Making a difference

On December 3, I was having breakfast when a friend sent me a tweet telling me about the clean-up after National Day in Abu Dhabi. I told him I would meet him in five minutes. When I arrived at Khalidiya Park, there was already a group of 10 volunteers and the group kept growing.

The whole thing was very spontaneous. I was just one of the volunteers, and other people would pass by and ask what we were doing. When people realised we were cleaning up, they asked if they could help too. We were there from about 9am until late in the afternoon.

There was even a hearing-impaired volunteer who saw us cleaning up. He gestured to ask if he could clean up with us, and he was one of the hardest workers there. There were also cleaners already on site. We got them food and snacks throughout the day. It was a great success because we did what we had to do. We made a difference.

As an Emirati, I couldn't be more proud. I honestly believe there is not a greater show of loyalty to a country than a group of individuals who go out and take care of its wellbeing. I honestly believe that the real National Day parade was not on December 2, but on December 3, the day when the residents of the UAE woke up, grabbed some trash bags and some rubber gloves and said this is our country and we are going to clean it up.

I would love to see this kind of mind-shift in the way people show their loyalty, from the fancy cars and spray cans, to spreading positive energy and giving back to the country in any way they can.

The initiative was purely based on social media. From just one tweet, hundreds of UAE residents arrived on the streets to clean their neighbourhoods. What is even more interesting was the Twitter activity started in the morning. There were no arrangements made, just a shout out to people who wanted to help and where to meet.

I believe that today social media plays a critical part in any initiative, no platform has the spreading power that twitter and Facebook possess, and anybody who ignores it ends up limiting the exposure and support they need.

— The reader is based in Abu Dhabi