My takeaway: information on an upcoming event in Seoul.

From Agent L (a pseudonym): “This conference will explore housing policies and the situation of homeless people and migrant-workers in Japan, Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan. It features multiple site visits and local engagement.”

East Asian Inclusive City Network, 14th Conference. https://www.iiud.org/ea-icn-14th

Today a couple of church-employees showed us around a church-carpark that has been re-purposed as an overnight shelter for our homeless friends.

However these stayers – the church-employees avoid calling them “clients” – are, more often than not, emotionally damaged people, who behave in (ahem) unconventional ways, to put it mildly. Sad but true.

My takeaway is a quote: “It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken people.”

I would like to repeat the church-employees' request: “If you own a building and would like to donate it, please let us know! cheeky giggle. And we would like to invite other churches to open up their physical space for rough sleepers. Sadly many church leaders have resisted the idea.”

https://yckc.org.sg/sheltering-the-homeless-at-yck-chapel/

In the twinkling of an eye, I have been a volunteer at Homeless Hearts of Singapore, for about 2.5 years.

Part of the ethos I have picked up:

“Homelessness is not a problem to be solved, but people to be loved.”

“Homelessness is not a lack of housing, it is a breakdown in relationships.” (eg. divorce, and the loss of the matrimonial house).

“Homelessness is not solved by providing houses alone.” (eg. a newly-built dormitory can still feel like a suffocating cage for a so-called “rough sleeper”.)

“The truest measure lies not in our provisions to those in the margins, but in our sense of kinship with them.” (Source: Gregory Boyle, a priest who is quoting a Buddhist nun, in the book titled: “Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion”.)

I would highlight that loneliness is an adjacent or overlapping phenomenon with regards to homelessness. Academic researchers have identified a “loneliness epidemic”: a concern of public health, which harms the suffering individual in the equivalent measure of smoking 15 cigarettes a day. (this statistical figure was passed to me by word of mouth; I have not yet verified its accuracy).

Due to limits on time, I end with a gentle call to awaken us from our collective forgetfulness. We can transcend the path of anxiety and sorrow. How blessed we are to live with access to the teachers' wisdom: Thich Nhat Hanh, Thubten Chodron, Tara Brach, the 14th Dalai Lama, Maia Duerr, and Pope Francis (just to name a few).

parting shot

As Marcus Aurelius wrote (pardon the awkward translation from Greek language to English): “To her who gives and takes back all, to nature, the man who is instructed and modest says: Give what thou wilt; take back what thou wilt. And he says this not proudly, but obediently and well pleased with her.” (Meditations 10.14)

And, from the same Marcus Aurelius:

“No longer talk about the kind of man that a good man ought to be, but be such.” (Meditations 10.16)

#HomelessAdvocate

I have been learning a lot, through such communities, over the past few days.

But, as an eccentric-yet-wise elder said, “I learnt a lot. But by the time I learnt a lot, I am dying. So I wrote a book to pass on what I have learnt.”

This is by way of passing it on.

P. S. I am grateful for no Covid lock-down today. shivers at the thought.

music

The young pianists – twenty-somethings, they looked like – were performing on either a Steinway or a Fazioli: grand pianos. Bach, and Liszt, and Mozart seemed to be popular choices. One of the pianists even nourished the audience with her own composition, a piece for a small ensemble: 1 harp, 2 cellos, 2 double basses, 1 percussion (drums), 1 horn, 1 flute, 1 clarinet.

That pianist-composer thanked God for holding her hand while walking through difficult times. She shared that her hands had suffered an injury while preparing for a performance.

The audience numbered about twenty to forty, and ranged in ages from very young, to elderly.

The following Venn diagram highlights some of my experiences.

biodiversity

We were talking about how your surroundings affect the way you behave around other humans. It makes a difference whether you are facing a wall of skyscraper buildings, or a forest of 200-year trees.

A young gentleman, Nasry, said that the most knowledgeable researchers of tropical trees are located far away from said tropical trees. He hopes to visit the U.K. to learn from one such researcher.

social work

In the segment of society known as hearing-impaired – who affectionately call themselves “deafies” – a tea-selling shop employs only deaf people. I saw that deaf people can and do throw tantrums while on-the-job. It takes a certain kind of manager to work alongside them.

In the segment of society known as rough sleepers – a student dormitory has become a temporary residence for such people who have been sleeping “in the streets”.

A anonymous gentleman donated SGD$200 for the food-and-drinks of a dinner. (Above-pictured). The goal? Community-building: so that the ex-homeless feel less isolated in their new residence.

“Homelessness is not solved by providing housing. There is the next step of integrating the individual into a larger community, according to the individual's specific personality and make-up. There is no one-size-fits all approach.”

)

#PlagueDiary #HomelessAdvocate

I first started volunteering with Homeless Hearts of Singapore (HHOS, for short), in late 2022. I had read an article in Channel NewsAsia, about this organisation. I looked up their website, and filled in a registration form, and then received a call from Derek shortly.

I'm a barista by profession – in my job, I am expected not only to brew coffee for customers, but also provide some kind of listening ear. The conversational skills that I learnt, on the job, would help to prepare me to meet our homeless friends.

Over the past two years, I have been to various outreaches – in the areas of Chinatown, Paya Lebar, Yishun, Jurong East, Aljunied, Changi Airport... the list goes on. Who are the volunteers that I meet?

There are undergraduates and retirees. Some are visitors from overseas, who depart from Singapore after a time. Everyone has a different reason for showing up at an outreach.

Walking alongside them on the streets of Singapore at night, I realise: I am spending time with complete strangers. Perhaps city life has alienated us from each other so much that a volunteering activity becomes a rare opportunity to embark on a shared adventure with someone who exists outside of our usual social circles.

And, of course, there are our homeless friends. (Derek told me, very early on: “this is how we refer to them: not homeless people, but our homeless friends”). Not a few are divorcees, whose shared house had gone to their ex-wives. There are middle-aged men, but also young men too. They are mostly male – though I have met a handful of female homeless friends. Again, among the females, there is a mix of ages: some are middle-aged, others are young (my guess would be twenty-something).

I still remember one Uncle who sleeps under a fly-over. (I shall not reveal his location for privacy reasons). He said he struggles to find enough money to afford one plate of cai fan (loosely translated as economical rice), every day. Three Singaporean dollars, for one meal a day – that is a stretch for his budget. My mind was flooded with questions when I first met him: Where does he go to, when he has to use a toilet? Isn't he scared of some thief in the night, when he sleeps in such a obscure area – or cockroaches or stray dogs, for that matter? His words still haunt me: “I want a house. When can I get a house?”

Then there is another Uncle who had spent most of his life-time sailing all over the world. His job had been to repair engines on boats. He had visited Thailand, Europe, and probably more countries than I would ever see in my life-time. When asked why he didn't remain overseas – he sighed and struggled to form the words – we, a rag-tag team of volunteers, didn't press the matter further. Again, his words echo through time and space: “I want a house. I can't stand the way that the passers-by look at me.”

Clearly, this is not just my story alone. “Homelessness is a complex, interlocking issue,” a keynote speaker said at a conference recently (titled: Homelessness Learning Forum, held in a compound known as Kampong Siglap. It had been the 10th day of October, World Homelessness Day). “Homelessness is not solved by providing houses. Homeless people who have received a house – they report that their house is a soul-less place.”

I wonder to myself: what can really warm someone's heart? Is it money, material possessions, fine clothes, or a fancy job title? I am reminded of F. Scott Fitzgerald – renowned author of the semi-autobiographical novel, “The Great Gatsby” – who seemed disappointed and weary, even when he was surrounded by all of those.

I think of Derek, our volunteer leader, who always says: “our homeless friends are not a problem to be solved. They are people to be loved.”

Yes, no matter the time and place, all human beings, everywhere, desire to feel loved and valued. They respond positively when others treat them with dignity – and hit back when their dignity is violated.

Dignity – something money may not necessarily buy, these days. Can we, as a society, give dignity to one another, without money being involved? A big question.

What are the values of a society that we all want to live in? Can we be more patient, kind, and compassionate?

Some young people have already given up. “You'll never find compassion in Singapore,” one young man said to me recently, with no small hint of bitterness.

I look forward, after ten years of HHOS, to a collective challenge in the future: to give dignity to our homeless friends. To spend time together – no agenda, only love and presence-of-mind. Can we do it, in such a outwardly messed-up place like Singapore, where the weather is so humid, construction noise never stops, and commuters poke into each others' bodies on the MRT?

An older, wiser female has told me: “let us not choose the tasks that are equal to our powers; let us gain the power that is equal to the tasks.”

And what is this power? Is it my conversational skills? Or is it Derek's always-online routine, where he responds personally in a humongous number of WhatsApp chat-groups? Or is it Mr. T.S.'s car, which he uses to ferry volunteers to and fro, during outreaches?

Whatever it is, I know I cannot do it alone. None of us can. We are interdependent – you have something I don't, and I have something you don't. Can we pool our resources together, and work together for a more live-able future? I don't know with 100% certainty, but I have hope. Join me in this hope, where you are – on the other side of these ubiquitous electronic screens – or wherever you are reading this from.

To me, hope is not a nice-to-have. It is a necessity. It is a necessary hope for our friends' baby children – as hurricanes and earthquakes rock and crush our planet.

Allow me a quote from the Holy Bible: “These three remain: faith, hope and love. And the greatest of these is love.”

Let us challenge ourselves to love one another – homeless or not – in a world that is so lacking in love. I have faith in our shared humanity.

Thank you.

update on 30 November 2025:

An article has appeared in a mainstream newspaper in Singapore: Young and on the streets: Number of under-35s rough sleeping on the rise in Singapore. written by: Syaranfana Shafeeq. Hyperlink.

#HomelessAdvocate