Project Dignity

15th Oct

Today I had a meeting with a church for the hearing impaired. The pastor is deaf and so is his congregation. They have services over the weekend. Over the last few months I started to learn some of the sign languages and interestingly I learn that like our verbal languages, there are also different form of sign languages. Just take a song like Merry Christmas and if you youtube the song you will find that there are different way of "signing" the lyrics. At the end of the day I learn the basic alphabet A - Z.

The purpose of my meeting was to recruit hearing impaired to long at the opportunity for training to be hawkers. The conclusion is that the hearing impaired like any normal person needs to be convinced that a food stall operator is just another opportunity for them. I know some of them like the idea but to move out of their comfort zone need some effort.

Today we also started our first class - "Legal requirment - the hawker and peddler act" and no kidding this is the actual title. Surprisingly the students find this interesting and we also have a good lecturer. There was also join by the other food stall operator who just want to learn. Irregardless of your social or educational status, people are all the same.... they want to learn. There was just no opportunity for someone to open the door and invite them. In the course of the following weeks we will be conducting classes on a daily basis. The idea is to take management concept of MBA curriculum and decipher to the level of the food stall operator. Topic in marketing like the 5 P's do have relevance to the food stall operators. The task is to find someone who has that knowledge, work on the course material and then able to explain the management concept in a hawker language........

In the course of our lifetime, we collect our O level certificate, our A level certificate then the various diploma and degrees and in due course the paper either faded or get eaten up by worms. The knowledge however that comes with the paper qualification stays inside somewhere in our "hard disc" space up on our head. When we die, so the knowledge dies with it..... unless we share the knowledge.