Wei Jie

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A COMMUNITY international volunteer practice led by the Shekou Management and Service Center for Expats (Shekou MSCE) was selected as one of Guangdong’s Top 10 Outstanding International Volunteer Service Cases at the 2025 Understanding China Conference earlier this week.

The case, titled “Community Practice Co-created by Shekou International Volunteers,” along with another project from Shenzhen, stood out from numerous entries across Guangdong, receiving the honor just ahead of International Volunteer Day on Dec. 5.

A highlight of the Shekou MSCE’s initiative is a series of community murals painted earlier this year outside a local kindergarten in the Weizai neighborhood by Portuguese artist and volunteer Maria João Príncipe, widely known as Majó. “The Flowers We Carry With Us” project helped transform a previously plain blue wall into a vibrant outdoor gallery, drawing people to pause and connect and creating an emotional, cross-cultural bridge for people of different ages and nationalities.

Organizers say Shekou’s case offers a replicable model for international volunteerism that leverages art, language skills, and professional teams to foster inclusive, people-centered community development.

The Shekou International Volunteer Team was established in 2017, serving as a formal platform for expat residents to participate in community service. In 2020, the team was registered as a district-level Shekou International Volunteer Service Team, the first of its kind in Nanshan District.

Now the team has some 380 registered international volunteers, speaking more than a dozen languages. Their activities span legal-awareness campaigns, foreign-related mediation, cultural exchange, multilingual signage improvements, and broader efforts to build an internationalized community.

The Shekou MSCE has subsequently formed three specialist sub-teams — the Shekou International Emergency Response Team, the Shekou International Dispute Mediation Team, and a foreign-related lawyers’ service team — to provide a wider range of support.