November 22, 2024
Prepared with care
By Joy Rojas
When disaster strikes—a fire, earthquake, volcanic eruption, or the succession of severe tropical storms that battered parts of the country—it’s natural to feel overwhelmed when you’re watching it from the safety of your home. Your first reaction is to help—but how do you even begin to extend assistance to communities so far away, and whose losses amount to millions of pesos?
“Giving isn’t a privilege of the rich, it is a privilege of the sincere,” reminds Dharma Master Cheng Yen.
As such, even the littlest form of help counts at the Tzu Chi Foundation. Whether it’s putting loose change in the foundation’s coin cans or packing essentials for calamity victims, every act big and small contributes to providing compassion and relief to people who have not only lost their families, homes, and livelihood, but any sense of hope in overcoming devastation.
Jeanifer B. Losing had two objectives for joining the repacking of donated clothes at Tzu Chi for survivors of Typhoon Marce (Yinxing): to help storm victims and to give back to the foundation that restored her health.
Diagnosed with hypothyroidism, she tolerated the condition for five years until she was granted medical assistance by Tzu Chi. In 2007, she underwent surgery at Tondo Medical Center. Tzu Chi volunteers monitored her until her discharge.
Seventeen years later, the foundation continues to impact her life. Losing, who had to stop working when she had hypothyroidism, is now a caregiver; she’s also training to be a call center agent. “I like to make good use of my time,” she says. “That’s why I wanted to help. In my own little way, my helping with the repacking of clothes is important to Tzu Chi.”
Angelita P. Ignas has been volunteering at various foundations since her daughter, Tzu Chi college scholar Aiza Zergie P. Ignas, was in preschool. “Even if you can’t help financially, you can help in other ways, right?” says Ignas who answered Tzu Chi’s call to repack donated clothes for Typhoon Marce beneficiaries.
Sympathy for the survivors also motivated her to volunteer. “I feel so sorry for them,” says a tearful Ignas of the families who continue to live in flood nearly a month after Typhoon Marce’s exit. “Even if we didn’t experience it ourselves, it still pains us. That’s why I feel so bad for them. They really need our help. Not just money, but clothes, rice, food. When you put yourself in their shoes, it’s hard. I pity them.”
The 3,220 pieces of donated clothing, along with 5,000 pairs of slippers, 4,800 packs of condensed milk, and foot medicine were recently transported to Aparri, where an advanced party of Tzu Chi volunteers will distribute them and other basic goods to typhoon-stricken communities.
While beneficiaries will be grateful to receive them, those who took the time and effort to put them together are just as appreciative of the opportunity to ease someone’s woes.
“The relief Tzu Chi organizes is a such a big help,” says Ignas. “Even if the help seems so simple, it’s actually huge. We don’t really need grand gestures. Simple help is enough.”
Volunteers met at Unity Hall in Buddhist Tzu Chi Campus to prepare bundles of donated clothes for distribution to communities affected by Typhoon Marce (Yinxing) in Aparri.
Tzu Chi volunteer Elvira Chua (center) joins Tzu Chi scholars and other volunteers in packing donated clothes for storm survivors.
From medical assistance beneficiary to volunteer, Jeanifer B. Losing participates in the packing of donated clothes as a way of thanking Tzu Chi. The foundation funded her surgery for hypothyroidism in 2007.
Repacked clothes include men’s, women’s, and children’s apparel and undergarments.
At Tzu Chi’s bakery, volunteers prepare pandesal for an ocular inspection team en route to Aparri early next morning. The bread was distributed in evacuation centers and during relief distribution efforts by the local government.
Over 3,000 pieces of pandesal were baked from scratch.
A few days earlier, Tzu Chi scholars joined volunteers in a repacking of donated clothes in the Tzu Chi campus.
In addition to helping out, the volunteer work was a chance for Tzu Chi scholars from different colleges and universities to get together.
Volunteerism knows no age. Everyone is welcome to help!