Yong-en Care Centre’s 15th Anniversary
DEDICATION TO COMMUNITY WAS SHOWN when leaders from Fairfield Methodist Church (FMC) set up Yong-en Care Centre (YECC) 15 years ago in response to the needs of elderly residents and children in the surrounding Chinatown area. Over the years, the services have expanded to include youths, adults and families as well.
YECC recently celebrated its 15th Anniversary with a Gala Dinner for 340 guests. The May 20 event featured milestones in YECC’s journey, video testimonies of beneficiaries and volunteers, performances by artistes as well as the auction of donated paintings by a budding young painter. A total of $83,500 was raised for the work of the centre.
As part of the celebrations, a 15th Anniversary Newsletter was also published and distributed, sharing the milestones of clients and marking out YECC’s milestones in its three departments.
• Elderly Services – Consisting of Preventive Health Care and Home Help programmes, and Dementia Day Care Service, amongst other projects such as promoting active ageing and senior volunteerism.
• Kids, Teens and Family Services – School support and literacy programmes, including tuition for children in need, bursary awards, workshops on holistic development and sex education, work with at-risk youth and with tertiary students, and even family education programmes for parents and school staff.
• Counselling, Social Work and Referral Services – Face-to-face counselling and social work services, such as support groups for single mothers and single men, therapeutic and befriending programmes for children and the elderly, and monthly food rations for those in need.
The newsletter also explained how donations are used, for example “$10 pays for one health examination for an elderly client” or “$50 provides one month’s worth of groceries for one family”.
YECC hopes to raise more funds at its Charity Golf Tournament on Sept 14, 2011.
Warm fellowship at GYM Convention 2011
A HUNDRED AND TWENTY-THREE seniors attended the Glowing Years Ministry (GYM) Convention held at Premiere Hotel, Klang from July 11 to 14 this year. is annual convention is organised by the Trinity Annual Conference Board of Seniors’ Ministry (TRAC BOSM).
The convention speaker, Dr Samuel Ong, TRAC Malaysia Conference Lay Leader, and the Director of TRAC BOSM, the Rev David C. S. Wee, gave very inspiring and down-to-earth messages on the theme “Living Well – Ending Well”. Everyone was blessed and had warm fellowship throughout.
Visitors from the Johor Bahru Wesley Methodist Seniors’ Fellowship, Mr and Mrs Michael Lim, felt that “the fellowship was very warm and friendly. We made new friends and met former ones. The ‘Activities Galore’ portion was an enriching learning experience for both of us and we picked up some interesting games which we could introduce to our own seniors.”
Fong Seng Narp is the Secretary of the Trinity Annual Conference Board of Seniors’ Ministry. He worships at Wesley Methodist Church.
Good response to Rummikub competition
RUMMIKUB – a game that is mentally-challenging and very popular among seniors – was introduced at the Befrienders’ Circle sessions 10 years ago. ereafter, many local Glowing Years Ministries (GYMs) have also introduced this table-top game in their sessions. Other games have since been introduced but Rummikub seems to be the most preferred.
In the year 2010, the Trinity Annual Conference Board of Seniors’ Ministry (TRAC BOSM) Co-ordinator of Activities, Mrs Catherine Chan, held a Rummikub competition among the members of the local GYMs and the Befrienders’ Circle.
The strong response encouraged her to organise a second Rummikub competition this year, on May 23 and 30. A total of 28 participants from the local GYMs and the Befrienders’ Circle took part with great enthusiasm. Ms Janet Lee from the Befrienders’ Circle was the winner, with Mr Jeffrey Chan of Faith Methodist GYM and Mrs Lucy Foo of Fairfield Methodist GYM achieving a tie as runners-up.
Catherine Chan is the Co-ordinator of Activities, Trinity Annual Conference Board of Seniors’ Ministry.