Home is Where the Heart Is

In the picturesque coastline of fine white sand in Barangay Sulu-an, Guiuan, Eastern Samar is a small makeshift house  with scraps of wood as foundation and plastic sheeting as roof and walls. This is home to an old man who is more known in the community as Papa Sendo.

In his life, he lost so many. He is deprived not only of things but of family as well. It has been 18 years since he last saw his wife and children. Since then, he has not even heard from them and had been living alone. Sometimes, he would go to Homonhon, a nearby island, to make a living as a carpenter for relatives.

Life is tough on him. His home, made from light materials, is often destroyed when typhoons hit the island. Although willing and insistent, he is too old to go fishing. To buy rice, he makes “pangal” or fish baskets for Php200 each. If he’s lucky, he can finish and sell one in a week. He does not worry about his viand to pair with his rice as there are many fish in the sea.

Despite the hardships he experiences, he does not use his poverty as an excuse to do ill or get ahead of other people. Even if there are moments when chickens would run into his home, he never dared to get them as they were not his and even returned them to its owner. As he said,“Poverty is not my choice, but I have to strive to survive.” 

Maybe for other people, what he calls home may uncomfortable to live in. For Papa Sendo, it is home, and he is not willing to move out. Even if he has relatives who persistently encourage him to live with them, he kindly declines because he is more comfortable living in his own space. Because for Tatay Sendo, home truly is where the heart is.

As one of the grantees of the Unconditional Cash Transfer under the Livelihood component of the ADB/JFPR Project, he said the money he would get would be a big help to him to buy rice and if possible as capital so he could go fishing again. Because even in his old age, he continues to strive to survive.