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UNI Apro Youth says "YES" to social movement unionism

Published: 10 September 2008
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 We were the first group that work up really early to get dressed with our “Stop ChildLabour” T-shirts, a quick wash and if time permitting – some breakfast. It has been raining the whole night and this morning looks rather miserable.



I have a promise to keep and that is – me and my team, yes “The Cooking Team’ is going to the Payatas to cook for 75 children.



We left the hotel at 7.30 am – a bit later than we anticipated as we had wanted to prepare all the food and cook earlier knowing that there are not adequate cooking utensils. It is a rather funny task because most of us are instance noodle cook rather than one that is going to cook a balance meal for the children.



In the bus, we were rather quiet – most trying to get a few more minutes of sleep but soon we arrived and we got into working mode immediately. The feeding centre is a small hut, it was dark and narrow. The actual part of the kitchen could only accommodate two people. One dish can only be cooked at any one time. We lay out the containers so that my team could scope in the cooked rice. When the vegetables were cooked, we started dishing it out while we started on the last dish – minced meat. We were told that these children do not often get the opportunity to eat meat and thus to help them, all meat are minced. We were all very quiet concentrating at our task.



The peace was shattered when our course mates arrived! They brought with them lots of fruits and balloons. With 30 people inside the feeding place, it was very cramp and with the heavy rain outside – everyone tried to help out with the preparations. It was decided that we need to shift to the covered court in the centre because of the rain. Most of the children also finds problems in coming as most areas are flooding or its too difficult to walk in the very heavy rain another issue was as the children are malnourished, they fall ill easily. However, we finished cooking and started to move everything to the court.



The Entertainment Group presented some songs while the Fun & Games Group had lots of games which were enjoyed by the children and UNI Apro Youth. The special group was visiting some children – we hope that they will be ok as the rain is really falling rather hard and the walk ways were not easy to maneuver as its turning into streams of water!



The children were really tiny – years of malnutrition have meant that their bodies and bones are not growing as it should be. Many children that gained adequate weight after the six months and is dropped from the feeding programme returned as underweight thus the need to continue with the programme. Most of these children have skin rashes – but we hold them and played with them – it doesn’t matter to us. What matter was the reward of their laughter and smiles! They weight nothing but they still smile at us.



After the games, we pass the food to them. They did not rush to get the food – they were very patience. However when eating, they were much focused to eat and savor the food. They did not complain that it wasn’t tasty but ate slowly and quietly. They were thankful that they can eat today.



UNI Apro youth distributed the fruits – something they do not have usually.



It was decide that we will provide our coaches to bring the children and their mothers’ home as the rain continue to fall. We stayed back to clean the hall and our groups evaluate our roles, impression and our feelings on this outing before departing.



Of all the meals that the cooking group members that will cook in the future, nothing will be more worthwhile than the meal that we cooked today. While it fills the stomach of the little ones, it fill our hearts in many invaluable ways.



Everyone came, no knowing what to expect. The poverty was something that we were not used to – seeing it in TV was very different than really being here and connecting with the people that live it day in and out. We thought that our role was to provide something today – maybe we did because there were lots of laughter and smiles. However when we left, we learned much more from these brave people. They come to find employment and when they could not, they did what ever they could to find a meal. Life is very hard for them and they looked much older than their age. Regardless of their difficulties, the children are children – they need food, shelter and clothing….as well as education but not having the means meant that they cannot have all these things that we took for granted.



This is the core reason that UNI Apro’s Social Movement Unionism plays such an important role. It high lights the unequal distribution of wealth in this globalised world that propaganda advertise the materialistic world that “money talks”. This has divided the people into two groups, one that is rich and one that is poor. The rich will get richer while the poor will get poorer as this group of people will not be able to afford to go to school and be “competitive” in the globalised world.



UNI Apro Youth is determine that basic human rights should be guaranteed for all human being regardless whether they have fat bank accounts or not and that children should be guaranteed rights for food, shelter and free education.



This event was made possible by UNI Apro, NWJ and UNI PLC Youth under the “Stepping Up on Youth@UNI Apro Telecom” held in Manila in August 2008. We would like to thank Bro. Christopher Ng, Regional Secretary UNI Apro,Bro. Kato President NWJ and the resource persons Alice, Eri, Kun, Peter, Rainier and Tamami as well as all our course mates that made everything such a great learning experience!