Dealing with A H1N1 Virus

3 months after the dreaded A H1N1 virus surfaced in Mexico and begun infecting humans, the sourge has made almost 200,000 people worldwide ill and killing over 1,300 of its victims. Although it is pandemic it is not a killer but we have not paid sufficient and serious attention to stop its multiplication. In Malaysia we have recorded almost 1,500 cases of imported and locally transmitted infections, over half of which are now locally transmitted. Of these we have already read of 11 deaths, 3 of which are within the past 24 hours. It is a worrisome trend. Any gathering of people in close proximity can give rise to cross infection and must be grounds for preventive actions. PBSNS has 25 trainees and up to 4 adult trainers and volunteers at any one time. Until today we have had little concern as none of our members have reported sick. Today we have a trainer who was ill, not seriously but he has been advised to self-quarantine and seek medical treatment if he does not recover in a day or two. Some trainees are coughing and the instruction given out is that parents with trainees who are unwell (cough, sneeze, fever) must not send them to the centre. If they do come they will be sent home to minimize exposing the other trainees. Trainers and volunteers who are unwell should inform the centre and be excused. In the worse case scenario, if a large number of the trainees and caregivers are unwell, be it from normal flu or H1N1 virus, the centre will have to be closed temporarily to mitigate the situation. We will watch for further developments and act accordingly.

We pray for the Malaysian Care 30th Anniversary Exhibition next weekend in Petaling Jaya in which we plan to participate, that our staff will be well to attend, that the various participants in the various events will not be afflicted with flu of any sort.

Aarons and Joshuas

The books of Exodus and Deuteronomy in the Old Testament wrote of the appointments of Aaron as Moses's helper and Joshua as his successor. Throughout human history we read of leaders wrestling with issues of competent helpers and advisers and choice of good successors. In PBSNS the same concerns will arise.

PBSNS, like any organisation, is set up for a purpose. Life is given to it by the people entrusted to run it, build it and deliver it to another team. No leader can claim full credit because he alone cannot perform every work required. Even Moses confessed his weakness and need for helpers to be a good leader so Aaron his brother was chosen by God for him. Even until his old age Aaron stood by his side, although he was not without fault but he was faithful.

Moses recognized that he need to groom a successor to take the Israelites into the Promise Land. Old age caught up with him and he knew that he could not see the fruit of his work in his lifetime, which is to step on the soil that God promised His people. Moses chose Joshua to lead the Israelites into the next phase of its history.

I take great comfort in the above narrations that we are never alone in our work, be they for ourselves or for God. If we confess our shortcomings before God, He will raise up suitable helpers to prop us up to do His work. And when our time comes, when our eyes have dimmed, our hearing short and our brain feeble, God will require us to pass on the baton to a new leader with the same vision to carry on His work.

PBSNS is at its first year. Come June we will hold our first Annual General Meeting. In June next year a new team will be elected to lead the association forward. Leadership comes from within the membership. Membership comes from invitation to those whom the committee believe to have the potential to serve. So this can be considered our growing pains. We want to build ourselves to be different, to be differentiated. It is a tall order but one that can be reached with and by dedicated leaders and servants.

I think if there is anything I love to see PBSNS become, is to see it become a quality service organization, maybe to be ISO certified one day. That will be a first I think! But for now I pray for more Aarons and wisdom to see some Joshuas to stand in line as the new leaders of the association one day.

Compassion in Society

Compassion is a feeling for another's sorrow or suffering. An equivalent term is empathy. Not many people has this ability to understand and feel for the sorrowful, the suffering, the disabled. Perhaps those who can already understood that in the realm of human capacities there is inequality and that they have experienced the empty or half cup syndrome, which is how a person feels looking at life up from the floor level, much as a crippled or a lame beggar would. They further understand that there are others in the same situation, and worst. As such it is easier for them to view life from a blessed eye and hence dispense compassion to those less well off. Or else how shall we explain the poor and the sick still having compassion for others? Compassion belongs to people of every status, wealth and educational background. I guess it is both a gift of discernment as well as life's experience that enable one to feel compassion.

How many of us has true compassion for the disabled people around us? Perhaps when they are truly disabled, like when they are obviously blind, crippled, speech impaired or mentally deficient that we are moved to feel pity and helpful towards them. But do we really feel the same way for others who are not so obviously handicapped? Like the learning disabled people in the workplace?

These people look as normal as you and I but for the exception that they are slow in thinking, expressing, learning and doing. Quite often we fall into the trap of raising our expectations of them. Like why are you STILL so slow? Why can't you learn as fast inspite of all the trainings?

Learning disability is a lifelong setback. Short of wearing a label that shouts 'I Am a Learning Disabled Person' we don't need to demean these fellow human beings any further. We ought to treat them normally BUT with understanding that they are not as normal as we normal people are, or ever will be. Strangers may be forgiven for not knowing the lack of certain capacities of these LD people but those in their circle like family members, neighbors and workplace colleagues ought to know better. Sadly, familiarity still breed contempt and over time our treatment of the LD shift towards the way we treat the other people.

Other factors as to why disabled people failed to receive special treatment are the 'why are they so special? I too have my own set of problems!' ,'it is not my problem!' and the 'they get the same pay so should do the same work!' attitudes. In bad times more and more people need compassion, including the regularly normal families who may cut off their feelings towards the disabled since they too believe that they now belong to the financially disabled crowd!

However, compassion towards the physically and mentally disabled must be an all-season attitude because they are an all-season disability people.

Disabled Persons in the Real World Job Market

It is all honky dory to believe that the real world outside will accept disabled persons in their midst with more compassion and patience than their regular peers. After all, the very fact that they are less endowed than us should invoke a sense of sympathy or even pity, right? Wrong!

What I have learned is that disabled employees are sometimes expected to perform just as well as the abled ones. Perhaps at the onset when they were new their colleagues tend to be more understanding but over time their expectations increase. They begin to expect the disabled colleagues to be picking up new skills as fast as they can and when that is not forthcoming they become critical. The able employees may not know that the disabled colleagues of theirs spent many years just to learn some basic skills and are also not able to learn new ones as well or as fast. Such treatment tend to give rise to grievances.

In some societies, perception of the disabled community is more matured in a sense this special people are already accepted as different and therefore treated with better respect and preference without any qualm. In such environments the disabled are accorded respect and preferential treatment that do not give rise to complaints from the normal adults. Evolving societies are learning to change their mindset. This process may take many years.

Management may have decided to give special privileges to their disabled employees. However, the workers themselves may not be as enthusiastic or charitable in their hearts. Such conflicts take time to resolve. It is necessary for open dialogs between employers and employees to resolve any misunderstanding.

Disable employees and their families are naturally aggrieved by any mistreatment or prejudice at the workplaces. It require patience and public discourse to bring this matter to the forefront, debated and resolved.

Looking Forward

After the anniversary celebration we need to look seriously forward to bringing PBSNS to its rightful role in society. Certainly we cannot remain where we are now or else there is no reason to move out of the church to be a society.

I have several thoughts to take PBSNS to a better position:

1. We need our own base. Presently we are renting space from the church. I believe it is understandable for us to buy over the building so that we can expand upward and recruit more trainees. This will require another fund raising drive.

2. We wish to become a centre that help train others to run their own centres. After being under Malaysian Care's guidance we need to wean off that dependence and move beyond to be a trainer ourselves.

3. We need to bring quality training through jobs that give our trainees fair income. One such new work for consideration in future when space allows is a laundry service.

4. We have to develop a corporate sponsorship base to help us secure sustainable financial contributions to pay our expenses.

5. We need to project an image that invoke trust and confidence in our work. That will require a strong leadership and executive teams to translate plans into actions.

We welcome suggestions and offers to help PBSNS to realise its greater work in the coming years.

Uncles and Aunties

A growing child needs an environment of discipline, love and support. Parents are often the main source of interactions and upbringing to the child and he is molded by the values parents impart on him. Yet a family without relatives to help the child grow is handicapped to an extent because uncles and aunties who have vested interest in the child's growth also help him realize that there is another world beyond his father and mother. His growth is that much enriched when uncles and aunties visit and share goodies with him or bring him out to play or have some fun.

The Persatuan scenario may not be exactly like what I've just painted but similar. The committee members are the parents and the rest of the association's membership are the uncles and aunties. Today I went round collecting membership forms as well as giving out some. I have different reactions, some positive some hesitant. Overall we have identified many members to participate in our inaugural meeting. I pray that it will be a good meeting. No, change that to a great meeting.

The Leadership Burden

Ephesians 4: 14 - 16 read:

"Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work."

I felt the appropriateness of these verses as we approach the day of reckoning, the day when we elect the committee members to run the Persatuan. As the nominated chairman from the church, Wesley Methodist Church Seremban, I feel this burden of leadership. I look for near perfection in ideals but I am also practical to accept lesser performance because we are human. What is important for now is to have a good team, a caring and supportive team, with the right intentions and the team spirit to support and share the workload with the leader as they together go forward to put Persatuan on a high pedestal of doing good work for the learning disabled.

We are a body that needs to grow and be built up. For this my desire is that every part will do its work so that the body may be strong and healthy. I ask that members not fear working, only fear not being found to work when God calls.