Read Part 1 and Part 2.

I think Brgy. 105 was the worst, for me. Certainly it was the most traumatic.

When the government stopped the dumping of garbage at Smokey Mountain, and started building the tenement housing, the residents were relocated here. Over 30 buildings of temporary housing were built, and hundreds–thousands?–of families moved in. When the tenement housing was completed, many left, but many stayed, and more arrived.

Today, it’s a very densely populated area. It’s here that you find places called Aroma, and Happyland. It’s here that people sell and eat pagpag, food salvaged from garbage and recooked. It’s hard to see the 30 or so buildings that stand here, as they’re hidden beneath tarps and sheets of aluminum or wood, makeshift shelters that serve as dwellings for families too many to count. You could easily get lost here, one of our staff told me, and of this I have no doubt. Climb up the stairs to the second level of a building, and you take labyrinthine paths to find a patient, their neighbor, somebody’s close contact. Piles of junk lie here and there. You could walk into somebody’s laundry hung out to dry, or you could walk past an Internet shop no bigger than your closet at home.

In narrow alleys were motorcycles, tricycles, bicycles, no doubt a means of meager livelihood. In some doorways sat men and women peeling garlic. In others were men and women sorting through junk and garbage, seeing what could be salvaged, sold, reused. A few times we ran into people with their hair wrapped in towels, having come from a communal bathroom. Children ran barefoot, naked even.

It was hard to tell where one residence began and another ended. Some dwellings didn’t have doors, exactly, but planks of wood or metal held precariously in place by other found materials. It was hard to tell how many people lived in one place, or even how big–or small, rather–each residence was. In a narrow gap between walls we would suddenly find a small ladder, and above we would hear voices; apparently another family lived there.

While other places in Tondo did not strike me as particularly unsafe, Brgy 105 felt like something altogether. Only here did I feel like the wrong move would get me in trouble. I feared that if I lost sight of our team, I would end up in an alley alone, and the prospect was unnerving. Only here did people decline to have their picture taken. Only here did people look at us and our photographer with suspicion.

In one alley we saw some shirtless men playing chess, and our photographer asked if she could take their picture. Politely, they declined, and I saw one move his towel from one shoulder to another, covering a tattoo. I remembered stories of criminals hiding in Tondo, and I shuddered. I’m sure my imagination was running wild, and I did my best to calm myself down.

I shrank into myself every time I had to walk through a narrow alley, or beneath a low doorway. My hands clenched as I tried to keep from touching anything. I watched carefully where I stepped, fearful of slipping and falling. A few times as we entered or exited a building, water dripped from who knows where, and I was terrified of a drop landing on me, imagining it carried germs unknown. I could feel the panic rising in my throat as I saw garbage under bare feet, dirt and grime in every corner, hoses and pipes snaking along walls and alleys. I was embarrassed to find myself disgusted by my surroundings. I must have held my breath the entire time we were there.

It’s hard to see such poverty. It’s hard to see people living in such desperate situations. It’s hard to see what difference we can make in their lives, when so many other things in society work against them.

But I was glad for the feisty little boy we saw, whose grandfather was diagnosed with tuberculosis, because he looked like he was ready to take on anything, and his father seemed truly concerned about his welfare. I was glad for the elderly couple we chatted with, as they peeled garlic outside their home. I was glad for the children who were on preventive treatment, and the adults who persuaded their households to get screened. If not for these bright spots on that day in Brgy 105, I think I would have broken down as soon as we were in the safety of the van.

All I can do is take comfort in the fact that their plight is not forgotten, that we and other organizations work hard to bring them what aid we can. All I can do is tell their stories in the ways I know how. I don’t pray much, but for the children in Tondo, all I can do is whisper prayers of hope for their futures.