Hello! My name is Oviya, and I am a proud volunteer of the Seattle VT Seva team. I want to share something that I did recently that started as a small idea, but turned out to be a project that I’m very glad I took on.
I learn an Indian art form called Madhubani, which originates from Mithila, India. One day, my art teacher shared info about a business fair, where kids could be entrepreneurs for a day, and sell their own products.
Me, and another girl from my art school ended up being the only ones who wanted to participate, and decided on creating Madhubani styled bookmarks and earrings.
Eventually, when we had all the other details planned out, the topic of what to do with the money we earned came up. That’s when VT Seva popped into my head. I told my partner about the organization, and my vision to donate the money to VT Seva, towards empowering an underprivileged kids education. Knowing that we would be donating the money to someone in need, pushed me to work hard on our products throughout the summer. By myself, I managed to get 17 bookmarks and 7 pairs of earrings done. Since each of our products were original art (each one was made by hand), it could take a few hours just to finish two or three bookmarks or pairs of earrings. But with the help of my partner for the fair, we had a total of 23 bookmarks and 23 pairs of earrings.
The day of the fair came and went quicker than it seemed at the time, and after weeks of preparation, we did very well. We were told we were one of the most successful stalls at the Children’s Business Fair. I am very happy to say that I raised $440 for VT Seva. I realize now that I was able to raise enough money to sponsor a child in India, and it brings me a lot of satisfaction to know that I helped someone who was in need. VT Seva taught me so many of the skills, like how to talk to people about the product, or building self-confidence and most importantly how to give back to community.
I hope to inspire people who think they don’t know what they’re doing, to realize that it only takes a tiny idea and small steps to reach a big goal.
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