Causeway Bay Donor Centre

One of my friends randomly asked us if we were up for donating blood one day. It was a very out-​of-​the-​blue suggestion, but hey, why not? We’re young and healthy and it’s effortlessly doing a good deed.
We decided to go to the center next to Sogo, inside a building that’s strangely called ‘Radio City’. When we got there, we were each given a form mounted on a clip board to fill in — forms are available in both English and Chinese. The form was a lot more extensive than I thought it would be — the first page was just filling in your particulars, like full name, address and the like, and after that were pages of questions asking you about your medical history, like if you’d taken this like of medicine in the last few weeks, ever experienced this kind of allergy etc. It took me more than five minutes to fill that form up!
After that, we were called in to a room for somebody to check our blood pressure, prick a little of my blood and run through the forms we had just filled in. The nurse was really friendly and made conversation with me, asking me what I was studying in university and whether I was enjoying it. She made me feel really comfortable and I felt like I was just having conversation with a friend.
When that was done with, we had to wait a little longer before we were directed to a chair for our blood to be drawn. The process was a lot faster than I thought, and once the needle was in, it didn’t hurt. It was a little scary to see your own blood flowing and being contained! The process was quite relaxing actually because I was just using my other hand to use my phone the whole time!
When enough blood had been drawn, we were led to a table where we could have some water, tea and biscuits to kind of restore ourselves. When we were sitting down, one of the staff approached us and started telling us about their charity and how they needed our support. He went on for quite a while and I didn’t understand him entirely as he was speaking really fast in Cantonese, but he was asking us if we were willing to give him our bank account details for a certain amount to be withdrawn each month as a donation. We declined politely as after all, we are students and would have to consult our parents regarding this.
Overall, my first blood donation was pleasant. The staff were all very patient and friendly, and the center was kept nicely and didn’t make me feel on edge that there was probably enough blood in this room to fill a couple of human bodies. I’ll definitely be back to donate again!