Manila, Philippines
 
In the overpopulated slums and squatter settlements of metro Manila, a crowd can form in a matter of minutes. That alone makes them ideal settings for the actors of Lunduyan, a youth group specializing in street theater.
 

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But there are more important reasons why they choose to perform in the poor barangays (neighborhoods) that surround the city's core. Lunduyan is a non-profit organization dedicated to protecting the rights of children and their welfare. If any group needs help, it's the children who live in the slums.
 
Aside from growing up poor (or because of it), they face a myriad of social problems ranging from drugs and sexual abuse to early pregnancy. Unfortunately, those are sensitive issues no one likes to talk about, let alone address.
 
That's where Lunduyan steps in. Working with youth who live in the various barangays, they formed a theater group and devised skits that force difficult issues into the open. They perform the skits with Lunduyan's signature look - painted faces and colorful costumes - right in the slums. The way they attract children, they're like a circus that's always in town.

Theater of Empowerment
 

	A Lunduyan actor entertains a child from her barangay

"Filipino people are very visual," says Maries Concepcion, a project leader at Lunduyan, explaining why the group chose street theater as their medium. "They don't like lectures because they feel like we're condemning them. We couldn't help them if we just lecture."
 
Instead, the youth act out stories, drawn from the lives of people in the communities. At the very least, they hope to get people talking about the drugs that are wasting so many young lives, about the sexual abuse going on secretly in many homes, and about all the unwanted pregnancies that have no easy resolution.
 
In the Philippines, the Catholic Church still has enormous political clout and abortion is banned by the constitution. Women and teenage girls who wish to terminate pregnancies have to resort to illegal and unsafe means. According to a study by the Alan Guttmacher Institute, more than 80,000 women a year are hospitalized due to self-induced abortions. That's out of an estimated 400,000 abortions a year.

The Cycle of Poverty
 

Lunduyan actors perform a skit that relates to abortion

Bringing the pregnancies to term is what the Church deems moral and proper. While many Filipinos may agree, unwanted pregnancies can still create complications for families that already have too many mouths to feed and not enough income. About 40 percent of the population lives below the poverty line. And so many can't find jobs that millions have to seek work outside the country, making the Philippines the biggest exporter of labor after Mexico. That is why for Lunduyan, the country's high fertility rate of 3.7 children per family is a cause for concern.
 
"Overpopulation is one of the main factors why poverty is rampant in the Philippines," says Maries. "That's why for the children we're reaching out to, we tell them for every right, there are corresponding responsibilities."
 
While Lunduyan promotes contraceptives when helping sex workers, they're more likely to promote abstinence in their skits, which target a younger audience. They try to show there are ways of expressing love other than sex. To drive the point home, they show the consequences of early pregnancy and how that ties in to other problems, which feed on one another.
 
Lunduyan hopes their skits will impress on young minds that children in this world should be wanted, cared for, provided for, and accorded their full rights. And it begins with them.

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