I THOUGHT I WAS FAMOUS

The heat was unbearable in the Hyundai Innovation Lab within the Gawad Kalinga Enchanted Farm at Angat Lab within the Gawad Kalinga Enchanted Farm at Angat, Bulacan, Philippines. The event was the 2014 Social Business Summit attended by social innovators and social enterprises. The topic was health and wellness.

Large industrial fans blew air but the wind wasn’t having any cooling effect. People were sitting up on the chairs but it seemed they were staying on the chairs out of courtesy and in consideration of the fact that this was an event they chose to attend. The previous speakers were interesting, but none of them made the audience forget the sweltering heat. And then, Benjamin O. Yap, chief operating officer of United Laboratorist, Inc. (Unilab), stepped behind the podium.

“So, guess what?” he began. “This Enchanted Farm is a long ways from civilization have a hard time reaching this far. I, personally, had to spend for a chopper ride to get here. Well, it was fun and it took less than 15 minutes to get here. The interesting part was when we landed on the open lot near one of the settlements, scores of little children swarmed up on the helicopter. As I stepped out, all of them came up to me and began to take my hand to respectfully touch it to their foreheads, saying ‘Mano po!”

“I hadn’t realized how well known and famous I was in these parts of the woods! I loved the adulation and I began to shake hands and nod, and pat their heads, and smile and wave. I couldn’t help it! There were so many and this felt good. I felt important, well-known like a celebrity. After 20 minutes of nodding, patting, and waving I began to walk away from the children. That’s when several of them, in unison, asked me, “Sir, who are you and what is your name?”

At this, the audience burst out laughing and the kindly speaker, Benjamin O. Yap then transitions into telling the audience about how 12 million more such children will be born in the Philippines within the next 10 years. He spoke of how the first 1,000 days of their lives will be crucial to their physical, mental, and spiritual wellbeing.

In the next 30 minutes he continued to expound upon the subject of safe birth and safe development in the first 1000 days of a child. All through those 30 minutes, the industrial fans continued blowing ineffectively, drops of sweat kept on gathering on listener’s brows, yet they sat there, eagerly hanging on his every word.

By: Raju Mandhyan