A Hand to the Afghan Refugees in South Korea
- Emily Dhong
- Oct 17, 2021
- 2 min read
Updated: Dec 11, 2021
On September 7th, 2021, my mom and I drove down to Jincheon province with 10 boxes of clothes gathered from YISS. The Afghans had arrived just the week before and I was able to host a Clothing Drive for Afghan Children in my school alone. I wished to be a community project to create a greater impact, but the COVID situation prevented me from forming a group nor hosting the Clothing Drive for a long time. The day Clothing Drive had started, there was startling news across the school microphone that a high schooler had been tested positive for COVID in our school, and we were to return to our houses immediately. What seemed impossible finished in an incredible miracle that I never expected: over ten boxes of clothes were ready to be delivered over one day of the period. I felt immensely grateful for the opportunity given to serve another community around me and immediately executed action to deliver the clothes the next week.
Hosting a Clothing Drive by myself was much work, especially because it was my first time doing so. The reason that caused me to have such a burden on me was because I wanted to do at least SOMETHING for them. It felt wrong to deal with the ongoing conflict in Afghanistan as a distant issue. I couldn't believe the violent actions of the Taliban, and how the global society was neglecting the issue, ignoring every single plead of Afghan citizens for help. The reason I especially felt a pang of this was because Korea also once had a time when they needed help from foreign nations in their lowest times. Thus, when I heard some of the Afghans were fleeing to South Korea, I felt a need to "give them a hand" in whatever way. In this case, it was in the form of delivering gently-used winter clothes to them.
At the onset of preparing for the Clothing Drive, I had no idea what to do. So I simply went into the High School Principal's office without much thought. I told him my visions and he consented to help me. There were no charities nor clubs behind this; it was solely me. This could mean that it was the very first valuable impact I've caused in the world, but also a lot of work. From creating announcements, contacting the mayor of Jincheon, going through every single cloth, and taping the boxes, it was done with my own hands. This tiring yet meaningful process helped me to be more aware of those around me that are in help but get neglected easily.
Last, something extraordinary happened to me; newspapers started to write about me. Below are some of the articles that spread my good-willed action to farther parts of the world.
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