Blessed Are the Givers: The Story of the Kinta Chapter Food Aid Program - a Charity Steward's report
- Benedict Chin
- 11 minutes ago
- 2 min read
The Companions of Kinta Chapter have hearts as expansive as the blue arch of Heaven, for this small country Chapter has, since 2017, sponsored meals for the Standard 6 underprivileged schoolchildren of SJK (T) Menglembu. This allows them to stay back after school for additional classes in the final push towards the (since abolished) UPSR examinations and its current replacement, the Ujian Akhir Sesi Akademik (UASA).
In conjunction with the school teachers—who provide tuition classes entirely free of charge—and the PIBG, Kinta Chapter works towards providing a future for these underprivileged schoolchildren. For what better way is there to help them escape the poverty trap than through education?
What began as a worthy project in support of the Second Grand Principle of Freemasonry became mission-critical after the onslaught of the pandemic on these underprivileged children. While the more fortunate among them continued their education through online learning, these children could neither afford the hardware nor the data plans to access the e-learning modules provided by the Malaysian Government, and were left even further behind. Post-pandemic, we focused on the 3M—Membaca, Menulis, and Mengira—the very basics of education.
Since 2017, every successive First Principal and the Companions of Kinta Chapter have embraced this noble challenge of investing in early intervention in education.
An outstanding characteristic of the Companions of Kinta Chapter is the manner in which they give—without scruple and without diffidence. We are all aware that our Companions support multiple charities and may, at times, experience charity fatigue.
Yet blessed are our Companions who share their bounty.
And blessed too are the children who share what little they have.
A LESSON IN SHARING
Three sisters sharing a meal meant for one—provided for the Standard 6 sibling only and sponsored by Kinta Chapter.
(Picture taken on 23 January 2017)
The children who have benefited from the benevolence of our Companions are too young to fully understand, and they will not remember us. Yet the good that we do lives on.
At their teachers’ prompting, a thank-you card was made by the Standard 6 students of the academic year 2025, and presented to our Grand Superintendent Tuan Mahathir Mazlan and MEZ Dr Arvinder Singh Harbaksh Singh on Wednesday, 2 July 2025.
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