Here's a heartwarming story of a foreign worker who donated $10 from his meagre salary just to help stray dogs. How many of us are willing to do the same?
Rajendran, an Indian worker made my remaining day smiling non-stop. It was a very heartwarming evening.
Last week while I was doing my stray feeding on the island, I was preparing the kibbles in the feeding bowls for about 8-10 dogs at a feeding spot. An Indian worker who was working just outside the feeding spot saw me & asked me many questions: ‘U feed all the dogs around here ? ‘The food you buy ?’, ‘Food expensive ?’, ‘Everyday feed the dogs?’.
While I was preparing the food I patiently answered all his questions concurrently. ‘Yes we feed the dogs here’, ‘Yes the food quite expensive because we need many many foods because got many many dogs at other areas’, ‘No I don’t have $$$ to buy the food everyday to feed the dogs, all these dog foods are donated by kind people, strangers, sometimes donation not enough we have to buy then we need to ‘beg’ (I used the word ‘beg’ coz I don’t think he understand the word ‘appeal’) people to donate $$$ for us to buy the dog food’. ‘Yes we everyday feed the dogs’.
And the last question he asked was, ‘Can I donate ?’. I replied of coz you can donate brother. I thought he wanna donate his dinner pack. But instead, he went to his locker & took out a piece of $10 & passed to me. I was dumb folded for a split second. For a foreign Indian construction worker who earns that little, he forked out $10 to donate to our shelter. $10 is a lot for labour workers like him but he’s willing to part his $10 to contribute to help our shelter dogs.
Today I just met him again & we waved to each other fr afar & I stopped by to chat a while with him. He said ‘Come feed dogs again ah ?’. ‘Yup’ I said. And then he told me, ‘Sorry today I don’t have $10 with me, I cannot donate, sorry’. The rest of the story I think you guys will know what i said to him. His name is Rajendran, my idol.
Is not the amount that matters, is depending on your financial status how sincere you are when come to part with your $$$ for charity purposes. One who earns $10K per mth donates $50 & One who earns $1200 donates $10. Do the comparison.
Do not belittle & look down on all foreign workers. Yes I agree many Singaporean think is not safe especially when there are many foreign labourers fr India or the Bangladesh. Yes I agree not all are good & kind & feel safe. But isn’t it the same as we Singaporean ourselves? Not all Singaporean are good people & safe to hang around with too.
Credits to Veronica Goh for the story
