I’ve volunteered for ATD (All Together in Dignity) Fourth World Philippines before, but last Saturday was my first time to join their annual Festival of Learning, together with my Flipper friends Sana (a long-time ATD volunteer) and Joko (who volunteers regularly for the annual festival).
It was a bright Saturday afternoon when we gathered at the North Cemetery, one of ATD’s communities in the Philippines. I had written a piece on this particular community for one of ATD’s reports last year, and I had read through a lot of documents and watched some video footage to write it, but I’d never actually set foot in the place before, and it was quite a moving experience to fill in my mental image of the area with the faces of the people from the community.
The first order of business for us was laying down the mats on the ground and reading books with the kids. I’ve always admired ATD’s street library concept, which is quite literally sharing books with the kids. I had barely even taken off my shoes when I received a couple of tugs on my shirt for storytime, and I sat down with three boys at the edge of the mat, where they presented me with a pile of books they wanted me to read to them. As luck would have it, the top book on the pile was Maurice Sendak’s “Where the Wild Things Are,” a book close to my heart (and one that was read aloud to me as well), and it helped that I was familiar with the story while I was grappling with the translation (erm, wild thing = halimaw?).
All around us was the buzz of reading, but the kids were enthralled as we read about Max and the Wild Things and the wild rumpus, and as they pushed more books into my hands, all I could think of was how hungry these kids were for books, and how something as simple as being read to brought smiles to their faces.
Then Joko and her friend Maira did a couple of storytelling sessions featuring “Ang Pambihirang Sombrero” written and illustrated by Jomike Tejido and “Araw sa Palengke” written by May Tobias-Papa and illustrated by Isabel “Pepper” Roxas, and the kids definitely got involved in the interactive narration.
As readers, we often experience the power of a story whenever we get engrossed in a book, but it’s still nothing short of magical when you see it move an entire crowd:
Later on we broke off into smaller groups for workshops, and there was a lot of activity going on all around the lot — journaling, sewing, clay art, collage, and many more.
In my little corner, we did a silhouette workshop, where the kids did life-sized drawings of themselves. All I had to do was pair them up, demonstrate the tracing, and they did the rest!
The star of the session, Potpot, who amazingly turned in a full-color portrait of himself as a superhero:
It was a lovely experience, being able to share two things I’m passionate about — books and art — with these kids, and it’s wonderful that ATD gives the kids a venue for knowledge and creativity, right in their own backyard.
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Find out more about ATD Fourth World Philippines: https://www.facebook.com/ATD.Philippines