All for Edhi
Help others to be helped. These mere words sum the whole life of Edhi Sb. When it comes to hospitality and conviviality, Edhi Sb was the greatest host. He was sedulous at his work, providing food to the starving, home to the homeless, hope to the hopeless, and help to the helpless. He was society’s paradigm.
Edhi is neither a person nor an organization but a thought; a good one, a different one.
Yes, you can be Edhi, we all can be Edhi. All we have to do is to bring a smile to someone’s face, fill someone’s empty stomach, help someone out in the hours of need. To achieve this milestone, we seek out help from the other Edhis.
After last week’s learnings and reflections, we decided to target several personals, organizations, and business entities in the second and final week of the Edhi Fundraising campaign that we were made a part of at Amal Academy.
Many of them helped and many rejected, but we learned that it was not about the donations, it was more about the awareness, the conversation that we needed to start around ourselves; one that pushes people to be more, do more for others.
Another thing that we learned through the activity was patience. Last week, we placed these money boxes at the entrance of two schools, and throughout this week, we could not wait to go back and find out if people had donated. But, we learned through the process that we have to let people and processes take their time. So, after a week full of waiting, Hamza went to the schools and brought back these moneyboxes, opening them brought back that childhood giddiness, and well people did not disappoint us.
Similarly, Afeen brought moneyboxes to two of the famous bakeries in her city; let us see what she has to say about the experience.
I personally went to these two shops along with my father and asked for donations by telling them all the details related to the task. At first, they seemed unconvinced, so I showed them the letter that was provided by Amal for authenticity. After that, the shop owner, workers, and customers started giving me money in the form of cash. I sat in both shops for half an hour almost and collected funds in two boxes that I was carrying along with me. I placed one box in the first shop and another in the second shop. I requested the workers of both bakeries to convey the message to everyone who was coming to visit their stores. In addition to that, I wrote the message on a piece of paper in the Urdu language for better understanding and pasted it on the box. It was done at home before stepping out to avoid inconvenience. Then, I left those boxes at the shops for one day. The next day, I went again to both shops and collected the boxes. To be honest, I was expecting more money but at least the shops that I approached didn’t refuse to help.
No doubt, it was tough as I noticed that people were not ready to give money despite showing them the proof letter. Most people said that they have already contributed to “The Edhi Foundation”. Some said I should have approached earlier as they usually donate at the start of Ramadan. Another biggest challenge was to make people listen to you at least. Because of Covid, lockdown, intense heat, and Ramadan, people were very much angry and didn’t bother to listen to me. But I showed them the boxes with the display message so they got an idea of what I was about to say and then they gave me their time which I was really thankful for.
The other group members also experienced something similar to Hamza and Afeen, however, due to Covid’s higher rate in the main cities, fellows from Islamabad, Rawalpindi, and Peshawar did not step out, and focused on reaching out to businesses online. Mahnoor reached out to two online businesses that she had had a good experience with, one of them responded warmly and donated, while the second business did not respond. The experiences of the other group members were not much satisfactory, they also faced rejections from many, but those few who did donate left them feeling glad and rewarded.
All in all, comparing the two week’s performances, collectively the circle collected less amount in week 2 than week 1, but that is understandable since this time around the fellows contacted organizations and persons who did not know them.
In conclusion, the experience of fundraising was very unique and enlightening. It was a reminder of how blessed we are to be able to help anyone. We often forget to count our blessings and end up complaining, but times like these make us realize the worth of things. We have n vowed to always pay attention to the people who need our help as well as all the donation requests that we get from other people. It was indeed a very noble act of Amal Academy to include us in these activities, something we are going to remember throughout our lives.
