Starting today and all the way up until the Big Volunteer Week, we will highlight the values of Serve the City (Humility, Compassion, Respect, Courage, Love, Hope) once every other week. Each value will be represented by different people from diverse cultures, backgrounds, professions and ages.
Today we present a story of Humility:
There are many people who consistently dedicate their time to Serve the City and it is their commitment that allows us to have an impact and really help those we serve. Inge Huijbrechts is one of these dedicated people.
Inge has worked with us for four years now, with a company that has been working with us for five. She works as the Vice President Responsible Business for The Rezidor Hotel Group. In September each year Radisson Blu and Park Inn by Radisson hotels commit to one full month of service, which includes various kinds of fundraising or volunteering. The volunteers work in small groups of four or five and choose which project is of interest to them, but Inge does them all.
She makes sure that she goes to each one of the activities, explaining, “I think that it’s important to know what they are, to experience the projects, to know the people.” She also participates in each one so that she can speak to her team “about how interesting and enriching these activi-ties are.”
Inge also just wants to be a part of them. “These projects really make you humble,” she says, “They make you realise what good a life you have, in what a luxurious situation we all are.”
She sees the value in going to a different side of the city, with your feet on the ground, and say-ing, “We’re lucky, and let’s help people that are maybe not so lucky.”
Inge remarks on the growth of Serve the City in the past ten years from just one organisation started by one person to now one hundred cities worldwide. She believes that this growth really “shows that people in cities care, and volunteering with Serve the City is something that is worth doing.”
Inge particularly enjoys the enthusiasm of the people who volunteer with Serve the City and says “that’s really the nice thing about Serve the City as an organisation, that it brings people in contact with each other; it’s really connecting people.”
Through her experience working with the nuns of Little Sisters of the Poor, the children at Clair Matin, and the people who are homeless at Gare du Nord, she has interacted with many different people, both those serving and those being served, and she says of her experience, “It al-ways makes me quiet. It’s a moment where you really experience all aspects of the city and can make a difference in people’s lives.”
Join us for the Big Volunteer Week to meet Inge and other amazing people!
