Written by Board Member, Ate Charmain Tan
As we head towards the mother’s day and elections weekend our team prepared a Dental Mission at the Haven for Children in Muntinlupa City Alabang. It is the national center for street children recovering from substance abuse under the DSWD. Fifty boys participated in the event which was sponsored by Ate Teresa Prieto-Rufino. It was her birthday celebration with her friends and family. The event was also made possible with the participation of our dentists and also the dental students who helped us facilitate the event.
We started by grouping the kids and volunteers into five and they got to know one another. We then played our fun ( BALL GAME ). Each team was given 2 balls. Kuya Harvard would give one of the three gestures that the participants had to do. They were cross, X, Mcdonald’s, heart and the Kung Fu pose. As the music played group members had to pass the balls to the person beside them. When the music stopped the ones holding the balls had to stand and do the gesture that Kuya Harvard gave. The first ones to stand while doing the correct gesture would win the point. Two people per team had to stand at a time when the music stopped. Everyone laughed in excitement as they hurriedly stood up when the music stopped. They also had to make sure they do the correct gesture otherwise they wouldn’t get the point even if their group stood up first. In the end it was Group 4 who emerged as the winner as they were the fastest and the most alert.
While playing the games some of the kids went on to do their dental checkup. Our dentists checked the kids’ teeth in batches and did tooth extraction as needed. The kids were mostly behaved as they tried to be brave for the tooth extraction.
After the fun game we had the Art Workshop by our artist Kuya Robby. He taught the kids to make Name Boards. The kids made letters of their names using rolled newspaper. Then they put Japanese paper on the letters and wet the Japanese paper around the letters to flatten it. The letters of their names would pop out in different colors. The Ates and Kuyas helped the kids come out with colorful name boards. As we waited for the boards to dry we had our lunch. We also had food carts like the french fries food stand and dirty ice cream. The kids excitedly went in line after having lunch for their fries and ice cream dessert.
The kids were given individual gifts and the center was also given gifts such as rice, chocolate drinks, Hunger Packs from Stop Hunger Now and others. The kids sang a Happy Birthday song to our birthday celebrant Ate Teresa as they hugged and thanked them for a wonderful day.
