Bringing Hope at Action Pantry- Sarah’s Story

Sarah (not actual name) and her family turned up to the doorstep of our Mercy in Action Community Hub in Twerton, Bath in January 2023 feeling bewildered, lost and stressed. This family had just welcomed their third child and, as a result, Sarah had to leave her job with absolutely no support. She told me it, ‘felt like the world had ended.’ Their credit card bills were spiralling, doom felt like it was impending and providing basics suddenly felt out of reach.

On hearing about our Action Pantry, a local initiative to make affordable and fresh food easily accessible to those experiencing financial hardship, Sarah pursued her referral and suddenly had access to an option that was going to serve her family. Coming along and picking up groceries for their family of 5 weekly soon became a lifeline. She told me she noticed immediately she was spending less on a regular basis and on additional items that mount up. ‘This took the pressure off everything for us,’ she told me with a sense of relief on her face. These are sentiments we hear often at our Action Pantry, in a time where people’s budgets are squeezed and the cost of living crisis remains a harsh reality within many people’s worlds.

Sarah explained to me that since her and her family started using Action Pantry, it has since expanded and is continually covering more of her family’s needs. As I met with her, she had not only picked up her shopping for the week, but a selection of clothes from our Clothesline service, some new books for her children to enjoy, a bunch of nappies for her youngest son, a duvet cover her 3-year-old was delighted to have and a new educational toy they were eager to get home and delve into! She stated that she had not had to buy any new clothes for her children in such a long time and how much this takes the pressure off her family financially. This is thanks to the aforementioned Clothesline service, an abundant stash of clothing for any child from a low-income family to take home absolutely free. In these cold Winter days, I noticed the popularity of cosy coats and warm layers the families were choosing.

For Sarah and her family the ‘yellow shop’ as they have coined our Pantry has provided them with, ‘a lovely moment in time despite its difficulties.’ She tells me it feels like she is going back in time when she visits the Pantry – you know your shopkeepers name, build relationship, community and a sense of comfort within the four walls.

Our service is ever-expanding and, as we look ahead to Christmas, we are so delighted to know that families will eat, play and have a moment of relief as we provide them with Christmas dinners, hampers and gifts, as well as food to get them through the school break. We are so grateful for our Action Pantry Coordinator Fiona Wakley and all the volunteers who dedicate so much time and effort into keeping our ‘yellow shop’ a warm and thriving place to be.

Quote from Fi (coordinator) – ‘The work at Action Pantry is so important because it helps combat food insecurity by providing fresh and essential food that enables families to put healthy meals on the table. It gives support to people who are struggling to keep up with the everyday cost of life, to come in chose their food that sees them through the week, and the money saved can be put towards bills and other costs. We aim to create a space where people feel comfortable, supported and dignified.’

Roxanne's Story - From Scholar to Head Teacher!

Roxanne as a young Mercy in Action scholar

I’m Roxanne G Rosales.

I was a scholar in Mercy in Action for almost 10 years. I graduated my Bachelor’s Degree in Secondary Education in Filipino in March 2017.

Way back before, I will never forget those times when volunteers from the UK came and visited us in our place when I was living in the mountain area far away from the city. I was so happy because they visited our school and played a lot of games. They would play with us together with other scholars. The most memorable part was sharing the Word of God.

When I finished my University, I started working in admin at a Driving School. I’m so glad because Mercy in Action opened their doors and I became one of the teachers at Spring Village. Fast forward, now I am the Head Teacher here at Mercy in Action! I manage all of our teachers from the Drop-In Centre, Residential and Schooling Programme.

Mercy in Action was a big blessing that came into my life and played an important role in reaching my dreams and goals in life. I’m very thankful to Mercy in Action, especially to Ma’am Emily, Sir Tim, Mumsy and Popsy and to my sponsor, because without them I wouldn’t be here without them. Success wouldn’t be possible without their help. Thank you for helping me transform my life and for giving me the opportunity to help transform the lives of others.

Life transformed - Roxanne is now Head Teacher at our Residential and Schooling Programme

Celebration Stories!

Jessa and the Drop-in

Our Drop-in Centre team met Jessa in 2019 when she was just 5 years old. Jessa was not in school and was spending much of her day on the streets and returning home at night to sleep. Jessa has 4 siblings and they live in an urban slum area of Talisay. Her mother is a full-time housewife while her father worked as a part-time helper in the market. Jessa began regularly attending the Drop-in activities such as tutorial classes, monthly outings, sports activities and many more. Jessa is a respectful, friendly and playful child, and quickly made friends with the other children at the Drop-in. The staff team began working with her parents to try and keep the family together, prevent Jessa coming into care and lower the risks she was exposed to.

In 2020, the Drop-in Centre was temporarily closed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Even so, Mercy in Action continued to support not just Jessa’s family but all the families of the Drop-in kids by giving them food and groceries through our Emergency Appeal for Covid-19.

Jessa and her mother receiving supplies during covid lockdown.

By July 2020, Jessa was old enough to be enrolled in primary school. However, Jessa had no birth certificate and as it is one of the primary requirements the school needed, she was not enrolled. Meanwhile, Jessa’s mother was busy looking after Jessa’s younger siblings and looking for a part-time job to provide for the family, as Jessa’s father had lost his job due to lockdown.

In February 2021, Leah, the Drop-in manager, and Jessa’s mother started processing Jessa’s birth certificate. This is a lengthy and complicated process. Thankfully, Jessa’s birth certificate was eventually released. Finally in August of that same year, Jessa was formally enrolled in school. Jessa received all her uniform and school supplies from Mercy in Action. As schools were still closed due to Covid-19, her work was through modular lessons and home projects. Even though some lessons were hard, she kept working on them and never seemed to tire. She also made use of the Drop-in Centre tutorial programme on Thursdays and Fridays. Jessa would work on her modules at home and receive help from the Drop-in teacher during the tutorial days.

As young as she is, Jessa has big dreams of becoming a teacher someday. She is inspired by the Drop-in teacher who has been helping a lot of children, including her. Helping remove the barriers that Jessa was facing to be in education has helped open doors of opportunity for her future. She no longer spends time on the streets and her parents are much more attuned to the risks she may face being out of education. Now that schools are fully opened across the Philippines, she has started school in person for the first time! We look forward to watching her progress through her education!

Jessa collecting her school supplies and rucksack

Celebration Stories!

From children’s home to independent living

Stephanie joined our Residential Care Programme back in 2016 when she was 15 years old. She was rescued during a coordinated police and social welfare raid at a residence where trafficking was suspected to be taking place. Thankfully, Stephanie had been rescued before she unknowingly became a victim.

Stephanie had found herself in a place of extreme vulnerability due to a difficult home life, unstable housing and fractures in the family.  

She moved into our girls’ home with her younger siblings. She had regular contact with her parents and relatives and stayed connected to her local community.  

Stephanie excelled at education. After high school, she earned qualifications in vocational courses such as bread and pastry at Bloom Cafés in 2018 and Cosmetology and Body Spa with Rose Institute during 2019-2021.

A year ago, Stephanie moved into our Independent Living Program. She is thriving living by herself. She pays her rent on her own and is able to help her family as well. She receives emotional support and help with practical life skills from her MiA support worker.

Currently, she is working in a laundrette and supervises the daily operations. On her days off, she runs her own business offering beauty treatments and massages. Stephanie has grown into a mature young woman, with a very positive outlook on her future.

Celebration Stories!

Leah the Engineer!

Leah Mae Bernabat, a scholar of Mercy in Action, graduated with a Bachelors degree of Science in Civil Engineering last March 2020 and passed the Civil Engineering Licensure Examination in May 2022.

Leah Mae grew up with her parents and 2 siblings in an inner-city area of extreme poverty. Her father was a driver and her mother was a housewife. They would sometimes sell food in the sidewalk to earn extra income to help provide for the family. Leah had seen her parents struggling with the financial burden of sending them to school and providing their school resources. When she was 10 years old, she applied to join the Mercy in Action schooling programme. Her scholarship with Mercy in Action relieved a lot of financial pressure from her parents as her schooling needs and lunches were covered by her sponsorship.

Leah during her time on the schooling programme, aged 13 and 17

Leah Mae dreamed of becoming an Engineer. Her scholarship allowed her to pursue that by covering her tuition fees at University.  

After she graduated College, Leah Mae enrolled in a Review Centre in preparation for her Licensure Examination. However, the board exam schedule was then cancelled because of the Covid-19 Pandemic. While waiting to take the board exam, she applied for a job to help support her parents financially, as they had been badly affected by the pandemic, like many in the Philippines. While she was working, she continued studying in preparation for her board exam.

Eventually, all her hard work, sleepless nights and sacrifices paid off when she passed the bar exam for civil engineering. Finally, we can call her Engr. Leah Mae Bernabat, our very own Mercy in Action scholar. Congratulations Leah, we’re very proud of you!

Super Typhoon Emergency Relief

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JANUARY

Santa had to visit a lot of evacuation shelters last month but he managed it! Thank you so much for everyone’s support and encouragement through this truly difficult time. Over Christmas we were able to distribute over 600 food and gift packages to all of our sponsored children and more. It was a huge effort from volunteers and staff, who themselves have lost so much. In true Filipino spirit everyone came together to bless the community and get the job done for Christmas! However that is just the start of what we have planned.

At a national level international aid has not been allowed to come into The Philippines to help victims of Typhoon Ria. Travel is only allowed for Filipino nationals and their families. On the ground help and assistance from the local government is very minimal. Thousands are still living in evacuation centres and temporary camps made from salvaged materials in our city. Our aim to get every child on our schooling program into a safe home as soon as possible.

Our director Tim Rosal has arrived in Cebu this week to project manage building efforts. Water and electricity have just been restored in the last few days so we are excited to get going with building. The community team have continued covering a lot of ground assessing families and their needs. We will be getting individual updates for sponsors out as soon as we can! So

DAY 5

The situation in Cebu remains extremely challenging for our team and the wider community. There is no coordinated emergency response at a national level of government leaving Cebu with a massive shortage of water, food and fuel. There is still no power. For the wealthy they can afford to leave the city of pay hugely inflated prices for the small supplies available but it is the poor who suffer the most. Most families are queuing for water for 4 or 5 hours a day. Water is rationed to just 1 gallon per person per day. Many people have resorted to drinking untreated water. At our children’s homes are having to boil and treat water from a well ourselves. Widespread dysentery is a real concern right now.

We moved forward our Christmas Box distribution by 2 days so we can get the much needed food supplies we had prepared out to families. They will be going out today! We are gathering information on each one of our sponsored kids families. For those of you asking for specific updates we will get that out to you as soon as we can. Our initial estimate that around 75% of kids have lost their homes seems to be correct. Families are having to choose between living in very unhygienic evacuation centers or in the ruins where their homes once stood.

DAY 3

It’s been hard getting information from Cebu but it has trickled through to us. Once our team were able to check on one another, their own homes and secure our properties and kids they finally managed to get into the wider community. The devastation is awful. For communities along the shoreline they have almost entirely been wiped out! Although many roads are shut our team has been going by foot at great risk to themselves to try to check on each and every schooling program child we work with. We estimate around 50% of our families have lost their entire homes and all of them have damage to some level. It is so heartbreaking to see how much they have lost and how sad and traumatised everyone is from this tragedy.

The good news we can report is that so far every single one of the families we work with were able to safely evacuate in time and so we have no lives lost or major injuries, which is truly a miracle! For those who are homeless they are being housed in school gyms and sports halls. The biggest immediate problem right now is water. No water is working apart from those who have private wells. We do have a well but it’s not for drinking so we are having to boil everything! We have a huge road ahead to recovery and it’s not going to be easy. Please pray for the water to be restored to the city and for the funding we need to help each and very family re-build as soon as possible!

On a side note our Christmas Boxes will go ahead as last month the team decide to buy plastic storage containers this year, instead of cardboard boxes. What an absolute stroke of genius! It meant everything we had already bought was safely prepared and sealed in the box so it all made it through the typhoon!

DAY 1

Just 24 hours ago we had an eye on Typhoon Rai, it was predicated to be category 2 typhoon bringing some small disruptions. Unfortunately this wasn’t the case. It rapidly developed into a category 5 super typhoon with winds of over 160mph. The eye of the storm made landfall on Thursday directly over Talisay, the costal city where most of our work is based.

The local government did their best evacuating families living in insecure homes and those from costal communities. Schools, gyms and churches have become temporary evacuation shelters. Our team were checking on as many vulnerable families and children as possible to ensure they were in a evacuation centre.

We battened down our properties as well as we could and stocked up on essentials in our of our homes including food, gas and emergency lights.

Reports started coming in a few hours ago that the winds and rain have been brutal and caused extensive damage. We have a few hours until sunrise to properly assess the situation and the tail end of storm is still in the area. All electricity is now down but we hope our team will find means to communicate with us in the next few hours.

As families emerge in the morning to see what is left of their homes we know their will be lots of tears and sadness but Filipinos are also the most resilient people! At times of crisis they pull together as a strong community and make the best out of anything they are faced with. Although we don’t know the full picture yet we are launching a fundraising campaign so we can get as many families as possible, rebuilt and back in their homes for Christmas! Please help us pray for all the families affected.