Written by Kuya Harvard
This event in partnership with long time sponsor Funlipix was indeed a dream event for the kids of Tuklasan. Our team has been reaching out to them since 2007. In fact we have had 10 events there since then. The orphans and abandoned kids here love to play basketball. In their center in San Juan, they have two basketball courts. “They play it on the spare time, all the time”, says Ate Sandra, their social worker.
Play basketball with volunteers was super. Play it with two PBA stars was something else for these kids. At the sight of their idols- Marc Pingris of B-Meg Llamados and Don Allado of Baragay Ginebra, they immediately crowded them and had photos with them.
To make things more interesting, the stars were separated into two teams. Funlipix team was team Funny, we were team Happy. We started the day with free throw shooting. We won that 34 points to 32. Each of the 10 pairs of each team had 5 free throw attempts.
We had cheering after. Team Happy won that again with one of the kids leading a rap for us. Team Funny had a good round of cheer as well. So we are guessing the judges had a hard time.
The main event was next. 40 minutes of running time basketball. Each quarter had combination of players. 1st was all kids. 2nd was all volunteers. 3rd was volunteers, kids. 4th was all volunteers again. The star players played almost the entire game with their respective teams. The game ended at 65 all after the 4th. We made the kids play the extra minutes of overtime. The buzzer sounded and team Happy emerged as winners once more, 71-68.
The kids and volunteers were given their medals and trophies. We recognized the MVP for kids and MVP for the volunteers as well.
