Serving Inner-city families in East Vancouver

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On October 22nd and 24th, 2019, some of our Project Shine alumni volunteered to help serve inner-city families in East Vancouver with CRRS’ local outreach ministry’s partner organization Vancouver Urban Ministries (VUM). The two events were family gatherings for the students from VUM’s free after school tutoring and music program who cannot afford it otherwise. The community VUM serves is about 60% Indigenous and 40% from immigrant background. Their program is running out of an Aboriginal focus school and a school in the heart of China town in Vancouver. 

Together we shared a meal, sang songs, conducted music activities, played musical instrument and interacted with each other in a meaningful way. Esther Leung, our Outreach Ministry Manager gave a special talk presentation on “Music makes the heart glad”. In the presentation various musical instruments from different cultures such as Indigenous, Chinese and western were displayed. Esther also provided musical instruments from her own collection such as clay or wooden flutes, percussion instruments and bells for the students to explore and play. The kids also made a craft of “mini shakers” that they can bring home and use as an instrument. 

A big thank you for the Project Shine Alumni that served together! The volunteers helped served the food and clean up after the event. They also joined in with the musical group activities and helped the kids with their craft. In total we served about 80 people from both nights combined. As Project Shine alumni, we hope that we can continue to “shine” wherever we are after our amazing “Project Shine” experience together in previous summer or summers! 

 

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