MEP KIZ 2014/2015: Volunteerism - A Life Changing Experience!

My name is Vilkon Tauning or mostly known with the spelling Vilcon in all my social media accounts. I come from an isolated village deep inside the jungle in Sabah. The nearer town is Sandakan which is taking almost 5 hours driving by 4 wheels vehicles. I am the third child of 5 siblings. My parents Tauning Gambili and Saloma Tauning are both farmers and now undergoing a palm oil farm. I got into University by using my STPM certificate.

My passion is in volunteerism, travelling, making friends, scuba diving, jungle trekking and learning cultures. I am a cultural lover, and always ready to learn other cultures. Here I wanna share about how I get involve with volunteerisms.

After finishing school at the age of 18, my dad encouraged to go out of the village and to learn something new outside of my comfort zones. He said “Get out there, explore and learn!” that’s what an uneducated father who was only attending English school in his young age and spent almost his entire life to work under the sun. So, when I was 18, I was joining a World Wild Fan (WWF) volunteerism program in 3 conservations areas in Sabah. I wasn’t paid but they gave me a little allowances for helping them to work voluntarily inside the jungle, meeting many wild animals, sleeping in the jungle camp, and many other things. After almost 2 months volunteering, I decided to stop and went back to my village again to further my studies. I’ve learnt so many things throughout the 2 months volunteering with the WWF.

When I was 19, while I was in high school, I was joining another volunteerism program. It was called as “Our Little Books Keepers”. “Our Little Books Keepers” is a program where some volunteers from Kuala Lumpur donated books to the kids in the rural areas in Sabah. I was part of this program where I was volunteering to teach the kids or even teenagers English.

When I was 20, it was my gap year, so I got involved with many volunteerism activities. The first was Raleigh International. Raleigh International is an International Volunteer Organization based in England. One of the aims of this organization, is to inspire youths from all over the world to work and volunteer among the needy people. Currently, our projects sites are in Borneo, India, Tanzania, Costa Rica and Nicaragua. But there is more else Raleigh Support Groups in almost 92 countries in the World. I was joining this program as a Host Country Venturer. Which means we are representing Malaysia in this expedition held in Sabah. I was joining this program with another 17 Malaysians from East and West Malaysia. The period of this expedition is 10 weeks with 3 weeks for each phases. The phases are Community phase where we built a kindergarten, Environmental phase where we helped the rangers to build the Satellite Camp for scientists at Danum Valley Conservation Centre. And the last phase is adventure phase where we trekked near the jungle of Kalimantan Indonesia for 12 days and scuba diving for 5 days. 142 volunteers from around the globe were taking part in this global volunteerism project.

In the same year, I was chosen by the Professional Association Diver International (PADI) to join a volunteerism project organized by PADI we called as “Project Aware” in Sydney Australia. In this program, we were doing coral plantings, underwater cleanings, and many other necessary things. So many experiences I have gained in Australia especially when I have to work as the only one non-English native speaker in there.

The same year before I enrolled to University, I was joining another program we called as “Young Malaysian Ambassador” in Jakarta Indonesia for 1 month. But I was there only for 3 weeks because I have to get back to Malaysia earlier because I need to settle down my admission problem to Brunel University, England, which was finally unsettled due to scholarship problem and decided to continue my studies at UKM afterwards. 3 weeks in Indonesia I took the chances to know the local cultures closer and visiting few interesting places such as Bali, Bandung and Surabaya.

So far, I have been volunteering in several countries such as, Papua New Guinea, Cambodia and the Philippines to help the community in need. I’ve been visiting some other places as well like Vietnam, Thailand, and Myanmar to learn and to gain experiences especially in the aspect of cultures. I love learning cultures a lot!

How could I knew all of these activities?

I am living in a rural village with no internet access at all. So what I do is, every time my dad goes to the town, I would ask him to buy newspapers and I love to read the “youth” part. So I knew some of these activities from there, and I bravely filled the application form via online when dad asked me to accompany him to the town. When I was 19, I stayed in the hostel in the town because I was continuing my studies in form 6. So, I maximize the internet facilities at school to find local volunteerism organizations so that I can register as a member. That’s what I do to know and to join all these projects.

How about financial?

This is a very good question. I grew up in a poor family and of course my parents couldn’t afford me to join all these programs. But dad said “I am poor, but I will be poorer if I keep you at home”. So because they couldn’t support me much in term of financial, I find it by my own. So, since then, I did a project. I called it as “fundraising project”. In this fundraising project, with the help of my 2 younger brother and sister, we sold used books, we sold foods and beverages. In the school, I was organizing an English tuition class for the students who weren’t doing well in their exams. So they paid me too but I won’t charge them much because my aim was just to help them, it’s not about money or something. But they still paid me because they knew I need money for my expedition although I didn’t asked them to do so. Other than that, I was also writing letter to the Sabah Sport and Youth Minster to support me a little in term of financial. And yeah he sponsored my expedition fees! And I just couldn’t be happier! When I was in Australia, the organization gave me allowances and everything including flight tickets and accommodation are sponsored. So I was like the luckiest person on earth to get the chance that time!

Who inspires you to get involve with volunteerism?

First is of course my parents. They are not educated but they often encourage us to get out to learn something new outside. When I asked for permission to work part-time in the town, my mum said that, my age is the age to learn, to enrich knowledge and to see other cultures. Mum said, working is a learning process too, but we could only work and become a good worker when we have enough knowledge in the head. So, they inspire so much to go out and see the world. Although they couldn’t pay for my expenditures, their encouragements are the best expenditures in my life. The second is, the community in need. I realized that I need to give back to the community whatever I could. Of course I couldn’t give them money or something. But I could help them to get a better life in term of facilities. So, when I see the poverty of my family and the village I live in general, I said to myself that there is more people like us out there. So, this inspired me so much to give something back to the community in need. And after I joined the volunteerism, I personally demanded for another volunteerism project in my own village. And they approved it, the volunteers came to my village to provide the gravity water feeds system after that.

What is the impact?

This is very crucial to me because I learnt and gained a lot of knowledge. I have never thought that a kampong boy was able to join an international volunteerism projects, working alongside many people from all over the world. I just can’t believe that I made it! The Impact is, of course, my personal development is really improved. I have confidences, my leadership skills are improved, my English is really improved even I spoke almost every single day English at home with my family, I learn many new vocabularies that I rarely used before, and I made friends from all over the world. But the most important thing is, you could give something back to the community. It might be a little thing, but trust me it’s really meaningful for them. Through involving with volunteerism, I learnt about friendships, cultures, local knowledge, confidences, leaderships and some other soft skills. The impact is not about me, but also for the community that I worked to. The village that I worked to build the kindergarten is now able to supply their children early education without walking 2 hours a day one way to go to nearer school yet.

I am just an ordinary guy, who is growing up in a poor family, went to school by boat and living in a remote village. But my passion changed me to be a person who is always ready to change for a better life. So readers remember this..”if you have I can do, or I can do it attitude, you can achieve what you’ve desired in your life!”

Here is some photos in my volunteerism activities.

Taking part in the music video shooting shot by a British Opera Actor who is also an Engineer. Writer is the one with R tee at the back.

My first team during the induction day. We were from Malaysia, Scotland, Hong Kong, Ghana, Sweden, and England.

Group photo before off to the project site.

My second team of building the kindergarten. From The Netherlands, Malaysia, USA, Scotland, and Bermuda

My other team in my environmental volunteerism phase. From Malaysia, Australia, The Netherlands, England and Singapore

My team in our adventure phase. From Malaysia, Ireland, England, Scotland, The Netherlands, New Zealand, and Australia. We were in our trekking along the border of Indonesia