RC Cola joins 'kariton' revolution
MANILA, Philippines - An extraordinary thing happened one ordinary afternoon in March 2012. The place was Cavite City, and the humble but purposeful kariton became king of the road. Pushcart after pushcart assembled on the pavement, not in a parade but in a peaceful revolution on the streets, representing stubborn hope that plods on through the grittiest of circumstances.
The Kariton Revolution was spearheaded by the Dynamic Teen Company of Efren Peñaflorida Jr. and Cavite City’s SK Federation, in cooperation with the Tourism Council, the city government, and the local Department of Education. Various pushcarts were decked out to represent the following causes: kalikasan, kabuhayan, kalinangan, kapayapaan, kabataan, karunungan, kalusugan (nature, livelihood, culture, peace, the youth, knowledge, health) aiming to ignite a sprit of community volunteerism. The caravan commenced at the Ladislao Diwa Elementary School, where townsfolk, local officials, and celebrities recommitted to the task of nation building.
One of the companies that participated in the advocacy campaign was Asiawide Refreshments Corporation (ARC), Philippine bottler of RC Cola. Championing the Kabuhayan crusade, ARC donated an RC Cola food kiosk fitted with a set of wheels so it could roll down Cavite’s thoroughfares during the caravan, and to serve as a mobile sari-sari store afterwards. The ARC management believes in the advocacies of DTC; thus, the kiosk will go a long way as a revenue-generating resource to further enable DTC to enable others.
Kariton Revolution’s advocacy is multi-pronged, precisely because real life’s like that: literacy and livelihood have health implications, which in turn affect the peace and order situation, and so on. This network of shared needs and values is something that ARC can understand because as a retail company with global ties, its stakeholders include customers, employees and their families, investors, distributors, and host communities, among others. By supporting the Kariton Revolution, ARC reiterates its pledge to be “a good neighbor.”
Positive transformation is a beautiful, inspiring thing, but the process is not easy. Volunteers of DTC started out by lugging backpacks that contained study materials, and as the number of their street pupils grew, the backpacks they carried grew heavier as well, pushing them to re-strategize. Bonn Manalaysay, mentor to Peñaflorida and other emerging street heroes, recounted how a youth volunteer who was a former mais vendor suggested that the kariton could be maneuvered even through a narrow eskinita. The humble vehicle proved to be an excellent metaphor for pushing on despite the odds, and provided an opposite, hopeful image to “crab mentality,” that attitude of pushing and pulling, stepping on and grabbing, so desperate and negative that it ensures virtually no freedom from the dire situation. Kariton Klasrum eventually won for Peñaflorida the CNN Hero of the Year award in 2009. Today, the alternative learning program is being adopted by the Department of Education, and is being replicated in different parts of the country and soon, also in Indonesia.
It was important for the Kariton Klasrum to first grow roots in Cavite, where, like in many barangays in the country, children as young as seven years old are already being recruited as gang members, said Manalaysay. “In Cavite, we have the Samahan ng mga Mangingisda, the TODA … but people are not aware that they should also mobilize for the sake of peace and order, the environment, and other causes. It’s about time,” and Cavite is a good place to start given that “it is the country’s seat of independence.”
Today, evidence of dreams coming true is everywhere in KarBil (Kariton Building), part of which was built with the prize money from CNN. Aside from Efren, there is Eman Bagual, who suggested the name Kariton Klasrum and who now heads MY Rights, a rights-based group that saves kids from peril. There is also Kesz Valdez, who started out so broken but is now one of the most heroic kids on the team, despite being among the youngest there. He has raised funds on his own initiative to help Sendong victims, and regularly hands out slippers to impoverished kids because his own young feet have endured too many calluses that he has made it his mission to ease other children’s pains.
Manalaysay encourages people and organizations to sign up and be counted: “Mamili ng mga adbokasiya na gusto nila. (Let them pick the advocacy they like.) It’s up to them if they want to devote two hours a week to effect change. What’s important is that we do something. We live in a world where we’re all connected; why don’t we lift each other up so we can also be lifted up?” This is the essence of the bayanihan.
When young people band together to organize the Kariton Revolution, when determined grownups push advocacy karitons along sun-scorched roads, and when strangers walk side by side for a common cause, they prove to all that nationalism truly is an action word.
