The work for the fashion show

The 27th of April, 2009 was Grade 10’s first Fashion Show Day in the GCA. It was from 6:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. However, in fact, the more time and more effort were used to prepare this concert. I, as a student of GCA, took part of the volunteer work for the Fashion Show.

Before this chance, I had the volunteer activity in the Nanjing Library. At that time, I worked in the outside of the school, so I tried finding the volunteer work at this time. Grace, who is one of the members of the students’ council, and my classmate, introduced the volunteer work for the Fashion Show. Many people – in fact, only some people, I will tell you the reason - wanted to join in the activity, and many of them were accepted. (I guessed the work would be easy because so many people join.)

There were two parts of the volunteer work. The first one had a greater deal of weight. It was before and after the show. It was to carry the chairs – for audience – and desks – to block the too wide entrance to keep people from coming to watch the show without the ticket. Oh my god, we, all volunteers and some students’ council members, moved all of desks and chairs on the first floor and some on the second floor for over 2 hours. It was a huge effort. Two of three classrooms on the first floor were empty. However, after the show finished, we only spend half an hour moving them. I do not know how we could do that. The second part was to stand sentry in the path which was not the official entrance of the show. It was a boring one. I just sat on the chair during one and half an hour of the Fashion Show like I did last time, and there were only about two people try going through that path.
Just like the volunteer work in the Nanjing Library, it did not need many much abilities. Moving chairs and desks also can be considered as a kind of simple labor, and standing sentry can be, too. It just required some physical strength and a little power of concentration. This experience taught me almost nothing. I just felt I was ordered to do something.

Then, I found many other students were not honest. Most of “volunteers” did not come nor work, so there were only five volunteers working really at last, including me. Maybe they thought that not doing the real work and getting the certification to make portfolio were okay. I hate this kind of altitude. I have undergone this kind of happenings and felt unfair. Fortunately – unfortunately to “someone”, the member of students’ council checked our names after the work, and only we, five volunteers who really worked, got the certifications. I think it was retribution.
I hope I can find some new, skillful volunteer work next time. Then, I can learn more things.

My first volunteer activity out of my school

Last weekends, I found and had my first volunteer work which did not take place at the school. It was in the largest library in Nanjing - Nanjing Library. Nanjing Library is the third largest library in China. The forerunner of the library was Jiangnan (江南) Library which was established in 1907. It makes a collection of over eight millions of documents. Nanjing Library includes four parts. They are original hall, new hall, historical documents hall and so on. Among these parts, the most famous place is the new hall, and I worked there, too.

I was worked on January 24th and 25th. On every day, I worked from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., but in fact, I just worked for 7.5 hours on each day because I should have lunch.In the morning of the first day, I worked in the Chinese newspaper reading room (中文报纸阅览室; own translation). The main work in this room was to arrange newspapers of that day and cabinets where to put newspapers and to keep a watchful eye on people who entered the room. They required few skills. In the afternoon, I was taken to the room on the under base second floor where to store overdue newspapers in the past and helped managers sort newspapers.
On the second day, I worked in the Chinese books lending-reading room (中文图书借阅室；own translation). In these hours, I just sat on the chair next to the entrance of the room, and watched people and helped them come in or made them take notice of their things – they should not bring bags, water or drinks.
For myself, I do not like this volunteer work very much. Firstly, it was boring. When I called Nanjing Library, I imagined some high work, for example, classifying some documents and books. Of course, the volunteer work is a steady and insipid job, but I could not endure to sit on a chair for not a few hours. Secondly, this activity just required little concentration and common physical strength. I want to call it a kind of simple labor. Thirdly, I could not study anything from this experience. My first aim was to go through this work – classifying documents, or arranging books in Nanjing Library - to study the effective way and the importance of arrangement and the system of a large-scale group. However, these kinds of work could not afford me satisfaction. There is almost no connection between my volunteer experiences in Nanjing Library and employability / life skills.
During this activity, the benefit to me and the result which I got were very little. I learned almost nothing and I do not have any feeling that I did some worthwhile things. Then, I also think the benefit to Nanjing Library was not much, too – one person who moved the newspaper and sat on the chair was slight. I just hope I can have more meaningful and useful experience, not like this one.