TEW Pulls of a Successful Dinner Auction!

Seattle, WA - The TEW team stayed up late on Saturday, April 24 to clean up after a successful staging of a dinner auction to benefit the TEW-GK Village. In spite of the fatigue, they all went home with a grateful heart and a smile on their faces.  Approximately 180 guests came to show their support by simply buying tickets and participating in the event. 

The evening started off with a Silent Auction where items ranging from simple home made potholders and volunteer services to high priced items like a bucket of Washington wine and vacation weekends fetched some big bucks from generous donors.  The excitement reached fever pitch as dinner approached with a countdown hosted by emcees John Crispala and Maria Velasquez.  The Pilipino American Youth Organization (PAYO) dancers started the entertainment off with a nicely choreographed traditional Filipino dance.  Pastor Rod Castillo came out for an invocation, welcomed the guests and thanked them for their support.  Dinner was promptly served courtesy of the members of WITH Living - young people who themselves paid for tickets yet chose to serve those guests (what a great bunch of guys and gals!).  In the meantime, bids were starting to come in for the Dessert Dash.

The after-dinner program kicked off with a powerful testimony from Sally Ramos, herself a GK Village builder, sharing about her own experiences building the Good Samaritan GK Village in Januiay, Iloilo and encouraging people to support TEW.  This is truly the spirit behind GK - each one supporting the other in the spirit of Bayanihan.  The key speaker for the evening, Dylan Wilk, himself a GK village builder and full time worker for GK, brought more light to the need for poverty alleviation in the world, particularly in the Philippines, and the success that the GK movement is experiencing.  His videos and words inspired some to make a commitment to go back to the Philippines for themselves and experience the good things that GK is doing.  Dylan's work also includes the vision of establishing the 'Made in the Philippines' brand as a world class name starting with products made by Human Heart Nature - a company whose vision and mission ties in with Gawad Kalinga's.

Harold Taniguchi led the Raise-the-Paddle portion of the evening where people actually raised their bid numbers and made commitments to give even more to the cause that evening - amounts ranged from $50 to $500 from several individuals.  After that, the results of the Dessert Dash bidding were announced and guests had the most fun literally running to get their desserts - awesome cakes and desserts provided by local bakeries and by volunteers who made really impressive creations.  There were even desserts that were left over and people continued to bid for them even when they had already given towards 1 dessert.  Most everyone ended up sharing desserts with everyone else, contributing to the feel of a large family event.  PAYO came out once again to close the evening with an impressive rendition of the famous Filipino dance - the tinikling, even coaxing some of the audience members to try out the dance themselves.
If you were a donor or a supporter of the event, TEW would like to give you a special and hearty thanks.  TEW was able to leave its mark among the giving community of Seattle - there will be more events to come in the future even as TEW works to reach their goal of raising the amounts needed to start and finish their GK village. Keep checking this website this year for their progress!