Improve Nutrition for 60 IP Filipino Children

            I am Flora, 36, a housewife and a mother to eight children. I am married to a farmer who earns less than three dollars a day. I help my husband plant corn, cassava or sweet potatoes on a borrowed lot whenever I am free from the house chores. We wait for almost five months before we can harvest corn for our consumption. We feed on “lagutmon” or root crops while we wait for harvest. We are able to eat rice just once a week. If there is no viand, we concoct soup out of water and salt.

            We are already used to poverty. I was born to a poor family and never had I experienced living a life without worries. However, with my children’s future at stake, I feel that I have to do something to help them get out of the usual cycle of being poor and hungry.

            Education for me is vital so that my children will have a better chance in life. Unlike me, they are still young and can still redirect the course of their lives by studying well. However, my daughter, Gina, struggles in school. Kung ako siya estoryaan murag wala jud sa iyaha. Mao sa iyang pag eskwela perme pula ang iyang grado. Ingon ang iyang teacher nag sige lang daw sya og dula pero sa iyang pangutok hinay jud daw. (When I talk to her, she seems she does not understand. She always gets failing grades. Her teacher said that she always plays but she is dull.)

            As a mother, I am worried. I know that I am not providing enough nutritious food for my children. Despite the struggles, though, I am looking for ways to keep them in school. Dili ko gusto na ilang masinati ang pait sa kinabuhi para pag-abot sa panahon makatabang na pud sila sa amoa. Gusto baya ni Gina na mahimu siya’g teacher. (I don’t like them to experience the bitter life that I have gone through. Time will come that they can help us. Gina dreams to be a teacher someday.)

            My spirit was lifted up when the supplemental feeding was initiated by the Children’s Joy Foundation, Inc. I felt like a burden was taken off from my shoulders. I know that it will only run for several months but it is already a big help. With the program, I know that my children are fed with nutritious food everyday until their physical well-being improves.

            My children also received school kits. I am very happy. Dako amung pasalamat kay usahay mawad-an me og paglaom pero kamu naa kanunay naga pahimangno na biskan kami na membro sa IP naa diay me katungod na mulambo.(We are very thankful because at times we lose hope but you are always there to remind us that even if we belong to the indigenous community, we have the right to progress.)

            Thank you for remembering our children. We would always pray for your success.

With much love,

Flora

Project Beneficiary

In late afternoon of March 25, 2016, an Outreach Team traveled to Matigsalog tribal community in the remote hinterlands of Davao City.  Its mission was to conduct a supplemental feeding to about 60 IP (indigenous people) children.  This activity was delayed for months due to the peace and order situation in the area. And at last on March 26, 2015, the wishes of Matigsalog kids and parents came true.

Our valued donors and supporters of Global Giving, the challenge of this project is to improve the health conditions of children in the indigenous communities of Salumay, Upian and Kalunbarak. The remote areas of Sitios Salumay and Upian are inhabited by Matigsalog tribal people.  Matigsalug" is a term, which means "people along the Salug River now called the Davao River.

The Outreach Team arrived in the area already in the twilight of March 25.  With the food stuffs in tacked, the Team members got busied themselves in preparing the ingredients to be cooked early morning the next day.  At dawn of March 26, the team woke up to cook the food consisting of two viands of beef steak and chicken kalderita and rice. 

In the venue at Sitio Kontrak of Salumay, the atmosphere was filled with joy and happy faces of Matigsalog children waiting for their share of the delicious and nutritious foods prepared for them.  It was like a birthday celebration where all kids present savored abundance of food that in their young lives rarely happens.

On the other hand, the mothers while their kids were eating had watched them with their smiles of joy saying in their own ways of thanking Global Giving and Children’s Joy Foundation for such a good opportunity for their kids given with abundance of food.   Mary Joy, a young Matigsalog mother of two children was very grateful of the project. “Nagpasalamat jud ko og dako na usa pud ang akong pamilya na benepisyari, wala jud kabutangan ang akong kalipay. Unya kamo na nag-anhi diri bisan pa lisod ang dalan nag antos jud mo anhi diri sa amoa aron lang mutabang” said Mary Joy with a smile. (I am very thankful that my family is a beneficiary, I am very happy. You came here despite of bad road, you sacrificed to come to our place just to help us.)

Rosana, a volunteer cook of the Outreach Team, said “first time pa nako naka adto dinhi sa Sitio Kontrak ug ang mga bata malipayon kaayo sila na wala nila na experience tungod na first time ni nahitabo dinhi na may feeding ug malipayon kaayo sila ug  kami sad na volunteer na nag serbisyo sa mga kabataan.” (It’s my first time to come here in Sitio Kontrak and the children are very happy for this is the first time that there is feeding here, and we volunteers that made the services to children are also happy).  Her message to GlobalGiving and Children’s Joy Foundation, Inc. is to continue this feeding program because the project really responses to felt needs of the tribal communities.

To all GlobalGiving donors and supporters, please keep on supporting this project. Let’s continue touching the lives of young IP children.  Let’s collectively provide the opportunity in leading them to become strong pillars in community and nation building.   

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