Let Us Unite Against Hunger

I have seen and experienced poverty first hand. Not surprising because I live in a country where the disparity between the middle-income family and the lower-income family is so extreme, it is mind-boggling.

While I experienced hardships at a young age, my parents made sure that meals on our table were there three times a day which was why it was so hard for me to understand what I saw firsthand during one of my school’s exposure activities in college.

We visited a house near our school that was being run by the Missionaries of Charity. At that time, adults occupied the first level of the house and children occupied the second level. We were assigned to visit the second level of that house. Cribs of different sizes occupy almost the entire second level. The bigger of the two rooms had big cribs that several toddlers and babies occupied.

The smaller room was where I saw something that was heartbreaking, gut-wrenching sight of children left by their parents to the care of the nuns. Children who were so undernourished their extremities looked like sticks sticking out of their bodies, children whose eyes were almost sticking out of their sockets but cannot properly see because they went blind and could just stare unseeing at the space, children who cannot hear the music from the playing radio inside their room because they got deaf due to constant lack of food, children that should have been running and playing around but could not stand on their own because their bones could not support them and children whose physical appearance were that of a one year old baby but were actually around 6-8 years old. Children who were too undernourished that the effects of malnutrition, like getting blind and/or deaf, cannot be reversed and will remain with them for the rest of their lives.

I could go on and on but one thing is for sure, those children do not deserve to suffer and to be perennially hungry, to get really sick due to severe undernourishment because in some places I have seen food that were overflowing, I have seen people wasting food and throwing them nonchalantly.

The nuns at the Missionaries of Charity and other organizations addressing this problem can only do what they can but we really should do our share. Reach out to the nearest person especially child who is suffering from hunger and poverty. Share what you have. Do not waste because for each morsel of food wasted, it could actually feed others. If you want to help but do not know where to start, check out your church, local health offices or even the online sites like: www.freerice.com, www.thehungersite.com, www.heifer.org.

Even a little help could really go a long way, let us start now.