Manila is the capital city of the Philippines. It is the heart of the country, the seat of the government and the center of the economy. It is Manila into which most of whatever wealth that flows into the Philippines settles. Manila is the Philippines' city of dreams.

There is a very old belief in the countryside, in places outside of Manila, saying that the streets of Manila are paved with gold. Manila is where the poor probinsyano, the man from the provinces, will have his shot at making his dream of gaining some wealth and comfort for his family come true. For in contrast to the perceived ease of life in the capital, life in the countryside is full of hardship. Many families in the countryside are subsistence farmers, tending to a land that is not their own. Usually, these families have around five children to feed. Everyone has to work, even the children. Access to quality education and healthcare, in some places, is unheard of.

So, in the quest for a better life, it is a common story for people from the provinces to pack their bags and sell what meager belongings they have in order to move to Manila and take their shot at chance and improve their lives. But it is when they reach Manila that the sad reality strikes them. The streets of Manila are not paved with gold. In order to survive the high cost of living in the city, families have to work hard, sometimes even harder than they had when they were still living in the provinces.

And because they had nothing when they came to the city and nowhere to go, these families are always forced to put up dwellings in places where they are not supposed to be: on idle land belonging to someone else, along the roadsides, under bridges, beside railways, on the banks of muddy creeks. They become squatters.

If life in the provinces is hard, these migrant families will be quick to discover that life in the city, living in shanties and in subhuman conditions, is even worse. Individual members of such families will take whatever job that they can get just to be able to eat. A family that manages to scrounge up three square meals a day is considered lucky, even if this meal consists only of some low-grade rice and a few pieces of salted fish, or perhaps some instant noodle soup.

The children of these migrant families are ultimately the victims in this sad story of dreams being broken and turning to dust in the streets of Manila. Being able to eat properly is never a given, and so these children are always threatened with malnutrition and sickness. Public education may be free, but it still comes at a cost, and at times at a cost that these squatter families cannot afford. With such a bleak future promising to be theirs with utmost certainty, how can these children of squatter families allow themselves to dream?

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