Jolene, Li Juan, Zhengquan and I made our way leisurely to uncle Choo’s flat from Woodlands MRT station, walking for about 10 minutes, lead by Li Juan. There was a sense of anticipation in me as it is my first time visiting him, and it is long time since we have a patient living in an unit bigger than the one-room flat.

My first impression of uncle Choo is that he is very polite. He asked us to excuse him for being topless and wanted to put on clothes when he saw us. I also noticed his raspy voice. I think it is due to the operation he has undergone. Uncle was cooking beehoon for breakfast when we arrived.

Uncle Choo’s place is bright, spacious and clean. It is very manageable in terms of housework, other than a few seriously blackened pots and pans. We were all pretty experienced and we got down to work automatically. I tackled the toilet; Li Juan the floor with broom and mop, and then the kitchen tables; Quange touching everything else with his rag and also washed the showering room. Jolene had a conversation with uncle to know him better.

We were joined by our super experienced volunteer James a while later. He lives nearby and has returned to settle the rest of the pots and pans which he did not clean 3 weeks ago. While we were busy with the chores, uncle rested in his room, and also went down stairs to get some drinks for us.

I did not talk much to uncle. James and Jolene did. Uncle is not the talkative kind who will ramble on and on (like Lavender and Balestier patients), but he responded well to our questions. He probably knew that he has a terminal illness as a doctor told him his illness is incurable. Uncle treated us to 100 plus and Pepsi which we accepted out of courtesy. Towards the end of our visit, Quange, Jolene and I relaxed ourselves in the living room chatting (about drama, acting, Quange going to Bejing, etc) while James and Li Juan continued to clean the kitchen/wash the utensils while chatting.

We left uncle’s house in good shape and bidded the smiling uncle farewell.

Remember to catch Quange acting in the 151th or 152th episode of Xiang Wo Ni de Shou!!!!!

Yo!

This week we are going to Marsiling Bedok, Lavendar and Jurong East Balestier…

Marsiling Bedok: Li Juan, Hsiao Yan, Limin, Sze Yin, Marcus (5)

Lavendar: Jolee, Li Ping, Jun Yi, Keith, Elvina (5)

Jurong East: Balestier: Jian Cheng, Tai Qin , Toh Ann, Tiew Hock (4)

This was our first visit to Marsiling’s Uncle house. Hong Yu, Long Qiang, Li Juan, James, Jian Cheng, Sheng Di and I met up at Uncle’s void deck prior to the visit. Max from HCA was there to help us out, too. He briefed us on Uncle’s case.

We then went up to Uncle’s house with Max. The house was quite dusty, probably because of Uncle’s condition, so he was not able to clean up his house thoroughly and regularly. My impression of Uncle is that he is quite friendly.

We wasted no time in getting started to clean up; washing the toilet, sweeping and mopping the floor, and cleaning the kitchen. Initially, Uncle offered to help us. However, we told him to have a good rest and let us do the job. I could see that Uncle was quite grateful and he even went downstairs to buy drinks for us. =)

The volunteers worked very hard on that day. By the end of the visit, the house was considerably cleaner and tidier than before!

We then bid farewell with Uncle and left his house.

We did not really had much time to know more about Uncle because we were busy cleaning up and Uncle went to rest during the latter part of the visit. But I’m sure in subsequent visits we will get to interact more with Uncle. =)

Jiang Tao, Hao Xing, Hong Yu, Sze Yin and I visited a new patient in Jurong East last saturday. She had an eye which couldn’t see well and of really skinny limbs. Although she is really sick, she, to me, looks quite optimistic as she welcomed us with a smiling face and was smiling all the time.

Oh ya, almost forgotten! Max and Sandra were there too. As she was a new patient, we were being briefed a little by Max before starting our routine. As for Sandra, her time was tight because she was very busy with her lab work. Though busy, she still spared some time to chat with the patient before she left us with the housework.

The patient ’s house was in a satisfactory condition. Almost everything in the house was quite clean except for the windows in the kitchen which were very oily and the floor which was very dusty. Max was responsible for the main toilet in the kitchen, Sze Yin and I cleaned the windows in each room and the toilet in the patient’s room, Jiang Tao and Hao Xing were in- charged of the windows in the kitchen and Hong Yu dealt with the windows in the hall, the vacuum cleaning and mopping.

The patient has a very cute son who is currently in set 1. He is a young teen with well manners. He was doing his homework while we were busy doing the chores. After cleaning his room’s windows, the busy him did not forget to thank me for helping him out.

We went to the living room and accompanied the patient to watch a drama after the physical work. She was a joyous lady who kept on entertaining us with jokes instead of us entertaining her. She even reminded the ladies to apply moisturizers at night so to maintain the smoothness of our skin. Haha…. She is indeed funny and somehow very particular of people’s appearance. Actually, in fact, she is a pretty lady. Just that she is ill now, or else, she would have been prettier.

Well, I hope that everything will go well with this patient. May GOD bless her and her son. Wish that she will be able to recover soon and live a happier life.