Loving Africa 1(Sameway Leisure 458)

Queenie Chow TranslatorCher Cheng
:
–
:
E
VCE
(Togo)
Queenie
15
1990
(Togo)
( : )
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Hawkers in the street
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Making new friends
Beautiful beach in Togo
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Queenie Chow TranslatorCher Cheng
My name is Queenie. I am 26 years
old and I love traveling.
microinsurance.
Dream a
little dream :
To-Go or
Not-To-Go
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I have lived in Hong Kong, Australia,
France and Mexico. In the past few
years, I have travelled to Malaysia,
Central Australia, Singapore, Taiwan,
Los Angeles, Myanmar, Tibet, Cuba,
Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Panama,
Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica
Less than 5 years since graduation,
more than 15 professional exams, I can
almost call myself an associate actuary.
Yet I am very different from a typical
actuary.
I am a risk-lover. I love adventure. I
love travelling.
I believe travel makes one modest.
The more one travels, the more you will
see what a tiny place you occupy in the
world. I continuously dream a little dream
to see more of this big great world out
there.
I decided my next adventure
would be Africa – wildlife safari, Sahara
deserts, sand dunes, tropical rain
forests, big cat stalk, pygmy hippos,
fabulous festivals, irresistible music, the
mysterious world of masks and secret
societies. The mosaic of African people
whose histories are epic and whose daily
struggles are similarly so.
I also became very interested in
a new subject called micro-insurance.
Micro-insurance first emerged in the
late 1990s in the context of international
development and microfinance.
Against a backdrop of the microcredit
movement, micro-insurance was singled
out as much needed financial service to
allow the poor to gain access to credit,
to support the viability of credit providers
and to protect the productive assets of
the loan taker. In the years since, as it
has become a regular part of the drive
for financial inclusion. Africa being the
poorest continent on earth made it one
of the best places for learning about
I may not
have known where
Togo was but Togo
choose me and I knew I was
To-Go. Almost immediately
after sending through my
resume introducing myself
and my intention of
volunteering in Africa for
a few months, I received
a response from a
senior actuary based in
West Africa. I have since
learnt that this actuary
was an executive director of
Actuaries Without Borders.
She welcomed my skillset and have
since introduced me to a new business
wonderland of micro-insurance in West
Africa.
To travel is to discover that
everyone is wrong about other countries.
Indeed, as I was packing to leave on my
adventure to West Africa, those around
me became concerned about my safety
(editors note: parents excepted) and
my next three months in one of the
poorest regions in the world. Alike to
skydiving, although one may know that
such activity is highly regulated and the
risk of accident is even lower than taking
a hot-air balloon but your heart will still
beat that much faster as you get on the
plane. Yet once you dive out, you will be
in love with flying freely in the sky.
This is the same as taking out a new
step out of ones comfort zone.
To travel is to take a journey into
yourself. Stepping out of the plane
may not be easiest, yet I know I will
never regret my first journey into West
Africa. Allow me to also take you on
my adventure to the home of African
landscapes of our imaginations and
inhabited by an astonishing diversity of
traditional peoples – Togo in West Africa.
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