I would! And even though I've been wanting to for a long time, after much procrastination (mainly due to not really knowing how to do it), I've finally gone and made my an organ donor! Thanks to this new local radio station, BFM, which I didn't know existed until a friend recommended it to me. They run a lot of talk shows about various topics every day, and one day I heard this talk about organ donation, with a guest speaker from the National Organ Transplant Centre (or something like that), and she explained the process of how to go about becoming an organ donor, as well as debunked some famous myths about organ donation.
Like, a lot of people aren't too keen on donating their organs, some of the main reasons being that they are afraid that the process of organ harvesting will postpone the funeral, that the body will come back looking like crap, or that organ donation is against their religion. The speaker explained that after death, the organ harvesting process is actually very quick, and the staff performing the havesting make every effort to ensure the body is kept in as good condition as possible. As for the religion bit, frankly I've never heard of any religion with any clause along the lines of "Thou shall not giveth thy organs away to anyone else". I would suppose most religions teach the importance of giving... and there are people out there in dire medical conditions who need organs to survive, and once your dead, it doesn't make you any more of a sinner if you're missing a couple of body parts here and there, so why not give already? Yeah well, the speaker didn't quite say it like that, but you know, I'm just...um... paraphrasing. Yeah.
As for me, I'm always into recycling whatever can be recycled, even myself. Waste not, want not, you know. And I was happy to find that the process to apply to be an organ donor was pretty easy. I just visited their website at www.agiftoflife.gov.my, clicked on the section on section on organ donor registration ("Jadilah Penderma"), downloaded, printed out and filled in the application form, and faxed the filled form back to the number provided. I also called their toll free number to make sure I did it right and that they received it. Instead of talking to a real person, I got a voice recording that asked me to key in a few numbers, say my details out loud, and at the end of it, the voice recording said they would send me my donor card within 2 weeks. *Bleep*. I was kinda like "Huh?" after that, wondering if they actually got my info right since I didn't speak to a real person, but I waited a couple of weeks, and lo and behold, I got my donor card in the mail!
It's actually a rather flimsy piece of card which will probably look like 'rojak' within a few months of keeping it in my wallet. But I HAVE to carry it on me at all times, so I don't have a choice. I'm also supposed to tell my family that I'm an organ donor, so that in the event of me passing on, kicking the bucket, biting the dust, and other nice replacements for the word 'die', my family will know my wishes and not object to the organ harvesting. This is a pretty big problem when they try to collect organs, families of the deceased donor have no idea, so they make a big objection against it and give the harvesters a hard time. So people, now you know I'm donating ALL my organs and tissues, so when they come for me, make sure they make the most of my dead body. Haha, that sounds very wrong. :P
While I'm not squeamish about most of my body parts being in someone else (or more than one someone else) after I die, the one thing that is a bit freaky to me is my face being on someone else, like was the case with this lady, Connie Culp , who was shot in the face by her husband, resulting in her looking like...um... really ugly. After a successful face transplant with facial tissues taken from another lady (who was dead by then, of course), she looked a lot more normal.
I suppose if I'm dead, I won't be able to experience the weirdness of having my face on someone else... but wouldn't that just be the weirdest thing for the family and friends of the dead donor? To see the face of someone they knew on another person? I mean, I wouldn't say no to donating my facial tissues (I guess that comes under 'all organs and tissues' on my donor card) coz' it would the best thing ever to someone who's been horribly disfigured like this poor lady.... but doesn't reduce the freaky factor.
So I guess the new question now would be... would you recycle your face??!!
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