March 14, 2014 - our dearest mother died of pneumonia. Her death did not come to us, the siblings, a surprise as she battled with the disease for some time. But even then, her passing left a huge vacuum in our lives, as her presence, especially towards her last years, turned our lives around. She knew, so well, how we appreciated her and our late father's sacrifices and preternatural vision, which swept us to where we are. She could not be more proud of herself, with the herculean handiwork she had crafted, in molding the idiosyncratic persona me and my siblings assume, into becoming better productive individuals. How she did seems amazingly unprecedented! We knew, that in our parents' death, they took with them the joy and pride, as we made them proud!
Looking back in my early years, before I took off to spread my wings, life in our household was tough and was always a constant struggle. Minimalist lifestyle, was all there is, not by choice. Poverty glued to the family so strongly, that at times, we made our parents felt 'mea culpa'. But despite of everything, our dear nanay made us turn around from this vapid predicament, to severe the imposing bondage of poverty. And that is by bequeathing to us the powerful legacy of education!
To honor the legacy of our parents - that is in proselytizing the transforming power of education, I initiated, and my siblings concurred, the creation of a non-profit eponymous foundation dubbed as Bernardo-Sebastiana Doyungan Educational Initiative (BSDEI). The objective of this Initiative is to poverty is not a roadblock to success'. We humbly try to showcase ourselves, in demonstrating the transforming power of education. As such, the Initiative adopted the elementary school, where most of our siblings finished elementary education, and pupils in this school receive all the school supplies at the start of the every school year. To motivate pupils to do well in school, cash awards are given to top five honor roll pupils/students, in a few select schools thus far, in appreciation and recognition of their academic
excellence, at the end of the school year. encourage the community, especially parents with school-age children and the pupils, the pursuit of education, despite of poverty. Our Initiative embraces the time-tested cliche " poverty is not a roadblock to success".
Now, on its fifth year of existence, we continue to go back to the elementary school where our educational journey took off. We have given cash awards to top five graduates in three elementary schools and a high school. We continue to encourage the people in that community to tool the children with education, as they look forward to our visit every start and end of the school year. Our Initiative, as we know, can only give this much of material support, but it is hoped that the impact is felt in the families decades after we gladly hand in school supplies to the pupils.
For certain, this Initiative commemorating our dearly beloved parents (Bernardo and Sebastiana Doyungan), is making them more proud of us. This is our way of giving back to them, by giving back to the community!
