program came to the airport to see me off on February 28th.
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