Experiencing Volunesia – Our Circle Just Keeps Expanding!
After our first successful Volunesia circle last week, Team KYS found ourselves back under our favorite tree in Cubbon Park yesterday with renewed energy and more raw materials from Goonj. We are so glad to announce that the number of volunteers who attended have almost doubled compared to our first circle last week! We are loving the response from people around us and it’s only reaffirming our faith in humanity, service and generosity.
What we have observed as a result of our Volunesia circles is that people want to belong to a heartfelt gathering. People want to step out of their homes, switch off their phones and devices, and just indulge in activities that are fun, honest, selfless and that make their hearts dance. We think sitting under the canopy of beautiful trees, listening to birds chirping in the background, and marvelling at the constant shower of dried flowers is the perfect recipe for brewing a happy concoction of love and service.
This Fool’s Day, the Volunesians got together at 9 am and took the plunge with the raw materials provided to create ‘Thank You’ goodies for the mentors and teachers of rural and underprivileged kids – people we interact with as a part of our Mentor India programme. As we sat down to create and flex our artistic muscles, we realised that our circle had grown double-fold. What a lovely feeling!
We were expecting half of the volunteers, but many people joined us purely because they liked what they saw. Our first volunteer was Shivani, who happened to pass by while we were setting things up for Volunesia. She was so pleased to hear about the concept and wanted to start right away! She ended up creating the first masterpiece of the session and got the ball rolling.
A little girl, Shreya, yelled to us over the fence of the park – “Excuse Me! Can I join you?” Our answer was equally excited – “Of course you can!” She came in, her mother, father and her little brother (Siddu, who was very keen on taking us to the rocky ‘mountains’ nearby) in tow.
Soon after, Archi arrived, bringing along a friend – Shagun. When we were introduced, we found out that Archi and Shagun happened to get acquainted with each other in a shared cab. Shagun, who was only visiting Bangalore for a brief period, loved what he heard about Volunesia and ended up under the tree with us! How beautiful is that?
These are just some of the happy meetings we heard about. We have more, which we will share with you gradually! We were very happy to see that our Level 2 badges for repeat volunteers were also circulating fast, indicating people had come back for more!
One special feature about Volunesia, this time around, was that Bangalore’s first Inclusion Circle joined us. Our favourite columnist – Ashwin Karthik was there with his gang of heroes to support us. It was an amazing experience getting to see the values of inclusion, service, compassion, love, and gratitude in action as we interacted with the little community.
Our star Volunesians – thank you very, very much for coming and creating beautiful goodies and pouring your heart out. We couldn’t be more grateful for the vibrant ambience that all of us co-created by holding space for each other. We can still feel the energy generated from the powerful 30-second silence we all shared during the group hug. Just wow!
As we take account of all the materials that were used and what they transformed into, Team KYS is full of smiles. We feel so fortunate to have crossed paths with generous hearts like yours. You all gathered under that tree, not because of our event, but by listening to your inner selves that constantly nudge you in the right direction. We are just the medium enabling your journey of service!
Once we finished the Volunesia session, we realised that we already had questions pouring in asking us about the next date and time. What can we say? More power to service! So, we are thrilled to announce that we are hosting another Volunesia event on the 8th of April, 2017, i.e. the upcoming Saturday. Same time, same place, same tree!
To know more details about the event, please visit this link and register. You can find all the pictures taken during the event here!
Enjoyed reading about this? Then you might like to read The Birth Of Volunesia – Celebrating Love, Service And Creativity.
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