Community Service Is a Choice and Not a Must.
If there is one thing I would like to continue over time, it's NYSC, the scheme created to make youths who are graduates serve their father’s land. So many people are against this and wish it should be scrapped but there are always merits and demerits to everything.
The merits of NYSC are greater than the demerits, but that's not the topic for today. The only backlash I realized from the scheme is that we have issues of insecurity in the country, and that is a big setback, but still, NYSC is worth more.
When we talk about community service, I can't say I have a good experience with it, not until I gotta serve my fatherland. At home I would do everything from the order and advice of my parents, then at school, I just live my life on my own. I don't really relate with many people aside from my close friends and hostel mates.
But when I got to my NYSC, the first thing was that I was away from my family and even far away from my region or tribe. We were declared a federal asset and we delivered.
The first community service I experienced was that of the CDS, which is an acronym for community development service. This is a day of the week dedicated to community service. We have meetings and discussions about how we want to render our services to the community.
The Market Square
Our first community service was to make a visit to the market square. You can tell how the market square will look, so dirty, noisy and unkempt. Our mission was to get to the market, then clean up all the dirt, and clear the gutters and sewage channels.
It was actually fun all through because we spent almost the whole day on the service. The beauty of any community service is going it in the group. If it were to be an individual handling it, then I would say it's really going to feel so weird. But no one felt bad about anyone looking at us, instead, we got appraisals in return and were even interviewed by the TV news stations.
Save the greens
This was another community service I experienced. It was all about saving the greens. We need more afforestation than deforestation. So we embarked on a mission of planting trees in different areas of the community.
Clean up.
We resided in the army barracks and there is always a rule of cleanliness in the barracks. This made us selflessly clean up our surroundings and some of our immediate surroundings that need to be cleaned up.
My experience as a blood donor
It was also during my service year I was able to volunteer myself to be a blood donor. I was reluctant at first and made everyone else have their way. But in the end, I was the one that had all the blood matches required. So I volunteered to be a donor.
There is some kind of peace and freedom you get from doing any of these services willingly. It shouldn’t be forced in any way. That's the beauty of it.
This is my response to the HIVE LEARNERS weekly prompt in hive learners community for the Week 151 Edition 3 and the topic to be discussed is THE HATE YOU GET
Wow. You were a blood donor? That's impressive. I would love to help in that regard someday but I don't think it would be possible because it's not as easy as getting someone with a B negative most times. I am B positive. Someone asked about my blood group the other day as they needed someone with b negative to donate to a woman who delivered a baby and needs blood. In fact, I want to experience that, too.