Through the eyes of a volunteer....

Below is the writtings of Chloe, a 20 year old who has come to volunteer with us for 3 weeks. She describes her first visit to the dump site community in Tondo....

  

"11/08/2012. Tondo dumpsite; festering with fermenting rubbish, knee deep toxic sludge, contaminated water and accessorized ever so plentifully with vermin. The visual can only be likened to the minds darkest concoctions of the aftermath of a war; devastation, disease and despair. As we travelled into the dumpsite dozens of smiling faces greeted and ran after us welcoming us to the community Not one child looked in anyway disheartened by their situation and couldn’t hold your hand or cuddle you any quicker - the people being the ultimate paradox to the extreme poverty they are victims of. Their affection, trust and joy left me with the heaviest feeling in my heart I have ever felt. I looked at the children, some with no clothes, some coughing from primary complex, some starving, some lying in contaminated flood water, ALL smiling – truly, diamonds in the rough. That day I listened to the children’s community choir singing for the first time. I was met by beaming faces desperate to perform. Whilst posing for the camera and singing ‘the climb’ the children sounded out of this world. Their English was word perfect, perfectly in tune,; the happiness in their eyes was overwhelming. When the choir finished and the children began to return to their ‘homes,’ cramped, disease ridden make shift homes scattered across the dumpsite, it hit me - these children have nothing but hope. That is the first time I have ever witnessed the power that having hope can have. It transforms these children from feeling alone and victimized to being some of the strongest characters I have ever met. I couldn’t help but cry later that day as I thought back to the tiny faces. That night I had a shower, I put on clean clothes, I went to the mall and I bought some dinner - not one of these things did I do without thinking how much I would give for those children to take my place. My mind boggled with how the situation could be so out of hand, the class divide far beyond any stretch of the imagination. I was consumed with feelings of anger, at why these children and adults must endure this when so many, including myself, have so much and always desire more in a complete self-obsessed ignorance. That night I felt the hollowest, darkest feeling I have ever felt - complete helplessness for the children. I wish I could take every single one of them and give them clean clothes, houses and rid them of disease, the fact that I cant and I have seen the conditions they live in makes me feel helpless and beyond any frustration imaginable. Photographs, videos, blogs, even fabrications of your mind, nothing will ever amount to the feeling that succumbs you in Tondo. So many turn a blind eye to the jewels that are buried under the dirt and the disease but my heart will never let me move on from the sights I saw my first day in Tondo ."