Coinciding with Thingyan, the Burmese new year, TWC2 organised an event at East Coast Park to boost our connection with the Burmese migrant worker community. In planning this event, we partnered with one of the trusted members of their community, social media influencer Ma Htet Htet, who was very helpful in promoting the event and advising on what would be culturally suitable or popular.
Looking at how happy the participants were, it was a great success. However, there is a serious purpose to such outreach events beyond having a good time. Outreach programmes build rapport, ensuring not only that more in the community know about TWC2 and the help we can provide, but also create a casual familiarity that makes it easy for workers to approach us whenever needed.
We organised three buses from downtown Singapore to the event location. En route, our volunteers gave talks (inside the buses) introducing TWC2’s role and the available assistance. These workers may not have serious problems today but if, in the months ahead, they hear of friends with difficulties, they can point them to TWC2.
Even in the lead-up to the event, when we advertised it on TWC2’s Burmese Facebook page – it was also advertised by Ma Htet Htet – we saw a spike in the number clicking to follow our page. A growing following improves the effectiveness of any worker education we do through social media, informing them of their rights and available avenues of redress.
Here are some pictures of the event (thanks, photo volunteers Wee Teck and Matteo, and video volunteers Rahul and Peter!):
The TWC2 team get the festivities going
As our photos show, there were Thingyan music, dancing and games that included TWC2 trivia. Prizes involved small amounts of cash, 15 spots for a rollerblading class at Ernsports, and 2 basic computer courses sponsored by the Professional Development Centre in Peninsula Plaza.
Of course, there was food. TWC2 organised lunch, but Htet Htet and her volunteers also arranged for food and snack donations.
Ma Htet Htet’s volunteers were not only resourceful in organising extra donations of food and snacks, they were highly inventive, “building” their food stand out of paper tubes
A lot of water was involved. It has a cultural significance at Thingyan, representing the washing away of the previous year’s bad luck, and renewal and purification for the year ahead. Various props were provided by TWC2, and our muscly volunteers from our OFWS affiliate group did the heavy lifting of filling the kiddie pools with water.
Getting ready for the final part of the event: the “water wars”
South Asian volunteers from affiliate group OFWS came early to the park to help inflate the kiddie pools and fill up with water.
We had a total of about 100 migrant workers (three busloads). Helping to coordinate the event were TWC2 volunteers, both direct volunteers as well as members of our Burmese network and OFWS affiliates, twelve volunteers from the NTU Myanmar Community, as well as Ma Htet Htet and her friends. Among all these volunteers, there were plenty of Burmese speakers at the event, enabling us to conduct the whole thing in Burmese (including the talks on the buses) which made the event all the more accessible and enjoyable to participants.
Thanks to everyone who made this event a success.