A Perfect Stranger Every December

Christmas is around the corner. All of us, each and every families in each and every houses might now be thinking what to prepare for their Noche Buena.Lots of foods would be sitting in their big and wondrous tables. Fruit salad, Lechon, Ham, Spaghetti, any kinds of delicious and delightful foods would be present.

It's a  marvellous and happy season, in did a wonderful celebration! Inside their well-decorated and comfortable houses. Everyone would be happy. Gifts would be wreck opened. Tummies would be full; Because a great season is to be celebrated.

But do all of us experience this kind of Christmas? The answer is, No.

Merry Christmas I say but you’ve all just pass by me. Can’t you see the words I’d hardly written?

Can’t you see the place I didn’t wish?

 I bet you can’t.

They are family, through high and through low.

This picture was taken outside the premises of Malolos Cathedral. A family, or should I say, group of Negritos are lingering in the area. Wishing for a couple of change or some rice for Christmas but no one seemed to see them, nor do they hear the little wishes of the group. They travel the entire city every December, in hope for some money and no one knows how they managed to be.  A stranger they are, around the loud and huge city. A stranger they will always be when Christmas is at its peak.

They don't beg for your hard-earned change, neither do they need your opinion or empathy.

All they need is a place to stay and some food to eat. Things they had on their paradise,  that “ THEY’VE” snatched.

They’ve snatched everything that we had, our home.

Unlike the other Negritos around the Malolos Cathedral, this family of Negritos are selling bamboo souvenirs to earn some money and be able to buy food for their starve tummy. Together with their children, neglecting the heat and dirt of the cement floor they are seating over. Just to satisfy their hunger. A thing they may not have experience, only if they are on their own home.

The city she feared is dark and dirty. Different faces, an unknown place.

Where is the green and peaceful paradise she knows?

A pretty little girl, lost in every way possible.

A little girl, who’s very young to earn some money, together with her family she strives hard to survive in a place she shouldn’t have been; Selling bamboo souvenirs in exchange of small cash. A pretty little girl who use to live inside her own magical world, now lost in a city she’s a stranger to. Can she survive?