PETALING JAYA, April 29 — Residents in Subang Jaya are getting their shavers out to support a noble cause.
Through the community Facebook page SJ Echo, locals have been sharing photos and videos of their newly-shaven bald heads in a bid to raise awareness about the “Feed the Hunger” initiative.
SS14 resident Chan Yow Wai was one of those who contributed to the cause, stating in a video post, “Good afternoon everyone. Before I go bald, I would like to thank all the kind and generous donors who have made Feed the Hunger a big success.
“Thank you to my friends, family and fellow residents. We’ve only done a small part by raising a total amount of RM14,438. So once I’ve organised everything (with the donors), I’ll hand it over to the Lions Club of Subang Jaya.”
He later revealed that the sum has increased to a total of RM15,000.
Chan wasn’t the only one willing to say goodbye to his precious locks as other Subang Jaya residents have also got their electric razors out to raise awareness for the initiative.
Feed the Hunger was initiated by the Lions Club of Subang Jaya at the end of March and is aimed at providing over 1,000 meals a day to those affected by the movement control order (MCO) restrictions in Subang Jaya.
The initiative will primarily be providing the meals and grocery supplies to households of daily-wage earners, such as cleaners and general workers, around Subang Jaya, USJ and parts of Sunway.
Lions Club member and Feed the Hunger organising chairperson Adrian Lim told Malay Mail that the extension of the lockdown meant that their efforts need to be extended as well, with efforts set to continue throughout the MCO.
“To sustain this massive project, we have to fundraise as we go along. But there is only so much awareness we can generate as a club.
“After doing multiple rounds of appeals through the media, getting our community newspaper SJ Echo on board too, we decided it was time we also got members of the public to help us raise awareness.”
Lim added that they came up with the idea to get people to “go bald for the cause”, to hopefully turn a few heads in the process.
“It’s funny and it makes a bold statement,” he said.
“The ‘shaves’ are now able to raise awareness of the plight of families trapped in hunger by the MCO and also get more people to do something about it through pledges.
“We were founded in Subang Jaya, for Subang Jaya. This is our obligation to help our town respond to what is probably the biggest shock it has ever faced.”
The initiative is a partnership between the club, Subang Jaya ADUN, Subang Jaya Police and Subang Jaya Municipal Council, with Sunway Malls also lending a helping hand by providing cooked meals from Sunway Pyramid, through the mall’s “Food for Thought” programme.
“We delivered more than 1,000 dinner meals daily without fail. By end-April, we will have donated more than 35,000 meals since the MCO was put in place,” said Lim.
“In our groceries phase of this project, we partnered with the Subang Jaya ADUN’s office on dry groceries distribution and successfully delivered them to 1,060 households on April 21 and 22.”
He added that he hopes the groceries, consisting of rice, canned food, sugar and biscuits worth RM50 will be enough to last these underprivileged families for one or two weeks -- until they can get more supplies.
If you’re keen to help out, all donations for the Feed the Hunger initiative can be made to Lions Club of Subang Jaya; Maybank account number 5122-2232-4551.
