A Bill and a Bread

Dumaguete City - AFTER OUR YOUNGEST son finished his soccer practice in school, all of us hungry and all decided to have our supper instead in our favorite 'tapsilog' restaurant along North Road. Along the way the two younger kids - Grade 2 and Grade 3 - informed me and my wife that they need some school supplies for tomorrow. So we decided to drop by a shopping mart on our way to the restaurant. When I had the car parked within the roadside parking lane, my wife disembarked, crossed the road, and did the shopping.

After almost an hour, my wife came back with the purchased items as the darkness left enough light for us to see without need for an artificial light. So I started maneuvering the car back to the traffic flow, turned on the headlights, only to see a figure a few feet from us scavenging the public trash can for recyclable scraps to sell.

Looking at her, her efforts to make a living despite the short end of resources handed to her, a strong emotion hit my heart, and I could not take my eyes from her. All I could think of was the sorrow I felt watching at her fighting to survive with a bicycle-load of scraps.

"Give her a hundred-peso bill," I told my wife. She alighted, approached the scavenging woman, and gave her the money. I could see the woman's eyes stuck with disbelief. She seemed to have not noticed that money was handed out to her as if her mind could not register such kindness from a total stranger.

Eventually she realized what was happening and accepted the money. With a humble smile in her heart, she said to my wife, Salamat! (Thank you!)

"Don't thank me for that. Thank God for that. He gave us the money for you."

With my wife inside the car now, I maneuvered the vehicle to join the north-bound traffic. But just as I joined the other vehicles moving forward, my wife told me, "I bought I loaf of sliced bread earlier. Maybe she's the reason why God wants me to buy it."

So my wife went down from the vehicle again, and gave the scavenging woman the newly bought loaf of sliced bread.

As we joined again the north-bound traffic, we felt the certainty that she now had something to eat on her way home and perhaps to share with her family too. That P100-bill could keep them fed for the next few days.

ZOSIMO
Sibulan, Negros Oriental