by Reynaldo de Jesus

The first Wednesday of August, which also happened to be the first day in August, was the first visit of Ateneo 50/54 to its GK site at Payatas, which is also the site of various Ateneo alumni GK projects. After Mass celebrated by classmate Fr. Guido Arguelles, S.J. at AIM, Emy Ramos, Totoy Llamas, Ding DeJesus, Fr. Guido, and Mel Salazar, together with GK's Ken Reston, trooped across the street to KFC, devoured two buckets of fried chicken, and then motored to Payatas in Ding's van. Some 45 minutes later saw them at a section of GK-Payatas' few homes already finished and occupied. Unlike GK-Baseco, which the class visited a few months earlier, GK-Payatas is not yet a contiguous whole. That is the intent, but right now negotiations are still ongoing between Gawad Kalinga and various land-owners at the place. Hence there is still no Ateneo 50/54 cluster of houses to speak of. Which is good, in that before a cluster is designated as that of Ateneo 50/54, hopefully all of the pledged donations will have been paid and remitted to Gawad Kalinga so that Ateneo 50/54 will have a contiguous cluster instead of one cluster of 10 or 11 houses and 2 or 3 more houses located willy-nilly at the site.

Class members had very pleasant visits with the residents, who as at other GK villages exuded that same spirit of hope and goodwill. Remember these were once upon a time squatters, without any means of livelihood and hope for a better life. All that has changed for them and they can now look forward to education for their children, gainful employment or source of livelihood, regular meals, clothes on their backs and their very own roof over their heads. The typical house is somewhat bigger than those at GK-Baseco, and each has two bedrooms. Most if not all of them are in various stages of finishing, i.e. interior walling, painting, etc., but they are certainly habitable. And no shortage of smiles from the inhabitants. What a difference from your typical slum-dweller! And what a warm feeling for every member of the class who was there!

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