Mano Amiga Alumni raise funds for Pedicab Drivers through Polaroid Paintings

Moved by the stories of families who had lost their jobs because of the community quarantine, two Mano Amiga scholars started HOPEN- which stands for Hopeful and Open-hearted People Encouraging Niceness. Zycareine, 17 and Lovely, 16, created polaroid paintings and sold it for 50php each. In a few weeks, they were able to raise Php4,700, to provide food and relief goods to the families of Pedicab Drivers living in Sampaloc Site II, Paranaque City. 

“An idea started in these lines "I was bored, I can't just lie down in my bed knowing other families are struggling and I'm just doing nothing."

And then we found ourselves starting an organization in an instant. It's called HOPEN, which stands for Hopeful and Open-hearted People Encouraging Niceness.

Our goal is to spread hope and open our hearts to those people in need, and those issues that needs awareness.

Our organization is composed of young and hopeful teenagers who have big dreams and wants to change the world for the better.

Finally, we've gathered a total of ₱4,700.00, thanks to our donors and those who purchased our Polaroid Paintings.

While buying and packing the goods, we can't deny the joy that we feel while doing this action. A mix of doubt and gratefulness are in our hearts. Doubt that the families would not appreciate what we did, and the gratefulness we feel towards the donors and to God who never let us down.

This help may seem small but seeing how the people we helped smiled as they receive the goods, we cannot be grateful enough. It wiped all the doubt that we felt before.

As a new organization and as young as we are, with this project as our first fundraiser, there's nothing we're not grateful of.

We have reached our goal and we were able to help a few families of pedicab drivers from Sampaloc Site II, Parañaque City.

We are looking forward to our next project, and we hope you can again help us help more people.

We realized that there is nothing wrong with being hopeful and open-hearted ❤️

THANK YOU for all those who supported our first ever fundraising activity and the organization!

Thank you for all those who ordered and donated, as well as those who followed the page and shared our posts.

We can never thank you enough!”