Dear Sponsors,

I hope you are all doing well and are having a fun summer with your families. I must say summer because it’s summer time here in the Philippines. You might be experiencing another kind of season but still, we hope that you are having a good time.

Part of the summer season is the really scorching hot weather. Manila often reaches a temperature of 36 degrees celsius. I wonder how you can measure that in your country, but, believe me when I say it is really really hot.

Foreigners love the warm weather, so a lot of people from other countries come over to spend the summer on our beaches. Tourism is one way that locals earn money here. When these tourists come over to spend a month or so, you see a lot of Filipinos bring out their native products to offer to these foreigners.

Some locals provide services like massages, henna tattooing, becoming a porter and carrying the foreigners baggage, and some become tourist guides and errand workers. Those are just some of the things that people do to earn money during this season.

These are some of the many kinds of jobs where children get involved. In their tender age, about seven to twelve, they learn to work to help their families. You see a lot of children selling all kinds of things on the sidewalk. I see this daily on my way to and from work.

What’s even worst is that most of these children are just begging for food or money and they will come from anywhere to beg. That is the reality of the lives of the children here. At such a young age these children are forced to enter the workforce without a chance to experience childhood in a school setting.

We appreciate you so much for helping us little by little to eliminate these situations by supporting our “Meals at School Program Project”. This is a great way to keep children in school. We thank you for that! You are keeping roughly 500 or more children in school simply by continuing to give your support.

On my visit to Dugcal Elementary in Naga, one of the sponsored schools, I had the opportunity to interview most of these children and learn about what their lives are like. My heart melted upon hearing that their lives were just like the ones I described above.

They help their parents earn for their families and support their younger siblings. They work so they can eat; they work so they can have money to travel to school or buy their scholarly needs. Without their earnings, there would be no food and no school.

I realized through my interviewing, what a wonderful program it is that we have. We provide food so that the students need not worry about these things. They need not to work and exhaust their little bodies to earn money and buy food when they should be in school. When we provide the food, they can just study and have fun. They are free to live their lives as happy children, for this opportunity will only come once.

I am amazed at how they have such positive attitudes towards whatever is happening in their lives. They experience hardships, but they are happy. They are intelligent children and they love to study.

It would be such a tragedy if these children weren’t able to continue their schooling. They all have a lot of potential, despite living in a third world country where opportunities are rare. These children are all able to enjoy their summer now. They have no worries outside of schoolwork and studying.

There is another progress in Dugcal Elementary now, a new kitchen is being built by Give Children Hope. The kitchen is so that the food preparations will be more comfortable and to make sure that it is being prepared well.

Chairs and other supplies for the kindergarten were provided as well. You would be thrilled to see these little ones sit on those chairs and enjoy their classes. I remember my kindergarten days. I was always thrilled to sit on my mini chair with my mini desk. I know that these children are feeling the same excitement and happiness that I felt back then. The pictures will be made available on: facebook.com/givechildrenhopehope. So visit facebook and look at how these projects are going. There are also pictures also from Maravilla Elementary School in Iloilo on our facebook.

There is literally not enough room to describe how happy we are when we see that we are making a difference for a lot of children. We hope that you can have a feel of what amount of happiness you are bringing to these children. If they could just say thank you right in front of you, I know they would with excitement. I have felt these children’s warm hugs and warm thanks. I am not the one giving them the financial aid, but I feel so good and I imagine how much more happiness you would feel being the main contributor to their lives happiness and success.

We thank you for all the support you give to these children. The Dugcal and Maravilla Elementary Schools are one of the blessed schools in the Philippines. The children are really grateful and happy for all the help that you give to them. We hope that we can do more for them and even extend our help to some other schools as well. It is really worth all the sacrifice and effort just to see these children happy.

In behalf of the Sponsored children, happy summer and Happy Mother’s Day!

Sincerely,
Kristina Sunico