Iskandar Saim (centre) and fellow volunteers make their storytelling sessions fun for the young patients at Hospital Kuala Lumpur.

Sime Darby’s volunteer programmes create a win-win situation for all parties involved.

THERE were tears in Iskandar Saim’s eyes when he talked about a young patient whom he had grown fond of, at Hospital Kuala Lumpur.

“This boy, a victim of Japanese encephalitis, has been reduced to a near-vegetative state. His mobility is limited to eye movements and facial expressions. His parents live in another state and they do not have the means to come and visit him every day, so he has been placed under the guardianship of the hospital. He was about 11 when he came in, and he has been at the hospital for the past three years,” said Iskandar, 44.

“I sat down and read him a story one day, and at the end of it, he smiled! I can’t tell you how much that smile meant to me. It was a humbling experience. Here is someone who can do so little, yet he mustered every bit of strength to show his appreciation with a smile.”

“This boy is such a gem,” added Iskandar’s colleague, Nadiah Hanim Abdul Latif, 33. “He has probably heard the same story many times but he is thankful that there are volunteers who care enough to sit by his side and spend time with him.”

Iskandar and Nadiah were told that the boy was just like any other active kid before he was stricken with Japanese encephalitis, a viral brain infection which resulted in brain damage.

Iskandar also recalled another patient he had met at a dialysis centre. “The young boy was undergoing dialysis. We read a story to him, to try and provide some form of distraction from an uncomfortable situation. He was so engrossed with the stories that he forgot himself, and asked at the end of the treatment, ‘Eh, dah habis?’ (Is it over?)”

Iskandar is one of the most active participants in the Sime Darby Volunteers Programme (SDVP). He is fully committed to ROAR (Reach Out and Read), a volunteering initiative under SDVP.

“We have a team that makes reading fun for children. We prepare our own props for the storytelling sessions,” said Iskandar, who heads the Talent, Organisation Development and Performance unit at Sime Darby Industrial.

Iskandar’s signature story is the classic Monyet Dan Kura-Kura (The Monkey And The Tortoise).

“I love working with children. Work can be stressful at times. Spending time with children takes the stress out of life,” said Iskandar. “We may think we’re helping the kids, but I think it’s more like they’re helping me! These children enable me to develop more patience and appreciate things that I would otherwise have taken for granted. It is good for personal growth.”

“Some of the projects under SDVP really hit close to home,” said Nadiah, head of corporate social responsibility at Sime Darby Bhd.

In February 2012, SDVP launched Project Rhizo, one of its biggest initiatives. The mangrove reforestation project is a joint effort with Majlis Perbandaran Port Dickson (MPPD) and Jabatan Perhutanan Negeri Sembilan to restore Port Dickson’s coastline. On that big day, 436 SDVP volunteers got together to plant 5,000 mangrove trees along Jalan Seremban in Port Dickson. The project was completed in less than five hours.

‘Our volunteer programmes serve as a channel for employees to express themselves through noble causes,’ says Nadiah Hanim, head of CSR in Sime Darby Bhd.

“We are trying to rehabilitate the environment with this project. Rapid development had caused massive soil erosion in the area, and mangrove trees can help to check that,” said Nadiah.

“I fell down a couple of times,” said Sunitha Naidu, 38, one of the participants of Project Rhizo. “We had to take advantage of the low tide in the morning, and got to work right away. For my team, we formed a production line: one volunteer dug a hole, another put in a tree, and the next person finished it off by filling up the hole.

“The best thing about SDVP is that there is follow-up for every project. We get to go back to the site and continue to offer help,” said Sunitha, an executive in customer relationship management at Sime Darby Property.

Employees are encouraged to come up with their own proposals for projects. Nurfasihah Abdol Rahim, 28, an executive at Sime Darby Bhd, mooted the idea of helping out a small community of orang asli in Gombak, Selangor.

The project, dubbed Lighting Your World, aims to improve the livelihood of the Temuans living in Kampung Sungai Relang. So one bright sunny Saturday, a group of 26 SDVP volunteers arrived at the village to check it out.

“We found that there were 10 families living in seven houses here. Between them, there are 10 kids between the ages of four and 10. The children do not attend school because they do not have any form of transportation,” said Nurfasihah.

“We got the kids together to do some colouring. Most of the children do not even know how to hold a colour pencil. We hope to introduce basic reading skills through our volunteer work,” said Nurfasihah, who expressed her concern over the children’s literacy level.

Nadiah explained that Lighting Your World, an ongoing project, is expected to run until September.

“We’re looking into providing a reliable source of electricity through the installation of a micro-hydropower system. As it is, they only have electricity until 8pm,” said Nadiah.

‘The learning experience is invaluable,’ says Iskandar Saim, an active participant of Sime Darby Volunteers Programme.

Lighting Your World is a collaborative effort with International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM).

Ultimately, Nurfasihah hopes the orang asli community will see the project as a platform for them to voice their concern.

“We want to be a channel for this orang asli community to improve their livelihood. We’re starting with realistic goals and we hope to achieve more in the coming months,” said Nurfasihah, a former IIUM student.

SDVP is also working with non-profit organisation Malaysian Dogs Deserve Better (MDDB) to seek treatment for some of the tracker dogs kept by the orang asli.

“We found that some of the dogs were in need of urgent medical attention. One of the dogs had a gangrenous leg,” said Nadiah.

Sime Darby’s commitment to its volunteer programmes and the employees’ enthusiastic responses work for the good of all.

Iskandar echoes the sentiments of his colleagues when he said: “At the end of an event, I always ask, what’s next? I like how the CSR department keeps coming up with new ideas to keep us engaged.

“The learning experience is invaluable. Prior to volunteering, I used to think everything had to go according to plan. With SDVP, I’ve learnt to expect the unexpected. If things do not go according to plan, it’s okay. You’ll eventually get to your goal through a different path.”

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