Member Spotlight: Fatima Mahmud
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Fatima Mahmud joined the Silver Spring Time Bank in September 2018 when she needed a long distance ride. Fatima saw an SSTB flier in her downtown Silver Spring apartment building and a resident on her floor was a member who told her about the timebank.
Sometimes when people join the timebank they can be unsure about what to offer. Fatima approached her offers analytically. She evaluated all of her skills and the tasks she enjoyed doing in her free time before she wrote any offers, and then decided what to offer.
Fatima’s offers are a mix of in-person and virtual ways that she can help fellow timebankers. Some of her offers are computer based administrative tasks like organizing computer files and other offers involve helping people around their home or with events. Fatima offers a whopping 27 offers, and provides detailed explanations of each of those offers in her Hourworld profile, so make sure to take a look!
Of all that she offers, Fatima most enjoys taking care of a task that a timebanker is frustrated by. For example, a few people felt frustrated by the status of various files on their computers and smartphones. Fatima helped them by remoting into their devices and organizing their files in a way that made them very happy.
Currently, Fatima spends about 2 hours a week remotely helping a sister timebank, the Ohio Simply Living Timebank (simplyliving.org) collect emails and notifications about local environmental events occurring in Ohio; and national environmental events relevant to the Buckeyes and then records them in a centralized calendar. That timebank taught Fatima how to use their calendar software once (Tockify.com) and shared their Google email account. Fatima tends to be good with technology and so she picked it up quickly and now manages their weekly calendar data without supervision. Fatima shares that she is great at organizing data. She created a digital inventory of 474 vinyl albums and 533 CDs for timebanker Kathy Napierala and Fatima couldn't believe that Kathy had 1,007 items until the end of the inventory!
Some SSTB offers Fatima has taken advantage of are car rides, especially longer ones as she doesn’t have a car in downtown Silver Spring. Building relationships with fellow timebankers is an added bonus of being a member of the timebank, Fatima says. Fatima shares that she has had great conversations with timebankers like Kathy Napierala, Sharon Englisch, and Fred Shuback, for instance.
If you ever wondered what offers to solicit from the timebank, Fatima says she asks members to do things for her that she either doesn't know how to do herself; or solicits advice on topics that she is not knowledgeable about. For example, Fatima solicited Mindy Shuback to cook for her, and Becky Sherblom, Claire Giammaria, and Mary Campbell to do sewing jobs. Fatima says there are great people in the SSTB willing and able to help!
Fatima has had some very memorable exchanges. Robert Lawhead converted 20 plus VHS tapes into digital format for her. Lisa Jacobson successfully dyed a stained white ¾ sleeve baseball shirt pink that had a permanent stain on it, thus bringing it back to life. The work was so good it looked like the shirt was originally pink! Jennifer Okosun did a great job braiding Fatima’s hair (see photo).
Moving forward, Fatima anticipates continuing with the same 27 offers she currently has on tap. However, if someone knows Fatima and her skills and suggests she offer another of her skills then she would certainly consider that.
What Fatima has enjoyed most about SSTB is getting to know her neighbors, receiving the help she has needed when she needed it, and helping others with anything they may feel is difficult.
A pearl of wisdom Fatima has to share is that when considering your offers, don’t undervalue all that you can do for others. An offer that may seem small to you may be very necessary for someone else. Also, take time every month or two to delete offers and requests that are no longer relevant. Finally, building a community of timebankers within the various Silver Spring apartment buildings can help increase the number and frequency of exchanges all around.
Timebank member Madeline Caliendo interviewed Fatima and wrote this lovely feature for the SSTB website and newsletter. In doing this, Madeline earned timebank hours. There are many ways members can do important work for the timebank and earn hours along the way: writing, social media, event planning, member support, website and newsletter help, etc. If you want to help, please write to silverspringtimebank@gmail.com, and we can suggest tasks that fit your skills and schedule.