WELCOME
On behalf of the Directors, we would like to welcome you to the March issue of our Newsletter, M.E.F. As we enter The Year of the Dragon, we are getting stronger and flying to new heights, just like a dragon. There is greater interest in our objectives of delivering birthday happiness to as many less fortunate children as possible by an analysis of our website. January saw an increase of 200% in post views and site sessions was up to 39%. This can be greatly attributed to the tremendous efforts by you getting our message out there. Thank you very much.
JOYOUS PARTIES IN JANUARY
The month started with a joyous party at the Wan Mok Law Shui Wah School in Tuen Mun.
You may recall that we first visited the School last year with the Consul General of the South
African Consulate, Mr. Mogono. The joyous party was subsequently reported in HK Standard
newspaper by Mr. Adrian Wong and this lead to a live interview with Ms. Noreen Mir on ‘Brunch with Noreen’. This joyous party had 11 male Celebrants and the Guests they invited to their joyous party were fellow Pupils in the Primary section of the School. We had 3 Volunteers, Sujomi, Mabel, Jobee and Mariella. The party started with singing Happy Birthday in English, our latest Volunteer, Jobee sang in Cantonese, Sujomi in Basha and Mariella taught the Participants how to sing it in French. There were the usual games followed by a yummy creation created by Jeremy who unfortunately could not attend. One of the Guests did not want to participate at all and refused to eat any food but only ate cake, a lot of it. Mariella cooked at home tuna bake and beef lasagne that the Participants appreciated, especially as it was made at home with love and affection. As there were no male Volunteers the birthday gifts were given by the female Volunteers, a cultural no-no but nobody was fazed as all the Celebrants were very happy. This joyous party was held during term time so it occurred between lessons. It is hoped that when we return the joyous party will be on the last day of term when the Pupils are on half day and even more relaxed.
Our next joyous party was in the beautiful new Love21 Centre in Diamond Hill. You may recall their old Centre was gutted by a major fire last year and they moved into their new premises a few weeks earlier. The Social Worker, Kenneth was keen to have us return and celebrate the birthdays of 11 Celebrants. Unlike the previous joyous party there were both male and female Celebrants who had to negotiate conducting the joyous party in the main games room, small room and the Reception area. Nissa and her son Benjamin, Rachael, Rachel, Arpita and her daughter, Aarya were joined by Isaac who came as Spiderman. The Participants loved his costume and hugged him tightly. The games were played in the Games Room and when finished everyone went to a smaller room where Radhika’s yummy creation was presented to the Celebrants to blow out the candles. The nutritious food was given to all the Participants in the Reception area to eat along with the cake and drinks. The Reception area was also used to present the Celebrants with their birthday gifts. The Celebrants and their Guests had a wonderful time thanks to the wonderful efforts of the Volunteers, many coming for the first time. It is hoped that we will return in 3 months’ time and deliver even more birthday happiness.
Our third joyous party of the month was in The Lok Sing Tong Benevolent Society in Kowloon City. This joyous party was for less fortunate children from South Asian community that use the Centre. There were 7 Celebrants with the youngest being only 6 years old. Tariq loved his party and his birthday gift of a model Car. He also won the Pass the Ball game. His prize was a model of a Boeing aeroplane and he did a jig of happiness. The oldest Celebrant was Asfiya who was celebrating her 13th birthday. She loved her gift of a stuffed giraffe. All the gifts and prizes were donated by JAS Forwarding. The yummy vanilla flavoured cake was created by Mabel who unfortunately couldn’t attend as she had to look after her children. She missed Tariq being overjoyed when Batman brought in his cake. As the Participants left, Ms. Rachel Chiu gave each of them snacks that she and her colleagues had kindly donated. As we left the Venue many of the Participants were outside overjoyed with birthday happiness. Truly awesome joyous party made memorable thanks to the wonderful efforts of all the Volunteers, our talented Cake Maker, Batman and the Social Worker, Bibi.
All birthday gifts and prizes sponsored by JAS Forwarding, Coppel Mexico and Gary Ferreira.
The Hong Kong Government with help from the Sino Group opened the first Common Living
Room to provide additional space with diversified facilities and services for grass roots families to meet their needs in their daily lives and social activities, and hopefully improving their quality of life. The first such room was opened late last year in Sham Shui Po, operated by our partnering organisation, the Lok Sing Tong Benevolent Society. For more information on this policy please go to the government site: https://www.info.gov.hk/gia/general/202312/18/P2023121800301.htm. The O.I.C, Ms. Ip has seen how we deliver birthday happiness and wanted us to come to the new Centre. Our third joyous party of the month was held on a Friday evening and was brilliantly led by Ms. Eva Lo. She started by asking if any of the Participants could say Happy Birthday in another language. One said it in Thai and another in Japanese. She had many new Volunteers and Stella and Tina return to Hong Kong for a holiday from England to coincide with the joyous party. Tina later wrote it “......was great fun and so happy to see the children were so enjoyable in the party”. There were originally 10 Celebrants but when a little girl, Annie
heard of the joyous party an hour before asked if she could join as a Celebrant and bring her
Grandmother who also about to celebrate her birthday. The young girl joined the joyous party with her Granny as her Guest. All the prizes for the winners of games and birthday gifts for the Celebrants were small as all of them live in caged homes. The yummy food was cooked with love by the parents of the Participants in the Common Room’s kitchen and they made mushroom pasta, fish balls, fried chicken and shumai. The joyous party had a yummy
chocolate cake made by Neetu. A great party and the Social Workers are looking when we can return to deliver more birthday happiness but on a weekend with maybe up to 50 Participants. Eva has indicted she would like to lead that joyous party.
All Birthday gifts sponsored by JAS Forwarding Limited. Gary & Coppel Mexico & Gary Ferreira Our last joyous party of the month was in the Society for Community Organization. A new Social Worker, Dicky Lo has kindly agreed to coordinate with us after Tim Tse decided to take a career break before starting his Masters later this year. There were 10 Celebrants ranging in age from 4 to 11 years old. Along with their Guests there were nearly 25 Participants. The joyous party started with greeting from the Volunteers and the grand entrance of Black Panther, Dr. Strange, Captain America and Wolverine. The joyous party had the usual fun games like Pass the ball, Musical Statue and Musical Chairs. The Celebrants really appreciated the yummy cake made by Radhika who baked her creation at the last moment when Aisha fell sick. As the cake was brought in by the Superheroes, Juanna, Christelle and Jun sang Happy Birthday in French. Whilst the Participants were eating their nutritional food of chicken and pork each Celebrants was called out to the front to be given their birthday gift. All of them loved them but Christine was overjoyed with her Flipeez panda stuffed toy. She would not let it go even when she joined the post joyous party briefing. Each participant’s departure gift was a handful of chocolates.
DONATION OF TOYS
The Directors, Team Leaders and Volunteers would like to say a big thank you to Mr. Gary
Ferreira, JAS Forwarding, Gary and Coppel Mexico for the wonderful donation of 3 pallets of
awesome toys that we have already started to give to Celebrants as birthday gifts and prizes. The Celebrants will treasure the gifts for the rest of their lives as a physical reminder when their special day was celebrated with wonderful caring people. On behalf of them all, thank you very much.
SPONSORSHIP REQUEST
As Birthday Happiness Asia grows in popularity and our message reaches more and more
people and organisations, we are receiving more inquiries and offers of donations of money,
sweets, toys etc. This has created a storage problem, a very nice position to be in compared
to a year ago. After extensive searching, a possible solution has emerged with an offer to have a large storage unit at the discounted price of HK$1,000 pm. If anyone is able to sponsor this storage unit, please do not hesitate to contact us. Thank you.
NEW PARTNERING ORGANISATIONS
At the last joyous party in 2023 in the Society for Community Organization, a senior manager
at the Hong Kong Student Aid Society, Ms. Bryony Hardy-Wong
(https://hksas.org.hk/tc/index.php) contacted us at the end of last year. Originally a friend
informed her that as they have small birthday acknowledgements for the children maybe our
wonderful Cake Maestros would provide yummy cakes for the children they serve. The Society has two Boys’ Homes with 97 and 108 boarders; small Group Homes and three school they supervise. They help so many children, Bryony felt that some would feel it is unfair that some of the children get to celebrate their birthdays and other do not have the chance. We explained that we would come to all the Homes or Schools at regular intervals and deliver birthday happiness with yummy homemade cakes. To demonstrate the value of one of our parties, we invited her to join us a Volunteer/Observer at the last joyous party in 2023 at the Society for Community Organization. She enjoyed the joyous party and seeing the happy smiles on the children’s faces. She was so impressed and it is hoped that we will have a trial joyous party with them before the Summer.
The Directors would like to thank Ms. Yoyo Lam who introduced us to Ms. Cindy Lo, Social
worker at the Fu Hong Society’s Tin Shui Wai District Support Centre. The Society has a
number of Centres in Hong Kong and the Tin Shui Wai Centre has 500 members mainly the
local Chinese Community and from the South Asian and Filipino communities. Their members range in age from 6 to 59 years old who have mental disabilities autism and some have severe autism. However, their average mental age is between 6 to 12. The Centre already acknowledges the birthdays of Members every three months with a small party with small gifts and cakes. They also invite members to make birthday cards for the Celebrants. After listening to how we deliver birthday happiness to children with disabilities, the Centre will have a trial joyous party with us on Saturday, 23rd March. It is then hoped we will then be invited to delivery birthday happiness to children in the Society’s other Centres in the New Territories.
Our Founder, Marilou believed that every child deserves to have their special day
acknowledged and give them a lifelong happy memory. This is why Birthday Happiness Asia
was created. We would like to give Celebrants and their Guests an opportunity to express in their own words how they feel about their birthdays being celebrated.
Christine was a Celebrant at her joyous party on Saturday, 24th February in the Society for
Community Organization
「今日真係超級開心,見到蜘蛛俠,仲有禮物係我最鍾意嘅熊貓
“I’m really grateful to join this amazing birthday party, it’s my first time to take photos with my
favourite superhero spider-men. Also, I really like the birthday present as it’s the panda plush
toy”.
The following were Celebrants and Guests at their joyous party in The Lok Sin Tong
Benevolent’s Common Living Area:
Jacob:
I feel happy to join this birthday party with my friends and parents!
「可以同屋企人、朋友一齊參加生日派對,我真係好開心!」
Louis:
The food is delicious, i love fried chicken drumsticks that made by my mother! I am really
happy at that night!
「我成晚都玩得好開心,嘢食好好味,我最鍾意媽咪整嘅炸雞!」
Yee:
I have never join a birthday party with 40 peoples, this a large event and everybody are happy.
「我未試過參加咁大型嘅生日party 㗎,大家都玩得好開心。」
Suet:
I play balloon and different games in the party, I got many candy and chocolate from the
volunteers. I love the chocolate cake, it is yummy!
「有氣球同埋好多唔同遊戲玩,啲姐姐俾咗好多糖我!個朱古力蛋糕都好好味。」
Yuki:
I hope i can join the party next year again, i love the birthday present, it is a barbie doll!
「希望下年都可以繼續參加生日party,我今年收到一個Barbie!」
Jackson:
There are many people of different nationalities, everybody enjoy the party and play together!
「Party有唔同文化嘅人,主持會翻譯,唔會因為唔同文化而忽略咗佢哋,令到大家都可以一
齊玩!」
Kelly:
I am happy of the birthday party, i can invite friends to enjoy the happiness with me!
「好開心,可以叫埋啲朋友過嚟一齊玩!」
VOLUNTEERS’ TESTIMONIALS
Birthday Happiness Asia is blessed with wonderful Volunteers who always deliver a great deal of birthday happiness to countless numbers of less fortunate children. We wish to give them an opportunity to express in their own words their own experiences.
Ryan Wong: “When you have 365 days a year to give and all they need is one day for someone to spend their birthday with, You’ll find that that one day will last them their lifetime”.