The power of stories

MANILA, Philippines - Like any other story, this one started with a vision, a dream.

It started in 2012, when visionary Rey Bufi, along with his friends visited the far town of Sison in Pangasinan, where Pinalpal Elementary School was situated. It was a typical public school, populated with children living in poverty but have an aspiration to get out of the cycle.

Since then, Kuya Rey was haunted by the idea of going back to change the paradigm of how children perceive reading.

“In school, we were taught how to read academically, but reading should be bigger than that. There is another side on it that the children have to discover and cultivate, and that is reading for pleasure,” he said.

With this idea of sparking hope, instilling inspiration, and tickling imagination rose The Storytelling Project.

“When I founded TSP, my vision was to instill to children from far-flung communities the love for reading through storytelling. At first there were reservations. Will the children like the idea? Will the parents allow their kids to be involved in this project? How will the teachers respond to the program? There were a lot of questions, but then it only took one step forward to answer them all,” explains Kuya Rey.

Tirelessly crossing rivers and conquering mountains to reach remote communities, Bufi believed that to create a habit his group must immerse and stay in the community for quite some time. The three-phase program starts with a month-long immersion to conduct storytelling sessions to grades 2 and 3 students, story writing training for grades 5 and 6 students, parenting seminars, teachers’ training, and volunteers’ training.

“This has always been the most crucial part of the program, because this is where we tie all the knots, break all the walls, build bridges to interconnect all the stakeholders’ principles. This is also the time when we have to form the habit.”

According to Kuya Rey, funding has always been the organization’s challenge, especially that they are only a small organization.

The program requires the team to spend on lodging, daily living expenses, cost of logistics for the program, materials needed for the trainings, and many more. Bufi stressed that “while there are donations coming in, they are relatively small to run the entire program, and we don’t want to shortchange the community by stopping the program midway. We want to complete the entire cycle to be able to see real results.”

One of the success stories TSP was able to share was the publication of their first children’s book done by a student from Sitio Buer in Pangasinan.

Jim Mark Carolino, with the help of TSP’s Grace Soriano wrote the story “Super Labandera,” a book dedicated to the former’s mother as he honors her livelihood, at the same time, being the “super mom” of the family.

“Jim Mark’s story was the triggering point that all the kids have followed. Him being able to have a published story is one of the biggest accomplishments we can brag because seeing a child learning how to mold his imagination into something relevant and beautiful is already a story worth sharing,” Bufi happily mentioned.

In a country where we prominently hear stories of corruption, misunderstanding, political mudslinging, character assassination, and destruction, who would have thought that there will be a story that will change one’s perspective into something brighter and more optimistic?

As Rey Bufi says, “We all have good stories to share, and we better start sharing now.”

The Storytelling Project is going back to its first community in Pinalpal Elementary School to continue the program. If you wish to donate, you may deposit at Kwento Pilipino Inc. BPI Checking Account #4531-0001-08 or email them at [email protected].