Another Week Beyond – 2134

August 20, 2021

Dear friends,

Ellyn joined our after-school programme at 9 years old and she remembers that she was placed 3^rd in a 5km race at the East Coast Park that year. She was having a shower when her mother told her that her name was being announced on stage and urged her to hurry up so that she could collect her prize. The occasion was the Streetwise Run, an annual Youth Day Celebration that was part of our calendar from 2001 to 2010. She also remembers learning circus skills and performing for a Sunday afternoon crowd at Toa Payoh and singing “Seasons of Love” from the Broadway musical Rent for President SR Nathan during a fund-raising dinner.

After her “A” Levels, Ellyn took a couple of years off, backpacking around the region but decided to hit the books after that and was glad to secure a place with a distance learning programme at the University of London, majoring in Banking & Finance in 2017. She received a loan from Mendaki covering 75% of her course fees and worked 40 hours a week in the food and beverage sector to pay for the remaining portion of her course fees as well household expenses. For the past 10 years, she has been living with her grandmother in a 2-room purchased flat and she has been servicing the monthly mortgage and paying for the utilities.

In 2019, she failed 2 subjects and had to repeat the entire school year. She was upset and disappointed as she had pay for an additional year of study. Ellyn told us that she was distracted trying to earn more money but ended up adding to her expenses. Nonetheless, she bounced back quickly, scoring well, and progressed to her final year. In 2020, as the pandemic was at its height, jobs in the F & B sector were hit and Ellyn landed a one-year assignment with the Attorney General’s Chambers as an assistant legal executive. It was a stroke of luck that she is most grateful for because unlike many, the pandemic worked for her. Because classes moved online, she was able to take on a full-time day job.

Last Friday, Ellyn sent us a copy of her Certificate of Completion and told us that she has been offered a full-time position as a finance and claims executive and she will start if she clears the background check. She is now 26 and has regarded Beyond as her “second family” for the past 17 years. She joked that a colleague she used to think of as an “uncle,” she would not call her “grandfather.”

I laughed along with her but then expressed my concern. I enquired if Beyond had made her think less of her own family. “I am very lucky to have 2 families,” she reassured me. “One that I was born into and one that I chose for myself, and both loved me in different ways.”

Several of the volunteers and staff she encountered are no longer with Beyond but she remembers them fondly and remains in touch with a few. “It was not one person but so many who cared for me, and those experiences meant a lot to me, and I learnt many things.” Curious, I asked her what she would say is the most important lesson she learnt from Beyond and she replied, “It is ok to seek help, it does not mean you are weak, it means you can be humble.”

Wishing you good health and peace of mind.

Sincerely,

Gerard

*Share love, give love, spray love, measure your life in love – Seasons of love…*

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