SABA AND SENYORITA BANANAS

PANGAKONG TINUPAD. The other day we bit the bullet on the cost to Transportify a mere one ton of Lemons from Tuba, Benguet to QC. It was 6K, including tolls on the three LEXes (TPLEX, SCTEX, NLEX). Ouch. Backload on an empty truck returning to NCR, it would cost just P2,000, and we can load as much as 2 tons. No such truck on Friday, earliest possible was Monday. The farmers will not insist if we made excuses but it would force them to “preserve” the Lemons they picked for us using Calcium Carbide (kalburo), the very practice we were speaking against, the stuff we say middlemen force them to do. We can’t take Lemons like that, and the the middlemen will take Lemons like that but they’ll pay the farmers so much less than our price. So there I was going back and forth with Tito Ricky, and he was going back and forth with the trucking company, before I explained the “dilemma” to Andie. She looked at me and said “Where’s the dilemma?” She got on her app, booked a truck. That’s it. A truck rolled into Tuba before the hour was up and the Lemons were in RuRI North before midnight. It cost 3X more to transport those Lemons, but we kept our promise. It’s important to keep promises always. It’s important to have a decisive woman in your life.

So why am I telling you all this? A BANANA farmer in San Guillermo, Isabela has made a deal with a middlemen and that middleman has stood her up. Mahirap daw ang daan, so on, so forth. Poor farmer, her name is Marissa, is left holding 500 kilos of bananas. Bananas the are ripening right before her eyes, please can RuRi help her? I am being decisive this time and this is our plan of action: buy the ripe bananas to give away locally (to school children and passers-by), and to buy the green bananas for transport to us.

SABA AND SENYORITA BANANA RESCUE BUY. This effort is dedicated to Marissa (in the video) and other farmers of San Guillermo, Isabela. We are seeking support to save the ripe bananas you see here (to give them away), and to buy two tons of green Saba and Senyorita bananas to bring to QC (for you). If you give P399, you shall get 10 kilos of mixed SENYORITA and SABA BANANAS, and you shall be able to give away the ripe bananas locally.