Report at a Special Elderly Nursing Home for Aged

Hello, I’m a member of the head office. I have been to a special nursing home for aged, “ Sendan-no-Sato” as a volunteer team since this Tuesday for four days.

This time we went there in a smaller group including some from the head office, since few students applied for this activity.

You may think there are no relation between this volunteer activity and the Great East Japan Earthquake. However, a lot of elderly people were shocked by this disaster. Not only people living in coast side damaged by the tsunami, but also people living in urban side were shocked. We heard that it is good stimulation for them to communicate, for example talking or playing games, with young people like us. So we decided to do this activity.

As we talk with elderly users there, I felt they became to speak more from themselves. It was such a good change that made me feel it was an amazing experience.

I’d like to bring in some of our activities:

Chatting with the users.

We spent most of the time talking with the users. They told us many stories, and some of them were quite educational. We had such a good time laughing and singing with them. They even surprised us with asking us “Please sing some song.” We sand “Mito-Koumon” all together when I sang “Mito-Koumonn” and “I am a Thousand Winds.” We couldn’t finish singing “I am a Thousand Winds” because we couldn’t remember the words.

Helping staffs there

We helped out washing the dishes, tray service, cleaning, and so on. We made an effort as much as we could, by using our experiences.

Walking

We went for a walk with the users. One of the users I walked together was good at drawing pictures. I looked at his sketchbook, and it was so wonderful. I decided to bring a sketchbook from next trip.

Helping Recreation

We helped some playing such as ball-basket and ring toss. When I was holding a basket and receiving balls, some users hit me with balls toward me.

Helping Cafeteria

We helped out a cafeteria in the nursing home. It was very interesting to meet with members of other part. They teased us a lot.

We had such a good experience that we wouldn’t able to have in universities through this visit. I sincerely felt it was very important for volunteer activity to have social relationship. There are something we can do each other, both provider and receiver. We believe we did give them smiles and also, users and staffs told us so many things important as a human.

There are a lot of elderly households in Tohoku district. Some of them can’t go to facilities like this, isolated from society even in evacuation center. If you know anybody under such circumstance near you, please go and see them and their condition. Please communicate with them even a little, and be happy each other.

You can learn a lot through volunteer activities. We realized this from this visit. When you do volunteer activities, please bring something back.

I would like to close by saying “Thank you” to the staffs of “Sendan-no-Sato”, and the users there. We are looking forward to seeing you again.