Hello and good morning ladies and gentlemen.

Thank you for having me

today. I’m Stephanie Anne Mercado, from Grade 8 San Jose Maria Escriva
and I have some questions to ask for you all. What if the Philippines will be
at war again? What if everyone will keep underestimating the LGBTQ
Community? What if your family will begin to fall apart from each other’s
arms? What if humans, ourselves, destroy our own environment? What will
happen to every one of us? Imagining those scenarios make me feel that
they are scarier than the whole universe itself. Well, as Frederick Buechner
said “Here is the world, good and terrible things will happen. Don’t be
afraid.” But sometimes, I also wonder how difficult it was back then when
other countries tried to occupy the Philippines, when there was all the
chaotic mess happening between our ancestors and the Spaniards. Glad I
was able to be born way after. Although all the wars have ended, we’ve still
been struggling to maintain a peaceful living in just our community. The
rules and regulations sometimes don’t give enough justice and the citizens
don’t even follow them. Keeping peace in your community is really simple
however the people doesn’t manage to just follow the basic laws provided
and made specially for us. We should all unite and have cooperation with
each other as members, or we’ll never experience a disciplined peaceful
community. So I could proudly say that my own community is educated,
cooperative and harmonious with one another. We are like a whole family
that helps to have a nice living at peace in our place, so I’m telling that you
guys should be like us for the best of us all.

Next topic is about when I once encountered a woman who was with
her girlfriend, suddenly people had all eyes on the two and gossiped
negative things about them. The way heterosexuals look down greatly to
the members of the LGBTQ community, is quite disappointing but not
surprising. I’ve seen a lot of similar experiences happening around me, and
I always think that it’s really not right to bring down a person just because
of their gender or sexuality. I just want you all to remember that no one’s
sexuality is superior than another because we are all equal, we all have the
same rights and we are all human.

Broken family? From a poor family? Don’t worry, whereas you still have
someone beside you. Others doesn’t even have neither a mother or father,
and a grandmother or grandfather. So what is important is that there’s still
someone that we should all be thankful for, the ones who takes care and
supports us wholeheartedly. The ones who are there for us and loves us in
whatever we do. It may hurt, and can be sad and lonely to have a missing
person in your family, but know that you are lucky for those until now never
left you alone and preferred to stay by your side. And if you are from a poor
family, then there’s nothing wrong about that. Our parents work hard for
everything and do anything just to provide all the needs and wants for us.
Being underprivileged, makes us need to just look inside of us and look
back at our own past life to understand our strengths, uniqueness, and use
them to move our life and other’s life forward. And also, as what I’ve said
all human are equal and not just because you’re richer, you are better.

Lastly, is about how the Amazon rainforest in Brazil was fired. It was
the world’s largest rainforest and many told that the fire was caused by the
people. It’s either the farmers cleared forest for cropland or illegal land-
grabbers destroyed the trees so they can raise the value of the property they
seize. Whatever reason that is, it needs to stopped. People around the world
are raising awareness of this issue because the people, plants, animals and
our mother earth is at risk. We are about to lose a lot of oxygen which is
essential for human survival and purifies the air we breathe by removing
pollutants in the atmosphere. Therefore, I’m also speaking about this to
everyone for we should be aware that humans destroy our environment but
humans are still affected in other way. Filipinos may not be the same as
Brazilians, but Filipinos too should stop cutting down more trees in order
to avoid worsening what’s happening in our environment.
Thank you all for your patience and for lending all your ears to be aware
in many of these topics. I wish you all a very good morning. Again, I’m
Stephanie Anne Mercado and that’s all for my speech.