A French connection
Enfants du Mekong (locally Batang Mekong) is a foundation based in France. Its work started in Laos and has since expanded to Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines. It has been in Cebu since 2000.
Teresita “Tere” Manguerra is currently the head of its projects in Cebu. Basically, the foundation looks for children who need to go to school but whose parents cannot afford the cost of their education. The foundation then looks for a family in France. The ideal plan is for them to support these children from grade school all the way up to college.
Tere says she got involved with Batang Mekong when she was asked to be in charge of scholars in the Cebu towns of Argao, Dalaguete and Alcoy. The children attend public schools and Batang Mekong pays for their needs for projects, school materials and other miscellaneous expenses, as well as for board and lodging, where applicable. In her area, the high school graduates usually take their college courses at the Cebu Technical University Argao campus.
“In my experience, I already have 10 college graduates, most of them teachers. I also have an IT graduate and one is even a seminarian,” said Tere.
Another project of Batang Mekong is Pagbantay Bata. This involves children from age one and a half to five years old living in the vicinity of the Inayawan garbage dump. There are seven cluster houses referred to as Balay Bantayan in the vicinity involved in this project. These houses are dropin centers for about 10 children, each of scavengers and other lowly workers in the area. There is a child development worker in charge of the children. The child development worker is trained to teach the children the basic rudiments of learning, so the children receive some kind of informal pre-school training. They are also taught to garden. They grow vegetables which they use for their meals. The children stay in the program until it is time for them to go to regular school. For parents, Pagbantay Bata means they do not have to bring their children with them as they scour the garbage dump.
Enfants du Mekong is basically concerned about the welfare of the youth and their education. But in other times of need, it also reaches out with other kinds of help to the community like housing for the survivors of Typhoon Yolanda. Truly like the Mekong river, whose waters flow out to the sea and there join the waters of the world, French beneficence through Enfants du Mekong has flowed out of Europe and into Asian lands. And the whole world is so much better for it.