This article from portal www.enanyang.my
“My starting point for engaging in humanitarian aid is to use my skills to change the lives of Myanmar people and help them become self-reliant and self-reliant. I can do as much charity as I can. The money I earn does not belong to me, it belongs to society. The money must be returned to society at the appropriate time.” – Yeap Huey Huey
Last year, Yeap Huey Huey became one of the winners of the “Malaysian Top Ten Outstanding Youth” Humanitarian and Volunteer Service Leadership Award for his humanitarian assistance in Myanmar.
A person who goes abroad to do charity will always cause people from all walks of life to talk about it: “Why don’t you do charity in your own country?”
Yeap Huey Huey has a very good reason, which is enough to eliminate the questions of the commentators.
She said: “I have always done charity in Malaysia, usually donating money or materials to charity organizations such as orphanages and nursing homes. In 2015, by chance, when I sent a group of Burmese illegal foreign workers back to China, I did so. Knowing that there is a big difference between charity and humanitarian aid, I later decided to focus on the latter.
Keep repeating the same mistakes
When sending illegal foreign workers back to Myanmar, she was struck by the fact that doing so was a vicious cycle. Due to the difficult life there, those foreign workers were repatriated to Malaysia and then smuggled into Malaysia again, repeating the same mistakes again and again. It was completely meaningless to repatriate them.
“Charity is about solving immediate or short-term problems. I found that what Myanmar needs is a solution to a long-term problem. A long-term solution that can help the local people to be self-reliant and live with dignity is related to humanitarian assistance.”
In that year, she launched a humanitarian aid charity in Myanmar.
Gold everywhere
Like most people, Yeap Huey Huey’s first impression of Myanmar was filled with negative words such as poor public security and danger. However, when she got off the plane and stepped onto that land, she immediately realized the difference between imagination and reality, and three thoughts suddenly came to her mind.
“The first idea is that Myanmar is not as bad as everyone thinks; secondly, Myanmar is a country full of gold and has great potential for development, but all it lacks are opportunities; thirdly, the locals are simple, hard-working and sincere in their treatment of others. .”
To engage in humanitarian aid, funds must be available. She insisted on not raising funds from outside, so she copied the automotive equipment business in Malaysia to Myanmar, providing free professional knowledge and skills training on automotive equipment to local people, and then also opened a training academy and Auto repair shop.
Achieve financial independence
As of 2019 statistics, the academy has trained approximately 500 people. After completing the training, trainees with specific skills will become employees of the company or work for other designated companies. Some will later set up their own business and achieve financial independence. Through the efforts of her and her team, business performance has grown rapidly, which means she has enough funds to carry out humanitarian aid.
As you can imagine, whether you are starting a business or providing humanitarian aid, the initial journey must be particularly bumpy, especially because language barriers are a major obstacle. Fortunately, most of the locals she does business with speak Malay, and she has learned a bit of Burmese.
“Most of the employees I hired were former illegal foreign workers in Malaysia, so they can speak a little Malay. To this day, they are still working for me, and some businesses are managed by them.”
Go in the opposite direction
Yeap Huey Huey founded the automotive equipment business in Malaysia and Myanmar. I asked her if she has any relevant academic background? She laughed and said, “I only studied until the second day of junior high school.”
In the eyes of her parents, she is a “wild child” because other children have graduated from college, but she is not “reading material”. The enterprising spirit she has today is all due to her independent nature, always going her own way, and preferring to go against the grain.
Early in her career, she worked in the bridal industry for about 13 years before deciding to switch gears. This time, he switched to an unrelated automobile industry, and was promoted from a wage earner to a boss.
Humanitarian aid is doing great
“I found that entrepreneurship must be reversed, so as to create its own value. Adhering to this belief, my business in Malaysia and Myanmar has grown rapidly, which also allows me to realize ‘teach others when you learn, help others when you earn’ concept.”
In Myanmar, the cause she founded has done a great job, and at the same time, she has also done an ideal and outstanding job in humanitarian aid. For her, it’s a way to give back the money she earns to the local community.
Hold up the village
In 2017, Yeap Huey Huey launched the “Home Start” plan, which expanded from the initial support for orphans to support for poor families, and increased from 150 families to the current 30,000 families. It is not an exaggeration to say that she can support a village by herself!
“At the beginning, we gave donations, donated materials, and provided medical assistance. Later, I found that the environment in some villages was really terrible! I once witnessed a homeless family building a simple and simple building next to a big ditch on the street. They live in straw huts. They use ditch water and rainwater for washing vegetables, laundry, bathing, etc., and the hygienic conditions are very poor.”
Seeing this horrible situation, she began to actively build bridges and roads for the village, solve the problem of river water pollution, and decorate dilapidated buildings, etc., to improve the living environment of the local people through infrastructure construction.
She admitted that due to the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic, subsidizing 30,000 households was already the limit. She plans to rent a field, teach the villagers to plant and trade, so that they can learn to be self-reliant, and at the same time make the “Home Start” project sustainable.
Profit for public welfare
“I spend 80% of the company’s profits on public welfare, and ensure that a certain amount of money is invested in various public welfare projects every month. My team is all locals, and they are very happy to assist me in completing the public welfare mission, because the company The profits earned are ultimately used to help their fellow citizens, which they know will change the fate of their people.”
Currently, she is working on a new project, which is to build a new city in Rakhine State in cooperation with the local government, which is planned to be implemented next year. Rakhine State is the second poorest region in Myanmar, and war continues, and the people live in dire straits.
“The purpose of my participation in the development is to increase employment opportunities, improve the lives of local people, and at the same time indirectly quell other disturbances. If people live well, will there still be wars? Will there still be illegal foreign workers smuggled into Malaysia? This city ultimately belongs to the local people, and it will be them who will drive sustainable development in the future.”
Courage wisdom
A woman single-handedly went to a foreign country where the law and order is unstable to do humanitarian aid, how courageous it is! She quickly clarified: “Many people think that I am not afraid of anything, but I am actually very afraid. After all, I am still a woman!”
What are you afraid of? “There are so many! Issues such as personal safety, interpersonal relationships, government negotiations, ethnic group negotiations, etc., I am afraid because many things are unpredictable. But I also know that no matter how afraid I am, I have to face it. If even I am afraid, how can I lead a team?”
“Now I have the experience and ability to face fear. I will be mentally prepared for many things. Although the panic has reduced, it does not mean that I am not afraid at all. For me now and in the future, I need more than just courage And wisdom, it requires a strict disciplined team and firm beliefs to move forward.”
What impressed me the most was that a war broke out in a local village in March last year, and she went to the scene to rescue. While she was rescuing in the safe zone, a missile suddenly fell. She was extremely frightened at that time, but she never thought about running away. All she could think about was saving people.
Choose the life you want
It’s just a humanitarian aid, and it needs money and effort, so do you still have to work so hard? “This must be related to the influence of my grandma! My grandma taught me to be more casual and not to be too attached to things outside of me since I was a child, because I can’t take anything with me when I die. She hopes that I can choose the life I want.”
“Life is short for a few decades, and I want to do my best to make a little contribution to the world. At least when I leave in the future, I will look back at my life and give myself a compliment.”
She deeply understands that one person cannot achieve great things, and the key to success is the concerted efforts of the team. She believes that what she has contributed is only a small amount of power. If everyone can contribute a little power, the lives of the poor can be changed, and the world will become a better place.
She also firmly believes that to change the fate of a child, the lives of the people must first be changed; changing the lives of the people can change the fate of society; changing the fate of society can change the fate of a country; changing the fate of a country can change the fate of a child. This is a virtuous cycle.
“I regard humanitarian assistance as my lifelong career, and Myanmar will not be the end!”