I think, I’ve heard about ‘Lupus’ like a million times on House, but I never bother Googling the word until today. Yeah, I know.. total ignorance. My bad.
Well, thankfully, Persatuan Lupus Malaysia organized an awareness campaign called Walk-A-Payung 2009 last Sunday morning to shade some insight on lupus for ignorant people like myself. The info I got explained that the Systemic lupus erythematosos (SLE) or better known as lupus is one of the disorders of the immune system where the immune system turns against parts of the body it is suppose to protect, or in typical Malay saying, its sort of like “Harapkan pagar, pagar makan padi” where the pagar would be the immune system, and the padi would be the body part’s it’s suppose to protect.
Actually, we (Fahriee, Amiey and I) were not invited to this event officially, but we figured that it would be interesting to join in, and do some ‘charity‘ work for a time being. After all, we had no idea what SLE was all about, and this would be the best platform to make ourselves ‘educated’ about such thing. In addition to that, the whole Walk-A-Payung project did seem really cool and interesting. Yes, we paid a full RM20 to participate as well =)
I personally think the whole event was blessed because just before the walk started, the heavy rain stopped, hence allowing all those involved to participate full in the Walk-A-Payung. The whole journey took about 4km, and all participants were equipped with a red t-shirt, a white cap, and a silver umbrella to complete the walk which started at the Kuching Amphitheater. If my calculation is right, there was about 50 participants, young and old, and all were eager to do their part to give the public more awareness on SLE.
Nadia whom also participated in the walkathon with family and friends said she was ecstatic about completing the walk, as she promised to help promote the event with her fellow college mates next year. The organizers were equally happy with the sponsors and also the good turnout this year, as they hoped that more people would become aware of SLE and help those whom are suffering from it.
I think, if you have no idea what SLE is all about, you should come for this event next year (assuming they will do it again). I came, expecting to know more about SLE and do my small part in charity, but I ended up hugely enjoying the whole walk around town, regardless of people slowing down their vehicles, while staring and most probably wondering who the hell we were. Even better, now I know what Dr House means when he says “It must be lupus“… Ain’t that cool??
