Ever since I can remember,
every Saturday morning, my dad would take his weekly “dump trip” to the
Wellesley Recycling Center. I never really understood the importance of my town’s
recycling center, until I realized all of the good it really stands for. Not only does it save
the community money by replacing a trash pick up company, but also it stands as
a place where you can go to drop off what seems to be a worthless item and
someone can take it and reuse it for their personal desire. About a year ago,
My dad’s coworker, Abasi
Semakula, asked my dad if he had any old bikes lying around that he would want
to give to him. My dad asked him why he wanted the old bikes, and if he was
planning on using them for his personal use. Abasi proceeded to tell my dad his reasoning for wanting the
bikes, and what he was going to use them for. He told my dad that he was
filling up a container of old toys, bikes, and sports equipment; basically anything
that a child could play with, and sending the crate to his native village in Uganda,
Africa. Abasi created The Clover Children’s Toy Project, based at his house in
Maynard Massachusetts, where he fills up a container of the recycled toys and
ships them back to the hundreds of poor Ugandan children whose families
are unable to buy them their own toys to play with. The crates of toys
sent over not only allow the children to play with them, but has also affected
their happiness and outlook on life. The older children fix the toys that aren’t as new
as some and are able to get them working again which results in life long working skills. When I learned about how life-changing toys were to
these kids, I realized how lucky I was to grow up with so many. I knew that I
wanted to help and give back to others in some way. Recycling the toys that I
had out grown and no longer had use for was one way I could do so. I remember
the first time, loading up my dad’s black pickup truck, with bikes, roller
blades, action figures, and balls from my house and giving it to
Abasi for his crate. He was so thankful and appreciative of my efforts to supply
these children, half way around the world, with toys. He told me that the
children in the village would be forever grateful for my donations, and that I
had done a great deed. What I had done was only a small contribution to the
project, but I really liked the feeling I got from donating to this cause.