The past does not define the present even if an abruptly life-changing moment happened to a person before; we still deserve second chances to change our lives for the better. In reality, we have people in our lives that can give and affects us which may result in a better life or lead us to evil behavior. We may have been carried away sometimes by the flow of life and lost control of our own lives depending on how people command us but it doesn’t mean that we will never change for the better and not be manipulated anymore by what others want us to do and not to do. In this kind of situation, we sometimes think that they are the one who gives us our happiness and fulfillment rather than our very own family. There’s always a time that we do not think about the outcome of what we are doing until something happens in the lives that take us away from the happy moments that we can probably spend on ourselves and with our loved ones. To be placed behind bars was a nightmare that no one would want to experience, everyone wants to earn genuine happiness outside with their loved ones but with the temptation that this world has, we sometimes lead to an action that was against and illegal because we just wanted to escape to the sadness or problems that we are facings. Who wishes to spend their days, months, and years in bars that are full of misery? Who wishes to have sleepless nights thinking about the sin they made and the family they left? Life, for some reason, challenges humans’ solidity in their time of misery.
There is a woman who has been convicted for about one year and four days at Camp Caringal Quezon City Jail. She is a mother who strives assiduously for a better change and fosters positivity in life, a former PDL, Ms. Amara Kim Pangan. She was 27 years old, a mom of a brave girl, residing at Commonwealth Avenue, Quezon City. She was released from jail on December 22, 2021. She has a live-in partner who has visited her before, regularly. Way back in 2020, when she was plea bargaining from jail and in the process of paying her offense to the law, this was the time that she found out about the FRED program of HLAF which gives her hope and a new life for her new beginning outside and this was also the time that she was being offered by HLAF to attend such counseling to guide her to get into a better life. In addition, the program also offers and teaches them how to make wallets, bags, accessories made with beads, and many more. This was all the proof that all of the things that she learned from the FRED program were being applied to her life because what we noticed from our past interview is that she have this tough personality that she admits that she made a mistake in the past but it doesn’t mean that it will dictate her future as a person and also as a mother.
She felt like a new door opened for her and give her many opportunities to get back to a better life. She has witnessed and even experienced the activities offered by the FRED program for a new beginning. It appeared that the FRED program gave opportunities to helpless ex-detainees like Ms. Amara Kim. HLAF lightened up the path for ex-PDL or PDL for that second chance. This organization gave hope to her to conquer the challenges that former PDLs face.
She concluded that when she entered HLAF, she even does not know that it could be a changing stage for her. She had so many things to learn in HLAF. And after she was detained, he even considered herself a “black ship” because she is the only one in her family who brought herself to jail. She was a careless mother before but now she is a powerful mom of her child. Though we do not believe that she was a black ship, even though he is an ex-PDL despite what she does in the past, she proves that she make a change now and no one can judge her because she is a normal person, normal people can make wrong but it would possibly make people learn from the mistake he/she has done.
