Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Livewire team decends on Jumble Station





Jumble Station fairly crackled with electricity as a team of photographers came to film the topic closest to our heart – helping a single parent. The crew of six from Livewire who were attending a Charge-Up conference were visiting JS for the first time and were fairly bristling with excitement.

The conference was a creative event designed to train a new generation of multimedia work crew capable of handling all things related to photography, videography, sound equipment, movie making etc. So the youngsters from as far as Miri and Ipoh came all prepared with a script to photograph the making and helping of a single parent at JS.

Our two helpers Adrian and Meksue were roped in to act as a couple while Mala’s two daughters Nur Ain and Nur Fazlin became their kids. The plot was about a couple who were originally happy but the hubby’s gambling habit tore the façade of happiness apart. They quarrel violently and the wife is pushed out of the house with her clothes thrown out as well. She goes out in tears with her two kids and they sleep in the corridors where JS staff (yours truly) finds them and rescues them. Lian See, JS co-founder then proceeds to interview and takes them under JS care. Simple right? But boy the photography took several hours and Kumeran was kind enough to allow us the use of his flat where the posing and the ‘acting’ could be carried out realistically and more importantly where the shots could be captured creatively. Shooting out in the corridor for the sake of artistic creativity and a touch of realism wasn't easy either - the smell and poor condition made it an appalling place to be at but that's the reality of some single mums who get kicked out of their matrimonial home and end up in the street so to speak. Helping single parents like these from the depths of despair to reach a comfortable state of confidence is exacty what JS aims to do... giving single parents the helping hand to rediscover themselves after a painful setback..Now we’re waiting for the final edited version from the Livewire pros to see how the project panned out!

Friday, January 8, 2010

Secure start to a new school term







Some 100 children of poor single parents were blessed this time around with brand new school bags and uniforms not to mention some stationery as well. This was made possible with the help of some individuals and groups more precisely Secure Parking, the parking behemoth and Sharm's students from the Kevala Wholistic Yoga group.

Secure Parking very generously agreed to finance the purchase of 100 school bags costing around RM59.90 each and some stationary as well as school socks while The Yoga kakis pooled their funds to help with the purchase of new uniforms and long pants. Parents without Partners Bhd’s president Lim Lian See had a tough time buying the school uniforms, pants and shirts from Mydin while sorting out who gets what sizes was another major challenge.

Still the smiles on the kids’ faces as they slipped the new bags onto their small shoulders was a joy to behold and many would have rushed and crowded into Venie’s small flat at Lembah Subang if we had not put them into batches and given them a specific time to collect their “Back 2 School” items.

At Angsana, Subang Mewah, USJ1 a low keyed Christmas celebration was organised to coincide with the Back2School programme where single parents from Puchong, Angsana and Klang were invited to attend. The event drew an enthusiastic response from the single parents who could make it and the highlight was to have tiny tots walking off delightedly with a bag that appeared somewhat bigger than their physique. So to all our sponsors, well wishers and collaborators, a Very Big Thank You for securing such a lovely start to a new school term.