Where Is The Food?

“Pagpag”

You live in Manila, the Philippines. What would you do if you had no money to buy fresh meat? What would you do if one day, you find yourself living in the slums, with not enough to eat? Where would you look first?

Welcome to Happyland, Manila.

Here, Manila’s poorest make meals of uneaten food from the landfills. These scraps of food are called “pagpag” literally means "to shake off the dust or dirt", and refers to the act of shaking the dirt off of the edible portion of the leftovers. Pagpag can be either eaten immediately or cooked in variety of ways after collecting it.

STEP ONE : COLLECTION

First, pagpag is collected from the landfills by a pagpag collector. This collector will rummage through bags of garbage and pick out the cleaner-looking pieces of meat. The meat collected range from chicken wings from fast food restaurants in the city, or potato fries, or even pieces of meat. The meat will be collected in a plastic bag and will be sold to restaurant owners. The pagpag collectors are usually paid around USD6 every week. The job of a pagpag collector usually lasts from 12 noon to 4am. This is when the collector and restaurant owner will meet up and the meat will be handed over.

STEP 2: PREPARATION AND COOKING

The meat will be brought back to the home of the cook and he will wash the meat and remove the bones. This will allow the meat to become slightly cleaner. From then on, it is really up to the chef how he wants to serve his pagpag. Some have recipes for spicy or sweet sauce with strong colours to cover over the dull colour of the pagpag, whereas some prefer to serve it as it is. The chef will cook his pagpag and serve the dish hot.

STEP 3: SERVING

The dish will then be sold at about 20 cents per bowl. If the chef is nice, you could order some rice too.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

In Manila, it is not unusual to find members of the poorer communities living off pagpag, especially the residents living in the outskirts. Having to live on these scraps everyday certainly is not easy, but the Filippinos get through by being grateful for what they have.

Some say that pagpag is already considered a culture and tourists who participate in what we now know as “slum tourism” find it extremely fascinating.

However, we should stop and think – what if we were the ones living this lifestyle? We may never be able to understand what these people go through, and even if we do eat a bowl of pagpag, will we truly be able to understand what poverty feels like?

Poverty isn’t a one-dimensional problem and there are too many layers of causes and effects. We easily overlook how tough it is just for these people to get by each day. There will not be an immediate or feasible solution, but there are many ways to gradually elevate the situation, like providing education for the younger children for them to break through the poverty cycle.

So its time to think: what can you do for these people?