FI Collaboration with AMRSP for Taal Evacuees

Last January 25, 2020, Srs. Lorna Genovate and Remedios Cabrera, and our 2 lay collaborators, Lucy Margarejo and Renato Ayade, joined the AMRSP’s response to the Taal Evacuees in the distribution of goods in the areas of evacuation. After the sorting and repacking in the previous days, about 40 members of different congregations worked in loading more than a thousand packs of goods and gallons of water into trucks and vans, and,  as a caravan, proceeded to the evacuation centers in Imus, General Trias, both in Cavite, and Tagaytay City.

Donations have been coming in from kind-hearted donors, mostly the congregations and individuals who wanted to share their resources to benefit the evacuees. The Hijas de Jesus’ FASFI (Fundación Ayuda Solidaria FI) as well as the Formation House of Asia-Oriental Province donated a generous amount for this endeavor.

First stop was Imus, where they unloaded about 300 packs of goods and interacted with many volunteers from Our Lady of the Pillar Parish who are also active in packing goods and attending to the evacuees. They then proceeded to General Trias, Cavite, where they encountered and interacted with about 80 families and about 300 individuals who are staying at the Amigonians Tertiary of the Franciscans Capuchins. Here, they spread out clothes and other goods along the garden where the people could just choose for themselves whatever they could get. They also got to see and talk with the people.

In Tagaytay City, they distributed packs of goods to individuals lining up in the streets. Many people were able to avail themselves of the items brought by the AMRSP truck and vans. Since it was getting dark and they would still travel back to Manila, the remaining goods and drums of water were brought to the Parish of Our Lady of Lourdes in Tagaytay City, where volunteers also gathered and were tirelessly arranging goods for distribution.

They arrived back in Manila almost midnight, tired but with hearts full of gladness for a chance to express their solidarity to some of the thousands of helpless people displaced by the eruption of Taal Volcano.