Been pouring for two straight days but the rains stopped for our UP campus tour – ambait ni God!
The rains just went away!
The Academic Oval, the main and the largest road in UP Diliman, surrounding by major college buildings of the university
The UP Carillion. When this tower starts to play those 46 bells, the sound can be heard from all four corners of the campus!
Two of our scholars with KAPITAS volunteers by the steps of Palma Hall, commonly known as AS building as this used to be the Arts and Sciences building
The UP Diliman Administration Building , doing the Oblation’s open arms
The Oblation. This concrete sculpture is a depiction of a man facing the sky with arms wide open, signifying selfless offering of oneself to his country
The UP Lagoon, the only body of water (not captured in this photo, though) inside the UP Diliman campus
Lovely trees line up by the walking paths next to the UP Lagoon!
With the last group of our scholars in our campus tour at the UP Lagoon
It must take an enormous amount of efforts for a child to keep his eyes and mind glued to his studies if he comes from such an environment as the Payatas dumpsite; we can only imagine. From what we gather, most of the kids there just go with their parents to collect from the garbage instead of attending school. Sadly, Payatas dumpsite and Erap City resettlement site are two places in the Philippines where having the opportunity to attend school is more of the exception than the rule.
We Googled and the map says Payatas dumpsite is just 22 minutes away from UP Diliman!
My parents were just regular salaried employees back then but they were able to send me to this university. It is state-owned and managed so the tuition costs cannot be as expensive as those of the major universities in Manila.
While the tour of the UP Diliman campus may be a small gesture for our 50 scholars, it’s our sincere hope that it was able to open their eyes that one need not come from a rich family to be able to attend this university and earn a college degree, land a stable job, and give their families a better life – and eventually leave the Payatas dumpsite. Nobody deserves to be trapped in there making a living out of picking from a landfill, risking their lives scavenging the dump in order to put food on the table to survive.
“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” ― Nelson Mandela
L❤️ VE makes life beautiful! 