300 Badjao kids served with hot meal by YMCA

By ALEXANDER D. LOPEZ
To highlight the commemoration of the 45th year anniversary of their organization, members of the Young Men’s Christian Association in Davao City (YMCA-Davao) on Thursday, May 26, headed to a seaside village in Matina Aplaya in Davao City to extend feeding assistance to nearly 300 children, most belong to Badjao Tribe who for years have been driven out from their floating houses in the seas of Jolo and Tawi-tawi, either due to violence or economic considerations, into the major cities of Mindanao.
 In Matina Aplaya, Badjao houses no longer float meters away from the beaches but are lined up near the shores, built in light materials but painted either with blue, green or red colors.
“This is one of the community works that YMCA members do in Davao City,” said YMCA-Davao president Fernando “Boie” S. Ongkingco Jr. when interviewed by EDGE Davao during the event.
Ongkingco said nearly 300 Badjao children benefited from the feeding program and that more activities of the same nature will be implemented by YMCA-Davao in the area in the coming days.
Nora was among the mothers who lined up with her children during the feeding program.
“I thank them (the YMCA) for the food. This is a big help to us and our children,” Nora, a mother of five said in local dialect when interviewed.
She said her husband sometimes joins a group of Badjao men for fishing in high seas for more than a week.
Now that rains have started to come they stopped their fishing expeditions and opted to join their neighbours in selling second-hand shoes in the major streets of Davao City.
Daily income for them is difficult, Nora asserted and feeding programs such as the one implemented by the YMCA and other institutions are very much welcome to them.
Ongkingco added that aside from community and feeding programs, YMCA is also involved in sports development especially for the youth.
On June 6, YMCA-Davao will facilitate a mini-Olympics that that will be joined by more than a thousand youth from Davao City.
The sports event is aimed to promote sports among the youth and discourage them from going into vices and drugs.
“We are going to invite all the schools in Davao to join the Olympics,” he pointed out.
Ongkingco said they will be announcing the specifics of their upcoming event in the social media and other means of information dissemination.