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A different kind of love this Valentine's Day |
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By Nuraisyah Binte Shamsudin
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Feb. 6 2012 |
While romantic love usually takes centre-stage in February, students from the NUS LEAD programme have taken the lead in championing a different kind of love. The undergraduates started Love through Lenses to promote familial love and inter-generational relationships through photography.
The NUS LEAD programme aims to enhance leadership skills amongst students at the National University of Singapore through organizing a project for the community.
The students - Hen Yi Xuan, Lubin Tan, Cheryl Tay, Idris Woo and Margaret Ee – decided to use photography to create awareness of inter-generational bonding.
“I thought of the photography idea because it’s a rising trend. I thought it would be easier to carry out and arouse interest for beneficiaries and promote the intergenerational relationships,” Lubin Tan, a fourth-year chemical engineering student, said.
“There is division between the young and the old and we want to bridge it. As you enter the 21st century, because there is more technology now, they spend less time interacting with humans than their technology.” he said.
Hen Yixuan, a first-year economics major, went on to further explain that the purpose of the programme was not only to promote intergenerational bonding but also to empower the youths participating in Love Through Lenses activities. The youths will learn photography skills, which will be useful for their future endeavours.
Comprising a photography camp and two community photography exhibitions, Love Through Lenses hopes to inspire the community, using photography as a medium.
The photography camp was held Jan. 28, involving more than 20 youths and facilitators. The participants attended a workshop by award-winning photographer Willy Foo, before going out to snap photographs of inter-generational relationships in action.
“We hope that residents can come and view the pictures and meet the youths who took the photo. We hope that these photos will remind them of their own families and they will treasure them,” Yixuan said.
These initiatives highlight the growing need for youths to be reminded to intentionally love and treasure family members.
First-year geography major Cheryl Tay says it boils down to the “stuff” youths participate in and the decisions they make as individuals:
“On a personal basis, we need to remember to spend time with the different generations of our families, because we often tend to neglect them with all those stuff going around in our lives.”
For more information on what they do and how to join in, visit their Facebook page.
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