[This story was first published on the Servants website back in 2006. It’s an honour to hear and share stories like these.]

Gilda is in her early fifties. She is unmarried and has considerable life experience. Growing up in a poor province in the Philippines, her father had always emphasized the need for good education. But all his daughters got married soon and when Gilda, the youngest, was old enough to train for a profession, he decided it was not a worthwhile investment, since “girls will just get married”. So Gilda went away in order to find work, first in Manila and later abroad in the Arab world… There she came in contact with committed Christians and she found her personal faith in Christ. Some time later she decided to go back to the Philippines and invest her life in serving the people of her homeland.

Gilda did not marry. Instead she took up studies for education and trained to be a teacher.

After some time of teaching she felt called to serve the least fortunate in society. She established a very innovative pre-school ‘Pandayan Bata’ in a slum area, together with friends of hers who lived in that same place. A lively class of pre-schoolers now learnt to read, write and calculate and got enthusiastically ready for elementary school.

It was exciting for Gilda and her co-workers to see even very poor families benefit from a creative Kindergarten that allowed its pupils to succeed well in elementary school.

But Gilda saw even greater need. While she didn’t live in that poor neighbourhood, she soon noticed particularly deprived children on her way through the area. These were older children that obviously did not go to school. Gilda befriended them and learnt why they had dropped out of elementary school. Mostly it was because they had not picked up reading and writing in time and where duly teased by their mates. They could not stand the peer pressure any longer, they stopped attending classes and started to prove themselves in other ways on the streets.

Gilda invited them to learn literacy together, without the competition of more skilled others. Day after day her young friends came to the Kindergarten where all the small kids had left by now. There they were allowed to catch up on playing with toys they never had, making games with Teacher Gilda, get warm-hearted attention and look at literacy in small portions, just right for their initially short concentration span. Within a few weeks they had learnt to read and started to write. They were getting ready to go back to school after the big holidays.

Several did start and some, mostly girls, are still proceeding Grade after Grade. But others lost interest again (or was it simply fear?) and were side-tracked from their plans. Jaime is back on the street, the young teenager is now like a young man, growing up very fast in this rough environment. Liezel has moved with her family and her parents seem to put no value whatsoever on education. Angie is older than all her classmates but faithfully goes to school and builds up her self-esteem, helped by a number of friends in the community who are aware of her situation. Anita is a fast and excited learner and it is painful to think that she nearly did not make it in this opportunity to go to school.

If it was not for Teacher Gilda who spends her time paying attention to some naughty boys and girls…

Gilda is no longer teaching in this Kindergarten, she has since helped establish more of them in other poor areas. And wherever she is, it does not take long until she gets to befriend some deprived children that seem to be ‘falling through the net’ – another opportunity for Gilda to pay a bit of attention to a young friend’s needs.

These days Gilda is teaching some kids living in the street. They are coming to a schooling program that is part of the Onesimo Kids ministry. The curriculum in this school includes things like the value of keeping oneself clean and coming to class in time, not 2 hours late. On Friday it is hard to get those children to come to school. Fridays are the days when begging in the street is most profitable because of local church events. Gilda is yet again facing new challenges as she is practically loving children that live on the streets.

[written by Rachel Hauser, a Swiss national, who has been serving with the Servants team in Manila for many years]

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