When she was in her early 20s, Dr Alicia Altorfer-Ong spent a few months volunteering at a refugee camp along the border between Myanmar and Thailand.

It was the 1990s, and she wanted to understand the region’s political and humanitarian realities beyond textbooks or newspaper headlines. She got in touch with a women’s organisation run by an ethnic minority group in Myanmar, and that was how she ended up living among the Karenni people.  

At the camp, she taught English and helped her host family with daily tasks. They welcomed her into their lives, sharing stories of fleeing from violent conflict and their favourite activities with friends and neighbours.

“Working and staying with the families I met was one of the best experiences of my life, and it’s moved and impacted me even after all these years,” Dr Altorfer-Ong told CNA Women.

Nearly three decades on, the 50-year-old is still in touch with them.

“When people go through adversity with hope and grit – flee from home with political instability over their heads, find their footing in an entirely foreign place by earning qualifications, find work and go through school – that kind of adaptability blows my mind,” she added. “The word ‘resilience’ was made for people like the ones I met at the border.”

As executive director of Ray of Hope, Dr Altorfer-Ong carries this deep empathy for others in her work. The crowdfunding charity raises funds by highlighting beneficiaries’ stories and lives as everyday people, rather than mere symbols of struggle.  

She rejects the idea that the only way to encourage giving is to provoke sympathy.

“I don’t believe in poverty porn,” she said. “It’s degrading and dehumanising when all we see about people is their suffering and what they lack – when every human is so much more than that, even when they’re in need.”