We visited Bodhi Homecare Cheras in March 2015, this is a follow-up post to provide the public with more information on this Buddhist monk’s legacy.
Bodhi Homecare Cheras is a registered home, set up in 1989 to house and take care of handicapped and abandoned children (presently aged 8 onwards) as well as needy and some disabled old folks forsaken by their families. In total there are about 40 inmates.
Although this home has its beginnings as a temple founded by a Chinese monk from China, it is now run by full-time lay members. The committee is a small group comprising of :-
1) Mr Jims Shee – Chairman
2) Ms Ng Ching Yuet – Treasurer
3) Ms Chua Ching Le – Secretary
The committee members stay in the homecare to give the inmates their fullest attention and care.
This humble homecare is situated on state land. Sometime back, the living quarters caught fire and were destroyed. This unlucky incident was followed by the Government reclaiming land to build a highway. As such, there is no space to rebuild proper living quarters at this point in time.
Some members of BeCause have made several visits to observe the inmates, caregivers and the overall environment. There are no frills and wasteful spending. Indeed, the home is run on very frugal guidelines. For the daily meals, vegetables are sometimes donated to the home after the market in the vicinity closes. Some meat is bought and the abled inmates help the caregivers to cook wholesome meals. We see healthy and happy children and old folks who are well cared for.
As the Bodhi Homecare is an NGO, the committee runs a small recycling station of donated items like clothes, plastic ware, newspapers etc for sale. This contributes to about 50% of their expenses which include living, medicare and schooling expenses for the inmates. Otherwise, they thrive on the occasional donations from the public.
Despite this, Bodhi Homecare provides free medical services and traditional herbal medicine to the needy public as they have a TCM doctor who comes on Sundays to donate his service. In addition, they give out bags of rice and food stuffs donated to them by the public to the more needy who comes a calling. Bodhi Homecare also maintains a station for about 50 abandoned and sick dogs left at their doorstep. The centre also provides free tuition and a kindergarten for poor children from the public.
Bodhi Homecare has an urgent need to accomplish their list of priorities:-
1) The members are presently accumulating funds to erect a stupa to house the statue of Kuan Yin who is seated in the main temple hall. They will then convert the hall to be sleeping quarters where all the inmates sleep on mattresses on the floor.
2) A wall and front gate are currently being built to encompass the centre. This will serve to protect the inmates from intruders and also to prevent flooding of the centre. Incidentally the centre is located below the road and water with garbage from the nearby market are always flowing into the premise.
3) The building of fish pond is in progress for the release of lives (in this case, fishes). A pond for releasing tortoise is already in existence.
4) The centre hopes to relocate 2 Tenaga posts to make more space to build the stupa and provide parking area for visitors.
5) The centre also aspires to relocate the huge dustbins of the wet market located nearby as the stench and flies are unhealthy for the inmates.
6) The centre has finally completed building a proper kitchen.
BeCause believes this home is deserving of our aid as we can see the sincerity and earnestness of the caregivers to love and care for these unfortunate inmates. We are blessed to be able to provide assistance for them.
To this end, BeCause is in the midst of organising something fun and challenging in September 2015 to help Bodhi Homecare. Stay tuned for more details!
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