Day 33: The Kids in the Neighboorhood

It's more than two weeks now that we are staying here with our host home in Brgy. Mabolo, Cebu City. My counterpart Isabelle and I are getting familiar with the children in the neighborhood. We usually arrive around 7:00 PM from work and our host mother Emma and our host sister Cha-cha usually finish preparing dinner for both of us. It inspires me a lot because they make sure to have a vegetarian food available. 

My Favorite Vegetable. Isabelle knows my two favorite dish which were the Mongo beans soup and the Tortang Talong (Eggplant + Scrabbled Egg). I say these two is a fantastic mix for a meal! Filipino Vegetable Meals usually have fish or meat mixed with it, but now, we are getting used to having tofu in our diet. It tastes almost the same but it's even healthier because you can avoid the animal fat.

Isabelle Swann, my counterpart with the
cute little kids in our neighborhood

Playing with the Kids.Tonight is very memorable because we had so much fun playing with the kids in our neighborhood. Isabelle taught them the A-Z of the Filipino Sign Language the previous nights. So now, we had a little review. We then played a very  challenging game. Isabelle sat on another area and made signs. The Kids would ran to me doing the sign and I'll finger spell it. They would then return to Isabelle and give the answer. 

When Learning is Fun. If kids at their age would be able to appreciate sign language, they would grow up seeing it as having no difference at all. They were very enthusiastic. Many hearing Filipinos aren't aware of the Deaf culture and they are easily stereotyped as Deaf-Mute which is a wrong notion because Deaf people can speak.

I believe it is not a question of majority or minority. It is a question about what we should do for Social Inclusion. Maybe putting a simple A-Z in our Elementary Education can make a difference. And when they grow old, it's up for them to nurture what was given unto them. We can only hope.