Good News, finally!

I am very sure that a lot of people will look to 2009 as a year of disasters.  Who can forget the following:

• Swine flu (hassle, men!)
• Puerto Galera tragedy (where a child of a friend perished, including his mom and his nephew)
• the passing of Tita Cory
• Nasser Pangandaman Jr
• Ondoy and Pepeng 
• Maguindanao massacre
• Martial Law 2009

I'm sure I may have missed out on some smaller ones, but puh-leeze, I don't want to talk about the terrible things, even just for now.

Now, I want to remember the happy things:

• the Eraserheads final concert
• (sige na nga, kahit hindi ako boxing fan...) Manny Pacquiao's wins vs Hatton and Cotto
• (this guy is MAJOR!  THIS is the guy who makes me proud to be Pinoy!  Itaas ang bandera!)  Efren Penaflorida!!!  CNN's Hero of the YEAR!!!  
• Earth Hour 2009 

Can anyone else add to this???

The list is so short, which is why I am so glad I was invited by Ogilvy and Tang to a presentation of a social experiment that they did.  It was simple:

• 100 kids (50 boys, 50 girls)
• Class C-D 
• ages 7-9 years old
• and PhP500 each

Each child was given PhP500, and brought to a makeshift store where they had toys, school supplies and an area where they could drop money for charity.  Purpose of the study is to find out what the kids would choose to get--and most their parents said "TOYS!".

Surprisingly, they didn't pick the toys!  Watch this video to find out.

Did you see that 99 out of 100 kids had a portion of their money saved?  Yup, there was ONE kid who spent EVERYTHING!  Yup!  He blew his entire PhP500 for school supplies for his siblings!!!

While the sample size is small, I feel that it still made a statement.  Kids are aware of what's happening in their families, they are responsible enough to make some decisions on their own.  We (Parents) have to trust in the way we have raised them.

Stories like this warm my heart.  I'm actually hoping that they conduct this experiment across all socio-economic classes and regions.  

How about you, what will your kid buy?  ;)