Reported by: Alissa Wu
As temperatures drop, COVID-19 has reached a new high this November. Most states have issued red alerts, closing increasing amounts of stores, and making many people unemployed. Without a strong source of income, these people are struggling to make ends meet, and depend on donation stores to resell clothing at very low prices that they can afford.
To help keep everyone warm through the winter, the Greater Princeton Branch of AYLUS (GPA) hosted a winter clothing donation event this month. Followed by other AYLUS branches across the country (Williamsville Branch in NY, Irvine Branch in CA, Gladstone Branch in NJ, Columbus Branch in OH, RSM Branch in CA, Phoenix Branch in AZ, Greater Memphis Branch in TN, East Cobb Branch in GA, and more!), together we are making this event nationwide so AYLUS volunteers could help more people in their communities.
From November 5th to November 21st, hundreds of GPA volunteers cleaned & bagged their old winter clothes and dropped them off at designated collection houses in Montgomery (Alissa Wu), Princeton (Fengqi Wen), Edison/Metuchen (Audrey Wang), Warren (Anthony Yang), West Windsor-Plainsboro and other locations (Cassie Tammy Wang). Totally we received over 2000 clothing items (coats, jackets, pants, hats, gloves, shoes), all re-packed in 55 large bags/boxes with AYLUS Donation labels taped.
On Saturday, November 21st, the GPA volunteers sent most donations to Goodwill Donation Center (415 Highway 18, East Brunswick, NJ 08816), a well-known nationwide charity organization to help low-income people in the NY and NJ area. Volunteers dropped off bags while wearing masks and taking proper steps to ensure safety.
Leaving the Goodwill, GPA volunteers continued to send the rest of donation bags to Feed Our Lambs, another non-profit organization (9 Pershing Ave., Somerset, NJ 08873), which plans to distribute the winter clothes to local homeless people and communities in need before Thanksgiving.
Although the COVID pandemic has exacerbated families’ financial problems with buying winter clothes, AYLUS hopes the “Keep Everyone Warm” Initiative will alleviate their difficulties, and bring warmth to their hearts!
Participants (11/21, 3 hrs for all): Alissa Wu, Cassie Tammy Wang, Fengqi Wen, Steven Li, Anthony Yang, Audrey Wang, Natalie Clark, Anna Pierson, Wenyan Wang, Xiangdong Wu, Haiying Fang, Selene Su, Yuqing Feng, Yi Wang.
