On 14 September 2016, a group of five alumni of the Yayasan Sukarelawan Siswi (YSS) Student Volunteer Mission paid a courtesy call on HE Ambassador Dato’ Ibrahim Abdullah at the Embassy of Malaysia in Paris.
Chef de Mission Abdul Rahim Rahman, 24, Siti Zurianah Ismail, 24, Nurul Azlinda Ab Razak, 24, Muhd Nur Ikhwan Naridan, 23 and Runiy Maldud, 25 were in the port city of Calais for a two-week humanitarian mission. They were volunteers for a Malaysian-run initiative called Kitchen in Calais to serve refugees from various countries stranded between the border of the United Kingdom and France.
During the courtesy call, the group shared their experience serving 120 kg to 160 kg of rice, 60-80 kg of potatoes and curries to about 1500 refugees on a daily basis. The group, along with five other Malaysian students studying in Jordan and the UK, also assisted preparation of special meals during the Eid al-Adha at the refugees’ camp.
HE Ambassador lauded YSS’s volunteer mission in Calais. Such volunteer mission complements Malaysia’s long-standing devotion and commitment in similar humanitarian assistance in other countries. He urged the team to reflect the newly gained experience for the betterment of YSS’s future volunteer missions in domestic and global arena.
Kitchen in Calais was founded in September 2015 by Jamalulail Ismail and Sofinee Harun, who were moved by the haunting image of drowned Syrian toddler Alan Kurdi, which appeared on newspapers, websites and TV news reports worldwide.
