A woman in her early fifties sat behind the president's table. She was wearing eyeglasses where her eyes darted out to Jemma as she walked inside. Strips of white ran along her shoulder-length curly hair, which swayed as she shifted her medium-built body. She gestured her to sit down. Jemma's brief research the other day revealed the woman's name.

"I've already made a perusal on your credentials that you've sent through mail, and I see that you are not quite qualified for the position," Mrs. Hinaloc began. "Now I need to hear from you how determined you are, and convince me that you have the dedication for this job."

This was her very first job application since she graduated college in 1998. After graduating and after she got pregnant, she got married. She failed the teacher's board exam the following year and the year after that. Frustrated and disappointed, she had decided to channel her interest into something else. And for the next eight years, she was hopping from one job to another, all without the hopes for financial stability. Her husband supported the family in majority, but with their two sons their income were not enough.

Now, facing this seemingly straightforward and stern woman, she couldn't help herself from fidgeting. She pressed both her palms against her lap.

"It makes me happy to be around with children. The kind of happiness that you cannot feel from somewhere and someone else. Children sparks my reason to live longer," she explained, abashed by her own words and by her sudden talking of things like that. Whatever doubt and self-questioning she felt, she muffled them inside.

"You mean, normal children," Mrs. Hinaloc said in a tone that was not suggesting but correcting.

"There's just a little difference between them, I guess. You just need extra time and effort to tend these kind of children," she went on, defending.

Mrs. Hinaloc glared silently at her, scrutinizing her mind through her eyes. After a while she looked down at the resume on the table. "Extra time and effort can sometimes be detrimental and deadly here, Mrs. Bermoy. Once those extra time and effort ran out, things around here get spinning out of control, overpowering you. These children here can shatter their own lives once you ran out of those, or shatter yours."

Jemma felt embarrassed. She felt like melting, and she needed badly to melt away so fast. Mrs Hinaloc, leaned back on her cushioned swivel chair, and then continued, "These children here don't need those extra time and effort, Mrs. Bermoy. They need most of those that you'll be left with no extra time and effort for yourself and your own kids. Now, tell me, are you willing to risk it?"

"I can risk my time. I will take the risks," she said, firmly.

"I mean your family."

She went silent. "Oh, that."

"Do you think you can survive?"

She recomposed herself, and looked straight at the woman. "I know this requires a lot of physical strength, but I'm accustomed to that. That will not be a problem to me."

Mrs. Hinaloc removed her eyeglasses and rubbed her temple. With a little trace of exasperation, she looked at her and said, "I'm not talking about physical endurance. I'm talking about emotional survival. We are not dealing with children who have control over themselves and over the things around them. We are talking about children with unexpected tantrums and special attention. Children with beyond ordinary needs. Yes, you need to endure them, but it also requires your right emotions to understand them, and make them understand themselves. In that way, you can help them control themselves."

"That is a challenge I am willing to take. To help them feel they deserve to carry on their existence, to make them feel valued. I want to make them feel welcomed, that they deserve to be in this world as much as we do."

Mrs. Hinaloc looked at her and smiled. "That's a wonderful drive. But then again I need to know that you are willing to pour your life here. "

Jemma shifted her weight and replaced her palms to her knees, and this time she was pressing them harder. They rested there, tensed and stiff.

"My two sons are old enough to prepare themselves for school, and they are old enough to understand that I needed to do this for them. Having this job will in no way affect our relationship and respect to each other and everything in between."

Mrs. Hinaloc went to scan her resume again as she retorted, "Children sometimes aren't old enough to distinguish what they should and shouldn't feel envy from. At some points they will come to feel jealousy and resentments for your tending children not your own."

"I will talk to them about it. I am completely aware of that reality, and I know that it's not just a possibility. I will explain everything to them. My husband is there to look after them."

Mrs. Hinaloc sighed. Then looked at her. "How would you not confuse yourself from and not going to incorporate your own issues with that of the Shelter's? I ask you this because, although we need you to let your dedication and passion for the children here to flow into your blood, we don't expect you to integrate your personal life and struggles with the situations we always have here. It is important to see the thin line in between."

"I understand it, ma'am. And I 'll never do that. It's not going to happen."

Mrs. Hinaloc stared at her again, this time even more penetrating, as though peeling her painstakingly to reveal her flesh and bones. "Good."

But she did not feel comfortable. She felt she was not convincing enough, judging the kind of tone her interviewer had delivered. She felt the urge to keep going, to be more persuasive. "Of course I know pretty well that this is a job. And I know that work and personal life should always be separate. Mixing them is destructive either way. These mongoloid children and ---"

Mrs Hinaloc glared sharply at her. She looked agitated. She ceased from leaning on the chair and moved her body forward, closer to Jemma. With a firm, pressing voice, she interrupted, "You seem to have no idea what this is all about. You see, this is not just a job. And this is not just one of those responsibilities that you have to perform. This is about involvement with what you do, and connection to children. This is about letting them flow into your life, treating them as if you die without them. This is about understanding what these children need most, how they really feel about themselves and about the things around them. This is about loving what you do and keeping to the end the same inspiration you feel at the very start so you can keep going. Do you see it that way?"

Sheepishly, she nodded. "Yes, ma'am."

Mrs. Hinaloc, went on, "And we don't call them mongoloids or retarded children. That's too harsh and cruel. Very inhumane. They don't deserve that, just like black people don't deserve to be called 'niggers'. These children can even feel, too, how people really treat them by calling names like that. And it hurts them. We prefer to call them Special, or Challenged. But not Retards."

"I'm so sorry, Mrs. Hinaloc. I don't mean to convey such thought or to imply such horrible level of treatment. It just came out wrong."

"It's OK. Just don't say it again."

When Mrs. Hinaloc went back to reading the entries on her resume, Jemma succinctly closed her eyes and sighed, fearing the dark destination in which this interview was leading to. "It won't happen again."

"Good," Mrs. Hinaloc uttered and then paused. Her eyes were still on the papers, appeared to be reading. Jemma, disparagaed with fading hope and enthusiasm, waited.

Mrs. Hinaloc looked up at her. "Very well."

Another pause. Another waiting.

Without any other applicants for the past five weeks now and time had already ran out, Mrs. Hinaloc was left with no other option. She had to succumb her standards and surrender her techinicality if she needs to. "OK. Let's give it a try. I will give you two weeks to make me not regret doing this, Mrs. Bermoy."

Jemma, confused but nevertheless happy, smiled reluctantly. After the news had sank in, she said, "Thank you, Mrs. Hinaloc. Thank you very much."

Mrs. Hinaloc smiled for the first time. "Call me Vilma. Surname's too formal and territorial."

After another word or two, they both stood up, shook hands, and Vilma led her to the door. A few meters outside the gate, Jemma turned to look back. She didn't really mean to stay there for long. Criselda was right, she just needed the experience alone to qualify as a caregiver for special children in Canada. She already had the papers needed for the application, and she had already borrowed money to cover the estimated expenses. What she was told to acquire was a certification from a training center and a certification from an employer to fortify her application. Everything had already been set, and nothing could ever change what she had already planned. After a while she smiled, and then went to continue walking.

They brought the children to the playground one Saturday morning. With Justin and Enrico helping them looked after the kids, any outbursts would easily be controlled. There were no swing, no seesaw, no slides; they posed high risks of getting the children hurt. They placed rubber padding on the ground, and provided no plastic or metal toys. All were rubber, inflated, or made of stuffed cloth.

The shadows of the trees were the children's utopia; the sun cast its eastern radiance through a series of mazy holes in the foliage and landed triumphantly on the smiling imperfect faces of the running and playing children. They were oblivious to the world around them, for in their own motley world they were busy painting the colors only known to them.

But such beauty of their world was twinned with fragileness and threats. And as the four of them were mesmerized by the unexpressed Eden of the playing children, a sudden horrified shriek tore the thin sheets of lightly moving air. And it came from the inside of the Shelter.

She wanted to run into the house to know what happened, and to help if needed. But she couldn't leave her own responsibilities in the playground. And as the screaming and frightened commotion went louder from inside, Enrico dashed to help. Afraid and unsure, she and Ricarda grouped the children into one and protected them from the unseen yet eminent danger.

A few minutes later, horrified but focused Enrico dashed outside into the parked L300, in his arms the unconscious body of 13 year-old Maricar, one of the 33 children from the Seraphim Room. From her head trailed several profuse streams of blood.

The heartbreaking and shocking sight of the young woman sent uncontrollable tremors all over her body as she gasped. Ricarda covered her mouth with both her hands, fighting frantically from screaming.

"What has happened? What's going on?" her strained confused voice reverberated across the lawn.

Josephine, shaking and crying, briefly explained. With his instinct waking him, Justin ran past Criselda and Andrea, toward the vehicle and hurriedly opened it for Enrico to put Maricar inside with him. Scared but controlled, Andrea followed inside. Justin closed the door and went to driver's seat and turned on the ignition.

The first day wasn't at all that easy and welcoming. It wasn't as hard as what she had expected; it was much more harder and exhausting.

She was met in the Guest Receiving Room by one of the social workers on duty that day. Her name was Ricarda Maputol, a medium-built woman in her late forties. Married for seventeen years with one son. Annulled on the eighteenth. Roughly six years ago, Ricarda made a terrible mistake that derailed her from the promising railways of her life into perdition. She played fire with another man, and was caught by her husband. Everything was hell after that, its demon snatched away her husband and her son. The annulment was painful, and the settlement for the custody was even more disheveling. After winning the case her husband, bringing with him their son, had flown to America. She couldn't blame her husband, and she hadn't felt resentments toward somebody else but herself. And in all those crushing years, what she ever wanted was to have them back. And all she ever needed was salvation. Forgiveness. Redemption.

Sut Jemma never saw traces of those story in the woman's face. And she had yet to hear the story. Ricarda smiled genuinely when she saw her walked in. The woman extended her hands happily as she introduced herself. Jemma smiled back, shook the woman's hand, and introduced herself in return. Jemma found her friendly and unselective. She immediately felt relaxed and comfortable.

"I can see in you myself years ago when I was still new here," Ricarda began as she led her to the side door. She pushed it with force, and then gestured Jemma to go inside. "And the same passion that I have, too. I can see them in you. You'll gonna stay long here."

Unsure what to respond, Jemma just smiled.

Smiling, too, Ricarda knowingly said, "Believe me, you will. Those others before you, I didn't see it in their eyes. And I knew right away they wouldn't last. And I was right."

She didn't know what to say. She just stood there, waiting for Ricarda to lead her through. As she turned around, she saw before her the real world inside the Shelter. All of the realities came rushing all at once to her as she watched there, transfixed.

A children of around thirty litter all over the floor, each of them engulfed by and dwelling in their own world. The room was noisy and hyperactive; children were groaning and laughing and whining; most of them by themselves. Some of them were talking to one another in gibberish, some of them were actually having conversations with the attendants or with each other, but with difficulty and less or no sense at all, and with random pauses. The six social workers, all of them women mostly in their early thirties, were busy tending some of the children. Three of them were feeding those who had not yet taken their breakfast. The other two were leading the children to the kitchen for toothbrushing, and the last one was on the floor scrubbing and drying the spilled liquid that smelled of urine. The room was slightly pungent, and her mind was already spinning wildly. But she did not cover her nose. She gave a faint smile as the woman on the floor looked up to see her, but the woman went immediately back to cleaning.

"How many children are there?" she asked Ricarda, who was on her right side. They were now walking toward the three attendants who were feeding some children.

"In this quarter, we call it Seraphim Room, we have thirty three children," Ricarda replied. "And in my quarter, and your quarter, we have ten children." Then she introduced Jemma to the three workers, and to the woman who was on the floor, cleaning.

After exchanging a few words with them, she went to continue her conversation with Ricarda. "You said a while ago that there are only ten children in the other quarter. That sounds too few compared to here."

"Oh, believe me, Jemma. One day you'll gonna wish they were even fewer, if not beg to be transferred."

Her heart made a sudden leap of wonderment. Curious, she asked, "Why? How many are we there?"

"Just you and me. Every now and then Justin will come to help. He's the all-around guy. And sometimes, when we can't control it anymore, Enrico will come to our aid. He's the driver here, our only driver."

They were walking toward the kitchen, which was located behind the main building. When they were there, Ricarda told her that it was where they prepare the foods for them and for the children. The huge bathroom adjacent to the kitchen and next to a row of toilets is where they brought the children to brush their teeth and to give them a bath. The other children in the isolated room had their own bath- and restroom.

From there she was taken to the sleeping quarters, which she later found out to be more of a huge hospital ward. Two rows of eight beds each lined against the walls, just like with the other room where there were seventeen beds.

They were standing outside the social workers' quarter when Jemma asked, "The other ten children, why are they separated from the rest? Are they in grave condition?"

Ricarda turned to face her, and then looked at her in the eyes. Then she held her hand and said, "Come with me."

Photograph by Dizzee Dayzee. Please CLICK HERE to visit the owner's Flickr page. Thanks!