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When a friend of mine asked people around her to donate a certain amount per kilometer she would run in a marathon race, many were amazed. She runs and people donate for that? This concept was new to the Koreans.
Since then, for more than 10 years that passed, we have made donations many times as she slowly advanced from an over five-hour record novice to a winning marathoner in her age group.
She has run in all major international races such as in Boston, New York, London, Chicago, and Berlin. She also loves to run in races in Korea, organized by the three major conservative newspaper companies.
My friend's professional work has become secondary in her life, after starting to run. With a race scheduled ahead, she could calculate the calorie, carbohydrates and protein in her meals. Of course, she is very mindful of the liquid she takes in. She runs along the riverside pedestrian road and swims twice a day.
People say that running is like a drug. In it, there is an element that makes people get addicted. You cannot stop doing it once you taste the sense of achievement at some level. Well, I am a perfect anti-sports person, but I can imagine that.
What does my friend do with the money her friends and neighbors have donated? She contributes it to World Vision, a global organization which uses donated dollars "to work in the field, partnering with children and families to help them break the cycle of poverty" since 1950.
My friend says that she likes World Vision because she is kept informed of how the money is spent, how all the changes are made by that money and administrative details concerned. She admits that the moving success in her fund-raising and donation at her first full-course marathon race has been the source of energy and passion for her 10 years of running.
Her first foster child was a 9-year-old boy from a faraway village in Ethiopia. His family had no means of living, with a single mom. My friend later told the donors a long, moving report of how the money changed not only the life of the boy's family, but the village as a whole.
The money collected after her first race was more than 6 million won. The boy's family could buy a few goats and sheep, which were a big asset, and more than enough for the basic necessities of the family.
Since the amount was too big just for the boy and his family, she decided to help the whole village with the remaining money. She asked the villagers to buy desks and chairs for the village school which had only four walls and roof. The money was enough to fill the room with desks and chairs. Now, even the girls of the village started to attend school as there were seats available for them.
"I can no longer help the boy. He is now 19 years old, and he is overage to get help," my friend said. Along with this Ethiopian village, her sponsorship has reached flood-stricken Vietnamese village, a self-help computer education program for disabled women in Azerbaijan, a center for the disabled in Mongolia, and an electricity and water supply program for those ''families at risk" in Korea.
After many years of these experiences, we now know that we could easily help all these needy people by simply donating some money to the World Vision account. Thus we are grateful for our running friend.
Moreover, the best part in the "after- donation reporting party" is the moment when we hear stories and testimonies of the race and where the money is put into good use. It is a heart-warming gathering for all of us because it helps us realize that the donations have impacted on the lives of many, especially the needy.
Once, I tried to make a rich friend of mine join in and share this simple but rewarding opportunity. Especially as I know "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God."
However, this friend of mine had a different concept of helping others. For him, he should take care of his immediate family first, before others. He said that if there's something left ― then help should be given to the next circle of kin like relatives and friends. And if there's still an extra ― then help can be given to other people whom he does not know.
To make him change his mind, I insinuated that he might have more than enough money to share with others. But unfortunately, it appeared that he had already a fixed notion on whom to help first.
Sharing and helping people is a universal norm. Traditional Korean society also has this practice, and it survives. I only hope that our attention could reach a wider scope of people in addition to "us," such as those outsiders with a different nationality, shape and thoughts living in other parts of the world.
The writer is the chairwoman of the Korea Heritage Education Institute (K*Heritage). Her email address is Heritagekorea21@gmail.com.
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