All together in Dignity

MANILA, Philippines - It is 9 o’clock and time for class. For the 30 students of Ang Galing!, their desks are tombs and their classroom is a mausoleum at the North Cemetery.

For three years now, All Together in Dignity (ATD) Fourth World Philippines, a non-government organization headquartered in France, has been holding Saturday tutoring classes at the cemetery to help children who are dubbed as slow learners to cope not only with their education but more importantly to raise their confidence.

Jeff is 10 years old and should be in Grade 4 or 5. But since he repeated kindergarten twice and has been in Grade 1 for three years, he has fallen behind in school. 

His mother Yolly explains that her youngest son is a special child who does not think like other kids his age. He is unable to adapt to the school’s system and suffers the ridicule of other students who sometimes call him “tanga” and “bobo.” 

“Sometimes, they would say I am bobo because I do not study,” says Jeff.

But he does not get mad because he remembers his mother’s instructions not to fight back and just report the incident to their teacher.

Yolly, who sells flowers in the cemetery and has been living there since 1969, approached Ang Galing! program coordinator Guy Malfait and asked that her son be included in their tutoring program. After a year of Ang Galing!’s Saturday classes, she has seen an improvement in Jeff. 

Not only has he learned the basics of reading and writing in Filipino but he has become interested in studying and has gone back to school this year as a Grade 1 pupil. 

“I am very grateful to Ang Ga-ling! In school, he did not learn how to count 1 to 100 but at Ang Galing!, when he came home he started shouting ‘Mama, mama, I already know how to count 1 to 100 and learned the alphabet.’ I was really surprised,” the happy mother shares.

Now, not even sickness, whether sore eyes or fever, could make Jeff skip class. Even if he has not eaten breakfast, he would dash to where the ATD has set up camp. 

Yolly adds that there were times when she asked Jeff to fetch water and the boy would line up their cart at the manual water pump, but then he would disappear. He would later be found attending the Ang Galing! class. 

ATD has been in existence for 50 years and is present in 40 other countries. It has been in the Philippines for 30 years but it was only in 2013 when they started the Ang Galing! program. 

For the organization, the keyword is dignity. They help those who are not only impoverished but those who have lost their self worth as a human being, says the 44-year-old Belgian national Malfait.

That is why they named the program Ang Galing!

“We have learned that when you think you are stupid, you cannot do clever things. The way they are called is sometimes the way that they would act. So it is important to tell them ‘ang galing mo’ to help boost their self-esteem. You cannot learn if you are afraid to make mistakes. So if we ask them questions and the child gives eight wrong answers and two right answers, we would focus on the two right answers and we tell him, ‘Ang galing mo’,” explains Malfait. 

He points out that their intention is not to replace the school education of the children. In fact, they coordinate with the schools where the young ones are enrolled. 

While poverty is one of the reasons children drop out of school or are unable to get an education, Malfait believes that is not the main reason. There are other factors that contribute to this problem, such as the environment and at times the bad examples they see in the neighborhood. 

The cemetery, he adds, “is not a place to live.”

Malfait, who speaks Filipino and goes around on a bicycle, says that the Ang Galing! program was an offshoot of their street library program called Aklatan. When they visited poor communities and held arts and crafts activities and story reading with their young audience, they realized that some of the children were not going to school.

“There were 10-year-old children who had difficulty writing their names. We also heard of children who were in Grade 2 but could not read and write,” he says. 

And so the “Ang Galing!” program was born in 2012. Their first tutoring class catered to children living under Quirino Bridge over the Estero de Pandacan, but these families were relocated. The following year, they ventured to the cemetery. They hold two sessions every Saturday – from 9 to 11 a.m. and from 2 to 4 p.m.

“At Ang Galing!, the most important thing is that unlike traditional schools where a child adjusts to the school reality, our challenge in Ang Galing! is to adjust to their reality. We hold it at a time when it is good for them, we do it in a place where it is close to them,” Malfait says.

 He says a good thing about holding classes in a mausoleum is that they always have a roof over their heads, whether it is a sunny or a rainy day.

They leave it to the mausoleum caretakers, who are ATD coordinators, to ask the families of the deceased for permission to use the place for their classes.

“Some owners were asked for their permission, but not all owners know. There was one instance while we were teaching at the tomb and the daughter of the one buried there came. She was very happy because her mother was a former teacher and for her it was like a continuation of something that was important to her mother,” Malfait relates.

He adds that they make sure and clean the place before leaving. 

When there is a burial procession nearby, the teaching would be interrupted because the children would be distracted. They run to the throng of mourners to get leftover food and juice drinks. But after they get their snacks, they come back to class. 

The program has around 10 volunteers as the core group, with a larger group of irregular volunteers, who come to help in the tutoring when they have time.

The Ang Galing! program only teaches Filipino “because Filipinos should learn how to speak Filipino, that is what they speak at home. It is important that you know how to read and write in your mother tongue. If you cannot be successful in your own language, you would not be successful in learning other subjects,” Malfait maintains.

Volunteer Alma Cecilia Lawagan, a public school teacher of Filipino, is married with two kids.

She says: “When I was in Grade 1 and Grade 2, I was a non-reader. For me, this is ‘paying it forward’. When I do this volunteer work, I remember my teacher and cousin who made time for me and patiently taught me how to read.”

Although she was not teased for being a non-reader, “I do not like it when kids experience being humiliated publicly just because they do not know how to read. Kids are sensitive and they would be hurt if their classmates laugh at them,” she says.

Lawagan hopes that the hours they spend with these kids would bear good results for them. “I hope that these kids would not only think about their poverty. I hope that they would realize that apart from their family, there are others who care for them.”

For volunteer Desiree Sison, an online news writer, signing up to tutor the kids was a dream come true. She joined because “this is the number one item in my bucket list, to be able to teach underprivileged children.”

At first, she thought that holding classes in a mausoleum was morbid, but soon she was able to adapt to her surroundings. Sison soon found out that teaching, especially special cases, is not easy.

One time, she almost lost her temper with a boy, who was already in Grade 4 but could not pronounce some of the letters correctly because he suffers from a speech defect. “Out of frustration, I got mad and I raised my voice. But then I realized that I do not have the luxury of being mad at him because he is still a child and he is fragile.”

Malfait told her that she should not rush the child’s learning because “what is important is to establish a connection with the student. Our goal is to make the child feel good about themselves and not just to educate them.” 

The child was apparently not offended or did not even notice her outburst because he showed up at their next tutoring class and she was so pleased because she managed to help him pronounce a letter correctly. 

For many, this might not be an accomplishment, but for Sison and the little boy Dex it was a big deal that encouraged them to move forward and conquer other letters.

The Ang Galing! team knows that they would not receive any financial compensation for their time and effort, but there are heartwarming moments that makes the effort worthwhile.

There is excitement in the child’s eyes when they see their tutors coming; when a child gives his teacher a wide smile; when the child is able to understand the day’s lesson; and when upon seeing their tutor they would stake their claim and shout, “Teacher ko yan!”

At the end of their session, the tutors give snacks to the children. They write a report to the parents or guardian informing them about the child’s progress. They als-o stamp words of encouragement such as “good job” or a smiley icon on the arm or sometimes, at the child’s insistence, on the cheek or forehead. 

For most, the cemetery is the end of the road. But for the children living in the North Cemetery and participating in the Ang Galing! program, it is the beginning of a brighter future.

To know more about the Ang Galing! program, call 563-9312 or check their Facebook page: ATD Fourth World Philippines.