Warning

Greetings from the Philippines! This is to inform you that I Brenda Hilario AM NOT in Africa in a great crisis of needing your money, starving etc.

Please let me explain. Last week we were victims of someone stealing our e-mail account password and our yahoo e-mail account so that I no longer can access our yahoo mail. The person that stole our account has been circulating an e-mail from mbjhilario@yahoo.com (Remove this address from your address book immediately please) about us internationally that I Brenda am in Africa and in need of assistance and especially finances. They ask you to reply to the e-mail sent from our account and they will send you bank account numbers to place the "much needed money". Please don't respond to that e-mail and DO NOT USE that e-mail address anymore to contact us. Please change IMMEDIATELY our address in your address book to melbrendahilario@yahoo.com

This is very annoying as we lost our whole address book with over 300 contacts. I have some addresses backed up but they are all at least a year old. We are asking your assistance that if you see people that know us and that may not have heard that it is a scam please tell them not to respond to the e-mail that was sent. IT IS NOT TRUE! I am here in the Philippines eating plenty of rice, fish and mangoes!

Mel is here with me also and just returned from Thailand two nights ago after a very fulfilling time of ministry.I will share more about that in a later e-mail.

If you have e-mailed us in the past two days would you kindly please send it to us again at our new address as I would not have been able to access it. Thank you!

We are very sorry for any trouble this may have caused you.

Blessings!

Mel & Brenda

It's Graduation Season here in the Philippines!

Every April in the Philippines thousands upon thousands of students graduate from pre-school(yes even complete with the cap and gown!), elementary school, high school and college. Here are a few glimpses of our local elementary school's graduation ceremony here in Loakan . This school is just a stone throw away from our house. Pictured are some of the students that we have here in the Family Ministries Student Sponsorship Ministry (SSM).

Each student marches down the aisle with their proud parents.

This is my (Brenda) Dad's sponsored child...its hard to believe that they are from such poor homes when you see them all dressed up so beautifully. It's wonderful to see the pleasure on their faces of knowing that they have made it this far in their schooling

Listening to the graduation program

The female elementary school graduates.

The teachers giving their speeches of exhortation to the students.

Our daughter is not at the stage of graduating yet, however all students are included in her school's 'Annual Awards Banquet and High School Graduation.' Joanna had had a difficult year at school and had worked quite hard so we were very happy for her when she received five shiny medallions. Here are some scenes from that special evening where a wonderful meal is served after a very long program!