LGBT Refuge

Hello everyone,

We are two lesbians who are partnered in the Philippines. We are ministers of the Unitarian Universalist faith. We have moved residences 6 times during the pandemic because of the various ways that our neighbors have disrespected us. Finally, we found ourselves a relatively safe and respectful neighborhood by the sea which is also relatively cheap.

However, as climate change is worsening and tides are rising, and especially because some miseducated neighbors have blocked the swamps, our refuge in this residence seems to be coming to a close as we are beginning to feel "squeezed out" again.

Fortunately, my partner, Leslie Mae Minasalvas, has secured a lot for us on the hills where it is cooler and the region has a very low incidence of catastrophes and calamities. We feel like we are becoming climate refugees and also LGBT-refugees in this fast-gentrifying city that only three years ago was a haven from uncertainty for low-income families.

To top it all off, we have been chosen by our extended family to care for Leslie's infant cousin, who was on the verge of starvation, abandoned by the biological mother to be cared for by the clan.

Due to my advocacies in making mud bricks in the past three years, I have become more knowledgeable in the failures from our testing and piloting and from insights of engineers and architects I've consulted.

After the relatively stable mud bricks structure has endured a year of various climates, we are now ready to launch a home of our own, which shall be a hybrid of mud bricks and concrete.

This brings down our cost for building.

We have some personal money saved to build our new home on a 36 square meter space, which is on Leslie's ancestral land, but we need much more.

I hope you can help us to:

1. Build a home for our small family which includes 3 dogs and a baby.

2. Create the latest iteration of mud bricks building.

3. Make our roof deck accessible for our LGBT ministries.

I would be happy if you could use the [Help by sharing] button to share about my project!