Arriving in Manila

I left my life in Taiwan and headed strait for Manila in the Philippines. From Kaohsiung, I took a bus to Taipei, then a taxi to the airport, then an airplane to Manila. Once in Manila, I realized that I forgot to write down the address I was to give the taxi to meet Jeff Long, the man who runs the orphanage called Kids International that I am working at. I also forgot to write down his cell phone number. So I had to go to the nearest place I could to access internet, which I was told was the Mall of Asia. I took a taxi there, found a Starbucks with internet access. (Side note: there are more Starbucks in Asia then almost anywhere in the world, and I think I would have been dead in the water without them and their wireless internet throughout this entire trip!) From there I called Jeff, got the address and, incidentally, headed to another Starbucks to meet two Americans who are full timers at the orphanage.

Once, I walked into the Starbucks I saw two American ladies, Kim and Daisy. Kim is the school master and Daisy is a volunteer that helps with the babies, she is planning on being for a full year. With Kim and Daisy where 5 month old, twin boys named Danny and Jacob. Their mother did not want them, she attempted to abort them a few times by poisoning herself, but was unable to. Then, Kids International came along and offered to take them. They were born premature but are healthy now and very cute.

As I sat in Starbucks with Kim, Daisy, Danny and Jacob – I was able to learn much about the orphanage that I was about to go and work at as we had to wait for another girl who arrived thru the domestic airport. I discovered that Kids International has two orphanages, one in the south and one here in Manila. The orphanage in Manila has 29 kids. 24 are school aged and there are 5 babies. The 24 school aged children go to the school that Kids International runs. In the school, along with the 24 kids from the home, they also provide free schooling to about 50 community kids. They chose the kids in the community who don’t have dads. In exchange, the single mothers come in about once every two weeks and make lunch for the kids and clean the school up.

The school was built last year and also serves as a community church on Sunday and a community center on most evenings. The top floor is one large open aired gym with basketball courts.

I am sure as I continue my work here I will find out more interesting things, and one thing is for sure, I will be keeping you posted!