Being Poor is Not Easy

In a small province in Quezon, where roads turn dusty in summer and muddy during the rainy season, Lester was born. He was not born into wealth, nor into a house with wide windows or a solid ceiling. Their home was made of wood and galvanized iron sheets, with small gaps that let in cold wind at night and sunlight in the morning. When it rained, parts of the floor had to be covered with old sacks or basins to catch the dripping water from the roof. But for Lester, all of this meant nothing yet. He was still a child—too young to understand the world. All he knew was his mother’s laughter, her soft voice calling him home, and his father’s heavy but comforting presence whenever he returned from working in the fields. “Lester! Come here!” his mother called one morning while preparing a simple breakfast—rice and dried fish. Lester ran barefoot across their worn wooden floor. He was small, thin, and always had dirt on his knees from playing outside. He didn’t understand why he had to eat breakfast; all he knew was that he wanted to go back outside afterward. Outside their home, the world was wide. There were coconut trees, carabaos slowly walking along the dirt road, and neighbors who knew each other by name. In the province, nobody seemed to rush. Even time itself felt slower. But as Lester grew older, his world slowly began to change. When he reached high school, he first began to feel the difference between his life and others. His uniform was always slightly faded. His shoes were often worn at the front, patched by his mother with thread just to make them last longer. But he still went to school every day. He rarely complained. At first, Lester was not a bright student. He was not confident in class either. He was often quiet, just listening, sometimes staring out the window while the ceiling fan slowly spun above him. “Lester, answer the question,” the teacher would sometimes call. He would freeze. He didn’t know the answer. But he never answered rudely. He would simply stand and say softly: “I’m sorry, Ma’am. I don’t know.” Some classmates would laugh. Others didn’t care. But Lester was already used to it—he was not used to success, but to struggle. At home, his mother would be washing clothes by the well. “How was school?” she would ask. “Okay,” Lester would reply, even though he wasn’t really sure what “okay” meant. As long as he wasn’t failing, it was enough. His father was often quiet. Always tired from working in the fields, he would eat in silence at the table. But whenever he looked at Lester, there was a kind of hope in his eyes that the boy did not yet fully understand. “Just study hard,” his father once said while fixing an old radio. “So you won’t suffer the way I did.” Lester did not fully understand those words yet. For him, hardship was normal. Muddy feet were normal. Simple meals were normal. Carrying the weight of walking long distances to school was normal. But inside the classroom, he slowly began to see a different world. Some classmates had brand-new phones. Some brought delicious food for lunch. Others didn’t even have to walk far because they had rides. Lester, however, always walked—through heat, rain, and dust. One day, while sitting under a mango tree behind the school, a classmate approached him. “Lester, why are you always so quiet?” the boy asked. Lester shrugged. “Nothing.” But inside him, there were many “nothings” he could not yet explain. Why was life easier for others? Why did he always have to struggle even in small things? Why did his family always seem to have just enough—or less—but still keep going? He did not know that those questions were only the beginning of something deeper. A journey not just about hardship. But about family, dreams, and the slow shaping of a boy who did not yet understand the world—but would one day learn how to face it. At the end of each day, Lester would walk home as the sun set behind the rice fields. His shadow stretched long across the dusty road, and inside his young heart, there was something he could not yet name. It felt like he was searching for something. Like something was about to come. And he did not yet know—it was only the beginning of his story.