In this soup kitchen, a Korean believes helping poor Pinoys starts with giving them fish first

InterAksyon.com
The online news portal of TV5

MANILA, Philippines - Food-loving Filipinos eat five to six times a day before and after work. But not the Mendez family of Third Avenue, Caloocan City.

Fifty eight-year-old Miguela Mendez, who sells bananas for a living, says it takes them one whole day to raise money to buy food that’s only good for one meal.

“Dalawang kilo ng bigas, kalahating kilo ng galunggong. Pito kaming kakain, pagkakasyahin na lang sa isang araw. Pag wala nang natira sa gabi, itutulog na lang ang gutom,” says Mendez, a widow and mother of three, who helps feed her three grandchildren ages nine and 12.

[Two kilos of rice, half a kilo of round scad. Seven people will share the food and make it last for the day. If nothing is left at night, we will just still the pangs of hunger by sleeping.]

Jocelyn Gruezo, 41, and her family suffer the same plight. The income that she and her husband get as laundrywoman and part-time driver respectively, isn’t enough to feed their four children ages 17, 11, 8, and 4.

"'Yan ang iniisip at pinagkaka-abalahan namin araw-araw, kung paano makakabili ng sapat na pagkain. Mahirap mag-isip kung walang laman ang t’yan,” says Gruezo, a resident of Barangay 31 also in Caloocan.

[That’s what we think about and work on everyday, how to be able to buy enough food. It’s hard to think when your stomach is empty.]

Mendez and her grandchildren and Gruezo and her children are among the frequent diners in a soup kitchen at the back of the city’s La Loma Catholic Cemetery.

The soup kitchen called Mindeule Guksujib or Dandelion Noodle House was founded by 61-year-old Sye Young Nam, a former Catholic friar-turned-layman from South Korea.

Sye Young is known in his country for establishing 12 years ago a similar meal center in Incheon City for his less fortunate countrymen. The soup kitchen has expanded and now also gives food rations to some 30 Filipina wives victimized by domestic abuse in Korea and houses a study facility for children who can’t afford private tutorials.

Sye Young’s kitchen soup in Caloocan that also serves as a day care center for kids six years old and below, feeds about 130 children. It is among the three meal centers that Sye Young, fondly called Mr. Peter by his Filipino friends, established in the Philippines in 2013. The other two are in the cities of Malabon and Navotas that each feeds around 60 children.

Even the parents and grandparents of the children are welcomed by Sye Young in his soup kitchens. He serves them food and treats them like friends and members of his own family, who also helps him in operating the meal centers in Korea and in the Philippines.

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Mr. Peter, who was a Catholic monk for 25 years and is connected with the Abbey Monastery in South Korea, says he fell in love with the Philippines and its people when he first visited the country in 1988 to work on a two-year project with Radio Veritas.

Sye Young also saw what other foreigners observed about Filipinos. “Many of them are optimistic even though they are poor. Other people are rich but they lack the spirit that Filipinos have. “

When he went back to the Philippines and coordinated with the local dioceses to establish the soup kitchens, Mr. Peter says he was determined to help poor but hopeful Filipinos by spreading a philosophy that deconstructs the proverb, “Give a man fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”

“I say, give the man and woman fish first so they will have the energy to find their own fish. It’s hard to work when a person is hungry. How can children effectively participate in class if they have nothing in their stomach? If people spend the whole day looking for food, how can they do other productive things?” explains Mr. Peter.

Contributions that Sye Young gets for his soup kitchens consist of goods and small amounts of money that mostly come from average joes or ordinary Koreans who support Mr. Peter’s philosophy of helping the poor.

Sye Young says he does not accept contributions from rich people fearing that their assistance could only lead to self-promotion. He likewise shuns donation drives and the formation of supporters’ group as well as receiving government subsidy.

“There’s humility in giving just like how Jesus helps people.  It’s the kind of giving that changes the hearts of both the giver and the receiver,” says Sye Young.

Like a true buddy, Mr. Peter also avoids sounding didactic to the diners in his soup kitchens.

“I avoid giving sermons because no one wants to change when he or she is criticized and feels slighted. The best way to help poor people is to first believe in them, to learn to trust them, and become their true friends,” he says.  

Asked why he names his soup kitchens after dandelions, Mr. Peter says, “It’s a symbol of hope because the flower blossoms even in very dirty areas through seeds blown by the wind. And like the dandelion, I also like to spread hope through my soup kitchens.” -AR Sabangan, InterAksyon.com