Having eaten what would

The day started out like any other one I had. I woke up to the sounds of my mother puttering pots and pans in our yellow-painted sunny kitchen downstairs. Smoothing my pajamas a bit, I went down our creaky stairs, wondering what’s for breakfast and what to wear today. I thought about my still unused black top with a pink print that mom bought the other day at the mall and wondered if I would look good in it.

As I got nearer the kitchen, the smell of my favorite toast and scrambled eggs wafted deliciously in the air. Upon reaching the open kitchen door, I greeted mom with my usual big grin and sat facing her, who was washing the dishes that she used for cooking. Having eaten what would have fed an army of hungry soldiers; I drank what’s left of my old coffee mug and dashed upstairs to prepare for school. Having shouted a hurried goodbye to mom and dad from across the house, I hopped to the front porch, the smell of mom’s yummy toast still following me on the way out.

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Looking up, I saw that the skies promises a good day for everyone, with the sun shining comfortably above, and the wind softly touching the leaves of the trees which lined the sidewalk. And because I was scheduled to go to an orphanage after classes are dismissed for a project, I hoped the weather will last till the afternoon. With what I had just wolfed down for breakfast, I literally sang my way to school, getting smiles along the way for my seemingly infectious good mood.

The day went by uneventfully, with the exception of my burly economics teacher pointing out that I was looking so much outside the newly-cleaned classroom window he joked if I was wondering why it wasn’t clean enough. When the bell sounded signaling class dismissal, I was one of the first to go out the room, thinking I might as well hurry up and go to the orphanage so I can go home early. This is the first time I was going to an orphanage and I did not know what to expect. Little did I know that my trip to that old, run-down building would change how I see life in general from that point on.

Going outside the school building, I saw that the good morning weather did not hold. It was a wet, dismal afternoon, the pendulous branches of the silver maples sweeping the ground. The orphanage was a long, drab rectangular building, three stories high and badly in need of repair.

The outer walls were soot- blackened and pockmarked with grey blobs where the plasters had flaked off. A white inner core revealed by recent flaking showed up here and there. Upon entering the orphanage, I immediately sensed the sad atmosphere of the place as it looked dark and dismal to me, but I thought that perhaps it was just the use of the building that made it seemed so.

The windows were small and set well back in the blotchy walls. The ground floor was comprised of the director’s sleeping quarters, kitchen, dining room, administrative offices and chapel, all connected by a corridor which ran right around the building, forming an inner rectangle and overlooking a courtyard on all four sides.

However it was the lack of options in the children’s lives that had no choice but to grow up there struck me the most. Although the building was a better place to live in than the streets, the surroundings are disheartening.

The profusion of a variety of flowers lining the paved path walk towards the main door of the orphanage did not help much to bring cheerfulness to the place. No pictures or posters broke the monotony. One child said that often, the water did not turn on, and the toilets did not always work. Unlike many children who have homes to call their own including me, the children had no choice about the kinds or even the amount of food, though they had an adequate diet.

Each child was assigned a bed with sparsely bedding, placed in two long rows along the third floor of the building, two to each bed for children seven years old and below. The second floor was taken up by the bare classrooms where the children were taught. With only a small number of financial contributors, I was told that the orphanage was regularly hard pressed to care for the growing number of orphans.

At the time that I spent there, I observed that the children’s day was ruled by the sound of a loud bell – by its shrill ring they would know that it was time to start the afternoon prayers, or eat their main meal. I noticed most of the children have a pleading look in their eyes when they look at outsiders who visit the building. With unwavering gaze, one child, about six years old with a creamy olive skin, enormous dark eyes and a long, shining dark brown hair, constantly followed me around, even when I went inside the office of the orphanage director to ask him several questions.

As I walked down a long hallway towards the director’s office, she was like my shadow following my every step. I immediately noticed the peeling paint on the walls of the small office that the tall, kindly director invited me in, while seeing from the corner of my eye that the child has reluctantly stepped back to let the director close the wooden door. I brought out the list of questions that I prepared from my backpack, along with my small, black recorder, and I immediately started the interview to which the director answered as much as he can.

Straightening up from the hard chair and shaking his hands while thanking him for his time, I headed outside when the bell rang for the evening meal. From all over the old building the orphans began to collect outside the dining hall. In their drab gray uniforms, they all looked the same, dreary and colorless. Just like the orphanage building itself. Thinking back, the orphanage was not a harsh place.

It was just sadness hung in the air like a sour smell. I never really saw my life as sad. I was blessed in so many ways that the orphans were not, although these blessings I failed to be really thankful of until that day at the orphanage.

When I got back home, I hugged my mom so tight she had an inquiring look on her face when I let her go, and smelled the appetizing aroma of dinner cooking, the pleasant smell of home. As we sat together had chicken with chardonnay and fresh herbs, I recounted my experience at the orphanage and what I saw there. In the midst of our family talk, I said a silent prayer of thanks for the blessings that I previously took for granted.

Before, I thought that I lacked so many things in life. But after a day at the orphanage, I become conscious of every little thing that I am blessed with. Most especially my parents, who were sitting with me at dinner that time; talking animatedly about how we could make the orphans happy, if only for a day.

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