CEBU, Philippines — The Filipino-American Youth Basketball Association (FYBA) touches the heart of underprivileged kids thousands of miles away from Washington DC area. FYBA’s outreach extends to the poor youth in Cebu, Philippines through its Kicks for Kids Project. This campaign led by Jared Conda, eldest son of FYBA Board Director Cesar Conda, collected a total of 53 pairs of slightly used shoes from the FYBA community during its 2012 Spring League. These shoes were donated to indigent youths through the Sangguniang Kabataan of Pardo, Cebu City and the Jojet Lawas Foundation in Sabang, Danao City. True to their community spirit, the Condas led this noble effort and brought these shoes during their family vacation in the Philippines.
The first shoe distribution for the Sangguniang Kabataan was held on July 7 at Pardo High School in Pardo, Cebu at an exhibition basketball game between the Sacred Heart Ateneo de Cebu and the University of San Carlos. The event was organized by Dr. Jean Dy, a medical school classmate of Janice Conda, Jared’s mom. Twenty nine pairs of basketball shoes from FYBA, plus another dozen from the basketball players of Ateneo were distributed to poor kids ages 5 to 15 years old. All recipients wearing “tsinelas” (slippers) were extremely grateful. The organizers of the event thanked 17-year old Jared for leading the effort to bring these shoes to the less fortunate. “It warms the heart to see one child with disability beaming with smile after receiving an almost brand new pair of Nike basketball shoes. It was indeed a memorable event for my family,” shared Cesar Conda.
The second distribution was held in Danao City on July 16. This featured an exhibition basketball game between Danao North and Danao South. 24 pairs of shoes and 4 basketball jerseys were distributed. Boyito Quiroz, a FYBA dad/coach who grew up in Sabang, Danao City arranged the event organized by the Jojet Lawas Foundation, a young organization which trains and develops underprivileged youth to play basketball. This is in honor of Jojet Lawas who was a revered basketball player who also served as trainer and coach for the youth in the area. “This event is meaningful to me as Jojet was my teammate and friend. His cordial efforts of helping the youth were cut short by a motorcycle accident that took out his life. However, his legacy of being a good point guard and animated mentor continues through this youthful and promising organization,” Boyito Quiroz noted.
The exhibition basketball game was played between 13-18 year old players and was watched by a crowd of over 100 cheering kids and locals from Danao City. The shoes and jerseys were given as a prize in a fun contest for kids who could make at least one shot in three attempts at the half court line.
FYBA-NABA DC Bantam teammates Jeremy Conda and Enzo Bascon played for Danao North. These FYBA players scored 15 points and 13 points, respectively in a game where most of the players were aged 4 to 5 years older than them. Despite being short of 2 points to win the game, Jeremy and Enzo displayed admirably as they both keyed a comeback in the fourth quarter, closing the gap from 12 to 2 points with 40 seconds left.
Moved by this, Jared Conda is inspired even more to expand the Kicks for Kids program to collect more shoe donations and to recruit other FYBA youth to also experience this meaningful outreach to disadvantaged youth in the Philippines — an epitome of FYBA’s vision of shaping the characters of our youth inside and outside the basketball court!
