Bank of America Group is one of our global partners who have supported the work of Habitat for Humanity in various countries for more than 30 years. Every year their employees participate in volunteer activities for housing needs in their neighborhood communities all over the world. As part of this effort, a collaborative work took place for the first time in Japan this autumn.

On the pleasant autumn day of October 15th, 16 volunteers from Bank of America Merrill Lynch gathered at a foster home in Machida city, Tokyo. The facility was built 40 years ago and the inner walls had never been refurbished. There were visible signs of aging such as paintings partly peeled off or stains. Seeing this state, Habitat Japan repainted the interior of the facility together with the Bank of America Merrill Lynch employees to make it more decent for the children to live. As it is known, masking the trims and preparation are the key for painting, volunteers started the work with carefully wiping the walls, and meticulously covering spaces where painting were not needed with masking tapes and sheets. Once this preparation was done, the work finally started with rollers, and the walls that were once dull regained their brightness in a blink of an eye.

School was off on that day. Children at the home showed great curiosity for this volunteer works and came to see it closely and some children enjoyed hand painting outside with volunteers. By the time the half of the wide corridor walls had been painted the lunch time came. Barbecue lunch was offered by Bank of America Merrill Lynch. 40 children living in the home joined the barbecue and enjoyed it so much that meats were gone as soon as they were cooked. The children sung a song as a gift after the barbecue, and the lovely day ended with smiles on both the children and volunteers.

Habitat for Humanity aims to create "a world everyone has a decent place to live" by building a foundation to achieve strength, stability and self-reliance through not only builiding homes but also through improvement of the living conditions and bringing people together.