Taong Grasas

Redemption
From left to right: Yvette
Rica D. Aquino, Grace
Ortega, Danilo Ortega, Me.

One
thing
Ive
realized
from
this
experience is that all
people, no matter what
walk of life theyve come
from, has a chance at
their own redemption. It
doesnt cost anything to
be a better version of
yourself so why not give
it a try? If Kuya Danilo
Ortega can do it, so can
everyone.
Our
search
for
taong grasa to interview
started by the footbridge
near the MRT Cubao
station.
We
first
approached Ms. Grace
Ortega
and
my
classmate Yvette first interviewed her. She told us that she had a husband and

Taong Grasa Project

CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY TERM PAPER
he was by the footbridge as well so we offered to buy them food and then we
proceeded with the interview. While Yvette was talking to Ate Grace, I was also
having a conversation with Kuya Danilo. They told us that theyve been married
for 15 years already and that they had 2 children. One of their children already
passed away while their other child is already 25 years old and is working at
Ma. Melody B. Francisco | BS ARCH 3-2 | February 19, 2016
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Jollibee. They occasionally stay at Ate Graces sister-in-laws house in Antipolo,

Padilla when they earn enough for transportation fare. When they dont earn
enough from the donations of the people at the footbridge give them, they sleep
by the side of Sogo Hotel near the footbridge. They said that people occasionally
give them coins and if they dont get enough money, they sometimes end up
hungry. Theyve gotten ill before and although it was a struggle, they manage to
get by with the money they manage to save up.
Kuya Danilo told me more on about his side of the story after a while. At
first he was warry of talking compared to Ate Grace because he feared that we
might get them caught by the police so we stayed by the footbridge to avoid
them. He told us that once before they were caught by the police and was
supposedly brought to Pampanga but they managed to get off but they had no
clothes and no money. They had to walk back to Cubao for many days. They tried
asking for food, help and even a bit of change from the people they pass by but
no one helped them. Then a mayor was kind hearted enough to donate Php
2,000.00 to them and gave clothes to wear and food to eat, so they managed to
come back to Cubao.

A picture of Grace and Danilo Ortega at the footbridge near MRT Cubao station.

At first I thought that the police were the only reason why Kuya Danilos
wariness towards us but I noticed his leg looking injured. He told us that his left
leg was burned for no reason by some children when he was asleep. He had that
injury for a long time now and considering that hes already 58 years old, I can
only imagine the struggle he goes through daily. The level of cruelty done to him
baffled me so the next thing he told us shocked me, because he said that he
killed the person responsible for his injury. He was jailed for that and he suffered,
but now he is working on being a better person. He kept talking about him being
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a devotee of the Black Nazarene, and how he is now trying to change to redeem
himself from the sin he has committed in the past. Hes devotion to his religion is
evident from the stories he told us about the struggles and the joys he
experienced from trying to be a better man. They may be taong grasa but that
doesnt make them less of a person. Their economic standing doesnt define
what they are and I saw that in them. And it is commendable that being a taong
grasa doesnt hinder him from becoming a better person.
Kuya Danilo also kept on warning us about the children in Cubao which are
notorious for being sly thieves. He kept on telling us to put our bags at the front
and to guard our valuables because they were also victimized by those children.
It just goes to show that bad things such as getting robbed also happen to the
taong grasa. Imagine having only a small amount of money that was meant to
their food getting taken away from them just like that? Its so sad to think that
even they get victimized by such things and that its more difficult for them to
get back up from what they lost but it doesnt stop them from spreading to word
to help other people to escape the same faith theyve experienced.

A picture of Kuya Danilo Ortega (on the left) and me.

This experience certainly helped me broaden my view on things in life. I

would certainly be more giving to taong grasa rather than just ignoring them like
what Ive been doing before. Seeing how Kuya Danilo wanted to redeem himself
also made me want to become a better version of myself. I wanted to help more
people like them after this experience and I hope that more people would also
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realize that taong grasa are people too, and most of the time they need help
more than we do. Their struggles in life are certainly more difficult than ours and
I hope more people would understand that and once everyone helps each other
out. I hope for a future in which that taong grasa would find a real home wherein
they could live, not just the dirty streets of the city.

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