after the short prayer rally, my friends and i visited the gawad kalinga community at the baseco compound in tondo, manila. this is the large urban poor area that burned down a little over a year ago and is now being developed by various volunteers and institutions including the dlsu student council. my volunteer-friends shared their stories at how they built some of the houses in the area and paved the walkways and nakaka-inggit actually that i still haven't participated in the gawad kalinga activities. i sure hope that i will be able to do so in the near future. the things that have been done and made here are really admirable although much has to be done pa as you may see in the other pictures.

back in high school, i always sincerely liked joining the outreach programs we had every year and i realized, when i went to baseco, that i wasn't able to participate much in outreach activities in college. the first org i joined in la salle was actually cosca, or the center for social concern and action. it's the school's arm that initiates social awareness activities and programs. i was intent on being an active participant in cosca's activities when i was a freshman pa lang but i found myself being active in tapat and the student council at that time. tuloy-tuloy na 'yun after that and i never had time to be active in cosca anymore. sniff. not being active in cosca would probably be one of the regrets i'd have in college but i guess life had other plans for me. it's all good.


these are the houses that the volunteers helped build for the community. a large part of baseco though still remains to be developed. the houses are small of course but it provides the residents with a better alternative than where they would have probably lived in.