Foster Flagship Training Program has a range of enlightening and interesting projects for its students directed at enhancing their leadership and professional skills while invoking commitment for serving the society as well. As a leader, your first duty is to the people, and if you don’t understand the people around you down to the very fundamental level, you cannot lead them successfully.
In one such project called Clothes Banking, Foster had teamed up with Akhuwat Foundation. The project required teams comprising three or four people to go door-to-door in an area of their choice to collect clothes as donations from the inhabitants. Following collection, the clothes were then to be transferred to Akhuwat’s clothes bank office. Akhuwat’s dedicated team that constitutes transgenders then sorted, washed, mended and packed these clothes that were then distributed among the underprivileged after careful analysis and evaluation.
Even though it sounds simple, the project turned out to be one of the hardest. It offered an opportunity to see the real variety of people and their perspectives that instill versatility in the society, for better or worse. Through the course of the project, we were fortunate enough to receive a positive response for the most part. People were polite and appreciated the social cause behind the project. I had honestly expected more backlash, but the project went surprisingly well. Even in rejection, we received kind and warm words.
What I found oddly satisfying was the realization of how drastically has the use of plastic bags gone down. If I’m being honest, we weren’t prepared for it. We didn’t take our bags along as it was beyond our expectations. While we managed to improvise, it was a matter of pride for me to see such a constructive change that is starting to stretch in our country.
I’m sincerely thankful to the company of the three groupmates who added the element of fun to the project and made the experience more memorable for me. Quite early in our journey, we were stopped by an elderly man on the street. While he started with the phrase “Please don’t mind…”, just a few moments later, he had completely forgotten his own advice, went totally off track, and continued to yell at us for a good few minutes. Amidst all the yelling, we were barely able to keep our laughter in.
What I loved the most about this project is how it never pushed me into boredom. To add to it was an opportunity to meet and interact with amusing kids and pet really cute cats. All fun aside, however, the social cause that drove the project never escaped our minds and we completed our task earnestly. We concluded the project with the confidence that the clothes will reach their purposed destinations and will prove to be useful for someone in need.
Kindness is seldom wasted and always comes around. After my own experience, I would strongly recommend everyone to indulge in similar activities of charity, as often as you can, without the thought of how big or small it is that you are donating. At the end of the day, you never know, your smallest act of kindness may just change someone’s life, and that someone, may just turn out to be yourself.
