A not so ordinary Sunday travel to the mountain

Smokey Mountain, that is.

Smokey Mountain was the term coined for a large landfill once located in Tondo, Manila.

It is now a slum area. The previous visit I had to this community was December last year 2018 when we distributed gift packs to residents. In July this year 2019, I met Justine in one of the volunteering trips that I joined to the province of Ifugao. When I saw her post on Facebook that she and her friends will celebrate their birthdays with the beneficiaries of Progressive Assistance Canada or PAC on 17 November, I shivered with the thought that the year is about to end and my last volunteering activity was in July. I need to join her birthday celebrattion with the kids.

I set my alarm at 4:30 in the morning. That's too early for a lazy Sunday but commute time to the meeting place (not yet the actual venue) is about two hours and I wanted to first have breakfast in our meeting place which is a restaurant. I arrived 30 minutes earlier and had my breakfast. I was done and no one was around yet. I was the earliest to arrive this morning. Cool!

There was a car service of one of Justine's friend wherein they loaded all their gifts for the kids. Justine asked me to go with the car so I can accompany and guide our way while she and the others will commute. As if I knew the way but there is Google GPS and Waze so no sweat.

I was saddened with the sight when we started to traverse the narrow street going inside the community. The place is worse than I last saw it. Piles of garbages are now along the street which was clear and clean before.

^{This is the exact spot where we parked the van that was loaded with grocery items which we distributed last year. Now it is a mountain of garbages. More piles are in other sides of the street that were also clear before.}

The street got narrower as we went farther inside the community. I thought the side mirrors will touch the walls on both sides but the driver was very good.

The venue that PAC coordinator told us was at the third floor of the barangay (village) hall. We unloaded the relief goods at the ground floor when reached the area.

While waiting for other volunteers, children wearing PAC shirts started to arrive from different sides of the street.

When Justine and more volunteers arrived, we hauled up to the third floor. The PAC coordinator along with Justine gaves us instructions and we all went to take care of our assigned tasks. We started preparing the relief goods. I was on the loot bags.

There were candies, cup cakes, biscuits, chocolates, cookies , jelly candies (all of which I hope the children's teeth will not be collateral damage), and school supplies like coloring book with crayons, pencil and notebook.

Just like my first visit here, the children had their breakfast of boiled egg and banana. The coordinators called for the children's grouping to come to order while we randomly dropped excess items to the loot bags. There were big bags of used (but not abused, as Justine coined it) clothes and toys but Justine said we will just distribute them separately so we did not include in the loot bags.

Team Love - ages six years to... I forgot.

Team Hope - of course, I also forgot the start of the range but it was up to ten years old.

Team Faith - ages eleven to sixteen years. This is the team I was randomly assigned to when we counted off.

Right when we were about to start our activities, I noticed someone taking the loot bags and going to towards the exit. I asked why and he was saying that we need to transfer venue because there is another group that will use the area for seminar. Seminar on a Sunday? I wanted to ask but thought better of it and just shut up.

I asked where we are transferring to. He said to GK building. That is Gawad Kalinga which is another charitable organization like the Habitat for Humanity. Wherever that building is, I did not ask. I just joined them hauling our stuff again and bringing them out. When I reached the ground floor, the loot bags that were carried out earlier were there. Apparently, we do not yet have a place to transfer to. They were waiting for further instruction. I choose to stay silent and did not make a comment.

So far, it did not take long for me to get bored before people started to move again. I waited to see where they will lead us to and the rest of us followed. Good gracious, it was just to the next building which is a health center. But guess what? We do not have a space to stay inside. We occupied their front yard. The loot bags were lined up along the patio. Poor us, we really have no better place to go. But heck, this is better than cancelling the outreach.

The outreach activity went on. And that is because of the active and still very motivated volunteers. What's more? Our being kicked out from the barangay hall seems nothing to the children. They just convened again and listened to the coordinators.

Nothing stopped everyone's mission to help. We pushed through even if the kids have to squat on the ground;

Use flower bed rim as their table;

Use the wall for writing;

Or even on the ground.

The volunteers responded with gusto. They too squatted on the ground;

And put up a classrom along the street;

At exactly beside the street got them so close together.

I was assigned two young lads, an eleven and twelve, and a young lady of eleven. The boys suddenly disappeared when our lesson started. When I looked for them, they were near the speakers in front and working on their quizzes on the floor. How I love these boys!

The one in black was quicker. When I asked how the one in white is doing, he ran away. I called out but he got lost in the crowd. I left the other boy and went looking for the one that got away. He was on the corner wall working on his multiplication quiz. I hovered over his back and noted that he was working on seven sticks per row. I looked at his quiz paper and he was on the multiplication of number seven.

I do not know how fast or slow I was with multiplication during my days but I do not recall needing sticks. This boy needs help. I want him to understand the logic of multiplication so I did not just give him the answers. We went through the rest of his sticks. My young lady student whom I forgot (sorry to her) came and teased the boy of being too slow. I told her to let him be. He was not yet looking confident with what I was explaining when the "teacher" called time is up. He had to submit his paper.

The next lesson was about fractions. The two boys were no longer anywhere to be found and I gave up looking for them. The teacher discussed the lesson and gave them quiz to work on. This time, the young lady came to me for help as she seem so serious of solving the problems.

It was addition of fraction but she has to do multiplication to find the common denominator. When I asked her about the product of the denominators, I was surprised when she motioned to multiply using her fingers. She knows the trick!

For those who do not know the trick to multiply using fingers, here is how it is done.

After the tutorial, I joined the rest of the volunteers in preparing the food. This time there were boxes of spaghetti and they were adding fried chicken, hotdog stick with marshmallow at the end and pichi-pichi. We then distributed to everyone who lined down on the ground.

Others were on the floor enjoying their meals with the birthday girl, Justine.

While the children were eating, the facilitator was leading them to sing the birthday song for every celebrator - Justine, Jel, Lance and the other lady I forgot her name (sorry) - who celebrated and will celebrate birthday within the month of November. Justine's birthday was last 14th November.

Loot bags distribution came next after the meals. This time, they lined down the stairway steps and waited foe their bags as the volunteers went around.

I don't know what they were talking about but I was sure they were happy with their bags.

Before finally leaving, the children lined up going out of the front yard for their apple for the day.

When the crowd was gone , one of the PAC coordinators called for Justine to say her piece. Her main message was, no matter how problematic you are, just imagine the joy that you still brought to the kids. She also encouraged everyone to continue volunteering.

Of course, group photo will not be missed.

Then we dispersed to eat the remaining packs of food. At first I suggested that we give the excess packs for take home of the kids. We actually gave a few of the kids their second packs but Justine later decided that we leave it for us volunteers. That was when I thought of checking the time: few minutes before noon. Yes, most of the volunteers may be hungry by this time specially those who may not have taken their breakfast because our meeting time was early at seven o'clock in the morning.

At first Justine decided to just hand the toys and clothes over to the PAC coordinators but later she decided to distribute the clothes to the residents along with the pansit bihon from a giant bamboo plate that was left untouched because there were many excess food packs.

We served the pansit in plates and started our way out of the community along with the bags of clothes.

The food was gone in seconds while someone was saying a few wanted to hoard the clothes. We continued to our way out while giving the clothes out. It was a hit and could have been gone too in seconds but we somehow controlled the distribution so a few more could have their share.

It was a very fulfilling outreach and to be reunited with a fellow volunteer whom I met from another cause. That was in spite of the fatigue that I was feeling in the peak of the activity as I forgot to mention that I swayed twice. I thought I would faint. I wondered why because I had full breakfast. I checked the temperature and it was not frying after all. Okay, I did not have enough sleep due to work.

Not bad. I made it and will do it again even if I do not know how to get there and get out unless I go along with other volunteers... Now, time to find my way back.