For Marlon Mendoza, a walkway over one of Quezon City’s busiest roads is as good a place to study as a table at home.
A photo of 11-year-old Marlon Mendoza and his 9-year-old brother Melvin has recently gone viral online, and for good reasons: they help their mother sell sampaguita while doing their school homework.
Such act by two young bouys was immediately praised by netizens.
Here’s the story behind the viral photo:
The boys’ mother, Rochelle, said she originally sold sampaguitas on her own, after her husband was imprisoned 2 years ago. He had used drugs, she says, and was allegedly framed and arrested for a crime related to it.
She and her kids have been visiting him in jail every Sunday–the only day they don’t sell the flowers which Rochelle gets from a market in Balintawak.
Later on, she says, Marlon and Melvin asked to come along and help her sell. And some days they insist on staying on longer if they haven’t sold all their flowers.
The kids get around P50 pesos each from the P300 they usually earn if they sell off their entire share of flowers.
Marlon says he does not mind his safety, since he’s used to sitting on the footbridge.
Rochelle knows their only source of livelihood is frowned upon, even illegal, but they return to the area every night even if they are turned away at times.
Marlon’s nightly sessions paid off–he landed in his class’s top 10 when he was in Grade 4, and hopes to repeat that this year or do better.
He does get sleepy in class, though, yet makes a point to still pay attention and answer in recitations.
Marlon and Melvin’s viral story of carrying a dream while trying to survive reflects the cross of issues in the country today–how the drug problem paralyzes families, how mothers and their children have to step up to fill the void left by fathers lost to it, how social services may not be enough for many homes in need, and how poverty continues to haunt the streets.
But their story also shows the determination of many Filipinos to move past their circumstances and their belief that despite life as it is, all is not lost.
There’s trust in the goodness in people, too.
Marlon says the pedestrians who buy from him or give him food often have some advice to go with it.
“Mag-ayos daw ako sa pag-aaral,“ he says.
When we asked him his Christmas wish, his immediate answer was less for himself and more for his family:
“Malipat kami ng bahay po. Makalaya po si papa.”
When it’s time to go home, Rochelle and the boys walk the series of connecting footbridges above EDSA which end at the terminal of buses in the mall.
Marlon and Melvin walk ahead, arms over each other’s shoulders. Rochelle smiles at how her boys can alternate between being enemies and best buds–as most brothers often do.
She spares a thought if puberty could change that.
But then, she says, they’ve already grown up somehow what they’ve been through and what they’re doing.
What was her wish this Christmas?
“Sana yung Panginoon, bigyan kami na sana ‘wag aila makahinto sa pag-aaral. Gusto ko po sila makatapos. Lagi ko sinasabi, ‘Mag-aral kayo anak para yung magiging anak niyo di maghihirap,” Rochelle said.
Rochelle and her sons board the northbound bus home just before midnight, after another day of making that wish real–one sold sampaguita garland and finished homework at a time.
