The Philippine capital of Manila was the infamous home of a massive steaming garbage dump nicknamed "Smoky Mountain." Until it closed several years ago, hundreds of families lived on and around the dump, surviving on food scraps, trying to make a few pesos repairing and reselling refuse.
During my yearlong stay in Manila, I joined the "Junior Rotarians," a student-run charitable offshoot of the local Rotary Club. When they announced a project to help the poor of Smoky Mountain, I volunteered.
While normal life at Smoky Mountain was miserable, some- times it crossed into the realm of the abysmally tragic. Three weeks before my arrival, an open cooking fire had spread, burning down a section of Tondo, the nearby shanty town, killing dozens. Without running water, no one could stop the flames.
In this setting the noble Junior Rotarians stepped up and a day of service was declared to help the hapless Smoky Mountaineers.
I joined the assembly in the parking lot of the Bel Air Country Club. Empty trash can-size oil drums filled the lot. About 25 volunteers painted some cans bright red and filled others with sand.
"What exactly are we doing here?" I asked Jojo, the group coordinator.
"The Junior Rotarians are donating this fire-prevention equipment to the poor in the Tondo neighborhood," he answered.
I looked for some sign of hoses, portable pumps, fire extinguishers, even a squirt gun, but saw nothing.
"What equipment?"
"All around you! We're filling these cans with sand the Tondoites can use to dump on fires. The sand won't attract mosquitoes like water would, which means we're saving them from malaria as well."
"So essentially, we're giving away trash cans?" I asked.
"Yes."
"To people who live in a trash dump?"
"Um, yes ... But we're painting them bright red! They'll stop fires!"
During my yearlong stay in Manila, I joined the "Junior Rotarians," a student-run charitable offshoot of the local Rotary Club. When they announced a project to help the poor of Smoky Mountain, I volunteered.
While normal life at Smoky Mountain was miserable, some- times it crossed into the realm of the abysmally tragic. Three weeks before my arrival, an open cooking fire had spread, burning down a section of Tondo, the nearby shanty town, killing dozens. Without running water, no one could stop the flames.
In this setting the noble Junior Rotarians stepped up and a day of service was declared to help the hapless Smoky Mountaineers.
I joined the assembly in the parking lot of the Bel Air Country Club. Empty trash can-size oil drums filled the lot. About 25 volunteers painted some cans bright red and filled others with sand.
"What exactly are we doing here?" I asked Jojo, the group coordinator.
"The Junior Rotarians are donating this fire-prevention equipment to the poor in the Tondo neighborhood," he answered.
I looked for some sign of hoses, portable pumps, fire extinguishers, even a squirt gun, but saw nothing.
"What equipment?"
"All around you! We're filling these cans with sand the Tondoites can use to dump on fires. The sand won't attract mosquitoes like water would, which means we're saving them from malaria as well."
"So essentially, we're giving away trash cans?" I asked.
"Yes."
"To people who live in a trash dump?"
"Um, yes ... But we're painting them bright red! They'll stop fires!"
see how this turned out by clinking to the link of my story in the San Francisco Chronicle
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/03/19/CMGU9GJ0CF1.DTL
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