DUBAI // While many young people spend their evenings at shopping malls or relax with friends and family, two Emirati women are sacrificing their free time to care for patients at Dubai's Rashid Hospital. After a full day of work at Dubai Customs, Fatma Ateeq Mohammed, 22, and her friend, Sheikha Saeed Dhahi, 21, a full-time student, head to the trauma and emergency department where, between 5pm and 9pm, they help with administration and comfort poorly patients. Ms Mohammed and Ms Dhahi, both from Dubai, are just two of the more than 4,300 young Emiratis and expatriates enrolled in the Emirates Foundation's Takatof programme - a scheme inspired by Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, to encourage a culture of volunteering in the UAE. Takatof offers people, particularly young Emiratis from the age of 15 upwards, the opportunity to help those in need through a variety of humanitarian, social and community programmes, including volunteering in hospitals across the country and renovating government schools and local houses. With Ramadan just days away, Ahmed al Ketbi, the senior projects developer at Takatof, is expecting an influx of volunteers for the special programme it runs throughout the holy month, in which they hand out food vouchers to needy and disadvantaged families. Praising the thousands of youngsters such as Ms Mohammed and Ms Dhahi for their efforts since the programme launched in April last year, he said: "They make a lot of difference and add a great deal to their surrounding community and to themselves. "By interacting with people and patients they create a social bond, they also learn how to treat others and experience new situations which gives them an appreciation of their lives." Ms Mohammed and her friend laugh as they describe how they rush home from work to prepare for their night shift. "We rush home and usually have 30 minutes to freshen up before we leave for volunteering at the hospital," said Ms Dhahi. "We have been here at Rashid Hospital since May 11 this year and each period is for three months, so our time is almost finished, unfortunately." The first two hours of their shift is spent performing administrative tasks - Ms Mohammed works at the reception desk and Ms Dhahi at registration - before being relieved at 7.30pm to visit patients on the trauma and paediatric wards. This, they say, is their favourite part of the programme. "We ask them about their health, how they came to be here," said Ms Dhahi. "We sometimes write down parts of the Quran, which their families then read to them and sometimes we take small gifts for them. "With the young patients, we spend time reading to them, watching Disney cartoons, even teaching them words or numbers." Ms Dhahi recalls a girl, 2, who had been involved in an accident and needed brain surgery: "She has now been transferred to another hospital but we used to like to go and sit with her. We became extremely close to her mother." Ms Mohammed explained why they chose to give up their free time: "We decided to do something extra. We are both workers, we don't like to stay at home or spend every evening at the mall. "This we do primarily for our country but also to get experience of meeting and talking to different people." And they have the full support of their families. "Sometimes volunteer programmes come up in Abu Dhabi and our parents will say no because they don't like us, as single girls, travelling so far alone," said Ms Dhahi. "But they are proud of what we are doing." The Emirates Foundation is a philanthropic organisation that funds community-based projects aimed at improving the quality of life in the UAE for its citizens. Started by an endowment from Sheikh Mohammed, the semi-official organisation is now funded by private and public-sector donors. It has six core areas of focus: education, arts and culture, social development, environment, science and technology, and public awareness. Khuloud al Nuwais, the director of projects at the foundation, said the aim of Takatof was to "change mindsets". And 16 months later it appears to be doing so. "Volunteering is embedded in Emirati culture but the malls had taken over," she said. "We were not sure getting them to actually come to events or volunteer to renovate a school for example, would be easy, but we discovered that these young people were just waiting for an opportunity." While most of their friends are also volunteers now, Ms Mohammed and Ms Dhahi admit some people still struggled to understand why they wanted to do extra work. Ms Mohammed laughed: "In our jobs they joke, 'We are searching for sleep, you are searching for more to do!' but we feel proud of ourselves. We want to do more." @email:loatway@thenational.ae