This weekend, I get to participate on my first outreach program. I was eagerly invited by my bestfriend and I was excited myself on preparing for the trip.

The event was lead and organized by Ate Izza. The participants are all volunteers with the soul purpose of helping out with the cause. I met so many good hearts that day.

Finally, I was able to let go of the clothes I've outsized. It was somehow easier to get them out of my closet and into a huge bag that I almost filled up. I also had friends who gave me few clothes and toys and I was excited to give them out to the kids there.

Apart from the clothes, I was also able to pledge few medicines. I feel fulfilled already! lol

We had a Facebook Group and a few Chat Groups where we talked and organized things with others. Me and my bestfriend got assigned with the Assessment Team. Hooray! We are going to teach Grade 2 Students! :)

Come the day of the trip and we reached the meeting place just in time to get to know the people whom we are going to have the trip with. I even ended up checking the attendance of the group I was in.

We had tons of boxes that made it easier to gather the rest of the group. By 4AM, we met up with two jeepneys that drove us to the town proper of Brgy. San Rafael.

It was an hour long drive and we were briefed with the route of the hike and was grouped into to two. There are three ways to reach the Dumagat Tribe of Kaysili; (1)via 10 assaults, (2)trekking trough the Marikina River or (3)riding a balsa. And I chose to join the assault group!

We had all the boxes secured with huge plastic bags and had them transported with the balsa, with the help of some of the local residents.

Hooray for the first photo of this post. haha. Just a few walk at the cemented pathway, we already saw huge rocks that eventually led us to a glimpse of The Wawa Dam of Rizal and a view of Bernardo Carpio's face.

We walked further to the calmer part of the Marikina River and was greeted with little rain shower and a pinch of fog. It's as if the place are greeting us and giving us small kisses on our arrival. :)

And then our first rainbow showed up!

We reached the point where we need to cross the river and continue our hike. We were told by the locals that the river was too wild to cross by foot. And from here we saw two rainbows!♥♥

And then the "real" hike starts!

We were told that we will have 10 assaults but as we were on trail, we didn't even mind how many we have passed and just wanted to arrive at the resting spot.

I haven't quite hiked for a long time now and have little to no cardio lately so the hike was close to hard for me plus my bag was heavy that day ~ hello asthma! lol

There were few good peaks but I was too tired to take a photo and just appreciated the view on the way.

And at last! The resting spot! Yey!

We caught up with the first team and was about to continue on when we arrived. I took a seat right away!

Here's the rest of the amazing view and the only group photo I am in! lol

Anywho, after photos taken on each of our phones, we went ahead and continued with the hike. We were told that it will all be down hill from here.

And hey, it didn't took as long to reach the tribe's main village.

We arrived at the main village with the other volunteers preparing everyone's meal. We quickly washed up, changed shirts, freshen up and helped out with what we can. There were tons of medicines, clothes and food! I myself never thought we have collected this much, it was really amazing.

The team in-charged with the entertainment gathered the kids and started with the games. It was so much fun! Everybody was lively as if they don't know how to get tired.

As the games for the kids go on, some got busy on laying out the rest of the donated goods, repacking groceries for each of the family and the medical team was preparing with the individual check-ups for everyone.

The last activity by afternoon was the mini lecture for the kids. They were grouped in to their corresponding school grades and the assessment team (which I'm in) gave the kids a good few minutes of school activities.

It was surprising to see the enthusiasm of the kids to learn and how much they already know with their age. On the group I was teaching, we had a mother that's studying together with her son. That was really cool!

The lecture was stopped after almost an hour. As some of the kids were told by their parents to walk back to the town proper early. The kids told us that the they have to walk back to the town to attend school by Monaday. They have a house back at the town to stay close at school then go back to the village when the weekend comes.

The first group of people was able to ride the raft back to the village so we didn't had any option but to walk back with the kids.

It was a pretty long stroll, but I loved the sceneries that we have passed by along the way. We passed the river 9 times! And it was really relaxing to see how everything is green and peaceful and quite. :)

Here are photos along the away grabbed from friends from the outreach:

More photos here:
https://www.facebook.com/azylem4bk/media_set?set=a.1294695753892695.100000568472980&type=3
https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipNFhcSB-wmUyVHcuZmixc3HRdFcCsUp8NxmWkozy5X5pJDQVqgUKzTkSWeibXQhDA?key=ejN3WUh6VnBSaF9STzdVbTlZcXViU0xpOWZONjFn

I am very thankful to have been a part of this event. It was a very memorable experience. If you are interested on participating, you may check out Ate Izza's profile and check out their next trip!.

Thank you for reading all the way through! :D

**The photos used at this post are taken with my Sony Xperia Z2 and grabbed from people I have the trip with , with the following applications used: Adobe Photoshop.