POPE FRANCIS VILLAGE

The belief in the supernatural is very prominent in the Filipino culture. Performing some house cleansing rituals come into play when, people are building houses or moving to a new house. Generally people do these to ward off evil spirits and other mystical entities. As a show of respect to traditional practices of Taclobanons, I have documented a seasoned ritual called “Padugo” or offering blood of an animal as a form of sacrifice at Pope Francis Village yesterday. The ritual was performed during the pre-concrete pouring for foundations of the first batch of rowhouse units.. It involves slitting of the throat of three white chickens and dripping the blood to the excavated holes before actual pouring of cement. This was performed by a folk healer who happened to be one of the community members of Pope Francis Village. According to traditional beliefs, this practice of taking the life of a sacrificed animal will prevent the evil forces from taking the life of workers or anyone conne

Seeing this heterogeneous cluster of savers eagerly handing-over a Php20.00 individual savings contribution to their cluster leaders is a testament that poor disaster survivors have inherent capacity to mobilize their own resources, if driven by a certain purpose. Savings member brings their individual passbook which serves  as a proof of their weekly savings contribution.  This group is one of the seven (7) savings clusters of Magallanes Survivors Homeowner’s Association (MSHOA) that was organized by Urban Poor Associates (UPA) in early February of 2014. The cluster meets every Sunday for their weekly meeting and savings mobilization activity. For this savings cluster, the minimum individual savings contribution is Php20.00 The Bayanihan Savings Program is both an organizing tool and a strategy of UPA in preparing Typhoon Yolanda survivors in transitional shelters and in areas currently covered by No-Build Zone to  become self-sustaining while waiting for their perm