As June comes to a close we take a look at this month’s highlights and celebrate another month of leveling the playing field, creating opportunities for those who had none before.

Fairplay School

Cycle 3 is coming to an end at the Fairplay School as the school continues to progress and develop. You can read the latest Faces of Payatas feature which talks about the impact the Fairplay School has as we meet Lyka and the Girl Effect.

Sports: MMFL and Payatas Sports Center Developments

The Metro Manila Futsal League came to a close. This is the youth league we run with Gawad Kalinga and Dream Big Pilipinas.

Everyone had fun and many of our newer players got to play against teams from other areas for the first time ever. With U12, U14, and U16 Divisions Payatas FC fielded A, B, and C teams to make sure everyone had playing time and cater to the growing number of kids who come by to our safe space to play.

Our U16s reached the final of the league and put in a heroic effort leading the game until the final few minutes. Our U14s lost narrowly in the Semi Finals. The U16s and U14s are captained by Regine and Althea, sisters who play above their age group and against boys and have now both traveled abroad with the National Youth Team. We featured Althea in a previous Faces of Payatas feature here.

At the Payatas Sports Center, construction continues in Stage 2 with the changing room facilities now almost complete. A water line needs to be installed and there’s some sprucing up to do, but it’s basically done. The security guard house, where we’re hoping a local family can move in so they have a bigger house in a safer place without needing to pay rent, is underway too. Once that’s completed it’s on to the bleachers with rooftop cover and the second futsal court itself. This will double the capacity and allow us to host more leagues and tournaments as well as reach more kids through the football program. See below for the before and after shots of the changing room construction.

This stage of the development is courtesy of the Australian Embassy in the Philippines, through their Direct Aid Program, so we’re excited to be working with them again! To see the court in action you can check out this cute video from our latest Community Day where GF United came down to join in the fun.

Another exciting development is the first ever Video Feature of Humans of Payatas. Humans of Payatas is about bringing the humanity back to a place pretty much only known as a place of garbage, drugs, and crime. Like the original Humans of New York, we post a picture of a person from the community and a short paragraph about their life, in their own words. Some people choose to tell us about challenges they’ve faced, some people choose to tell us about who they care about most, some people choose to tell us about how they met their partner or the work they do. The key is people share their stories in their words, and we get to hear from some incredible people.

This is the very first episode in a long-running series sharing beautiful messages from people in Payatas. In the first episode, we ask people what do you value the most? Let us know in the comments what you do too.

Next Month in Fairplay:

The Fairplay School looks back on the first half of the year

We announce the biggest partnership to date for Fairplay

The Silver Star Century Group are back in Payatas

A girls only league is set up in Payatas

We hear more from Humans of Payatas