Posted on: Saturday, September 18, 2004

EXPRESSIONS OF FAITH
You gain when you help others

By Elaine Masters

Last year, when I heard that Christian volunteers were needed in Honolulu to help Chinese children with their homework, I decided to try it. I could use my teaching experience while observing Chinese culture first-hand. My husband Don, a former Boy Scout leader, accompanied me.

We searched out the study center tucked away in the Chinese Cultural Plaza, then faced fearful eyes as we walked through the door. Of the 10 adults and 40-some children, we were the only haoles there. I'm not sure what the wary students expected — perhaps we were going to eat them? — but Pastor Lai of the Canaan Community Gospel Center and his wife, Candy, were delighted to see us.

Don and I decided if we didn't accomplish anything else, at least we would dispel some misconceptions. These children had parents, schoolteachers and neighbors of Asian descent. Some had never seen a haole up close. Now they could discover that we, too, were human.

Don was assigned a table of bright-eyed, inquisitive second-grade boys. I had a table of fifth-grade girls, just on the cusp of womanhood.

As we helped them figure out math homework and encouraged them in their writing assignments, we enjoyed getting acquainted. The girl who had come from Taiwan the year before was not so good in English but excellent in math. Others checked their homework by her paper. Another girl was excited about an upcoming visit to Disneyland. And a third one was shunned because she had cheated on a test at school. All distinct personalities. We had a God connection, too, praying for such things as an ailing grandmother and upcoming tests.

One highlight for me was getting to read aloud to the larger group. I covered a few chapters each Monday in my book, "The Thief in Chinatown." The story, set in 1896, takes place in the few blocks surrounding where we were sitting, and the children could picture just how it was on River Street in olden days.

I asked Pastor Lai why he had started the center, where the sign "The Immigrants' First Station" hangs. He said he grew up in Hong Kong, graduated first from the University of Hawai'i and then from Luther seminary in St. Paul, Minn. Even as he became a potential pastor of a church in Minnesota, he was being drawn back to Honolulu's Chinatown. He knew that this district was teeming with immigrants and second- and third-generation Chinese, but had no witness for Christ. He realized that children of immigrants have a hard time with homework because their parents often cannot speak English well enough to help. And so, he and Candy came back, first cooperating with another group, then with their own project, offering after-school homework help as well as church services and Bible classes for all ages.

Don and I are probably benefiting more than the kids. A new study cited in Prime magazine this summer found that older folks who did volunteer work for only 40 hours a year were less likely to die in the next seven years than nonvolunteers. Don and I laugh a lot as we talk story about our students. It's bound to be good for what ails us.

Elaine Masters is a member of First Presbyterian Church of Honolulu.