Dining In The Dark

Dining In The Dark
On 11 September 2011, 20 students from the Events Management & Roadshow (EMRS) team and Business Service Centre (BSC) together with Mr Chong went to Singapore Association of the Visually Handicapped (SAVH) to experience the event called ‘Dining in the Dark’. It is a very meaningful event as participants got to know about the challenges that people with vision impairment face in their daily life. Students can get to mingle around with other stopover students during the dining session; they can also share their experience to others and raise awareness of blindness.
So did we enjoy eating in the pitch dark? It is definitely a memorable dinner for all the participants. Most of the students ended up using their hands to eat instead of using the culinary provided on the table. Worse still, one of the students even spilled a glass of orange juice onto his pants and table while attempting to take a sip. Another hilarious part is that my friend was puzzled why her tea still tasted bland after putting 4 packets of sugar in it, without realizing that the sugar didn’t even get into her cup at all, it was all over the tea plate instead.
When the lights came on after the meal, everyone immediately burst into laughter seeing the mess we had created. From this event, we get to experience one of the aspects that the visually impaired face in their daily activities. Through this valuable experience, students have learnt to be more empathetic and tolerance when we encounter a visually handicapped.
Here are some of the photos taken during the event day.

Briefing before the dining session.

SAVH Staff.

Instruction given by visually impaired waitress.

                                             
                                              Staff leading the participants to their dining room.

                                                          Lights were on after the meal.

Written by Zhuo Shiling
(EMRS team 1)
Year 2, Diploma in Accountancy & Finance

Walk for Rice @ Bedok Stadium

Introduction

Hey everyone! For the past few weeks, TEP EMRS Teams 2 and 3 have been working on an event called Walk for Rice 2011 @ South East District Council that took place on 2 October 2011 at Bedok Stadium. This is EMRS’s first ever external mega event! Let us just give you all a brief introduction on what the event is about. For every 100m the participants walked, a bowl of rice would be donated to the needy families. To add on to the fun, it was a three legged walk!

Pre-event
So what did we prepare for the participants?
 

Afraid that you will feel drained out after the walk? Fear not, for we have packed a total of 1200 goodie bags with 16 interesting items in each. The goodie bags were packed in a systematic manner in a time span of two days. Since the buns were perishable items, we had to place the buns in the goodie bags at a later date.

The organizers collected the goodie bags two days before the event itself and we assisted them in the loading and unloading process. Sounds like a chore to you? Not at all! We had lots of fun and laughter which bonded us together and made our packing process smooth and successful!

In order to generate awareness for this event, we promoted this event by means of social media such as Facebook and a website specially designed by our DBI (Diploma in Business Informatics) students! In addition, we also set up a booth outside the shopping arcade to encourage students’ participation. Ready to move on to find out more about what happened at the event?

Event Itself

And then came the day that we have been waiting for! All the EMRS teams went down to assist in the event. Our roles include crowd control assistants, car park helpers, minders, registration counter helpers, message counter helpers, photographer, ushers, stage manager and runner. Our minders Wei Yang and Julian were in charge of assisting the GOH Mr Lee Yi Shyan, Minister of State, Ministry of Trade and Industry & Ministry of National Development and Mr Seah Kian Peng respectively. They also participated in the three - legged walk with both the guests. Our task was also to ensure the safety of all participants.

Even though it drizzled minutes before the event started, we braved through the rain! The participants don their ponchos and continued having fun! They took part in the warm-up exercise before the walk and were still enthusiastic despite the gloomy weather. The event turned out to be a success with more than 700 participants. A total of 2800 bowls of rice was donated to the needy families in the South East district!

Post event

Our last task was to packed 1800 goodies bags for the contests and road shows that will be held in November by the South East district council.

In conclusion, the Walk for Rice event has been an eye opener for both teams 2 and 3. It has provided us with insights on how to organize a mega event. We have forged genuine friendship towards the end of our EMRS journey. Thanks to all of our supervisors for their never ending support!