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Did we ever wonder why a piggy figurine is commonly used as a savings bank? I had been into livelihood projects with the poor in the past. There is really a close association with pigs when you ask them to decide for an alternative livelihood. I always discouraged them on such engagement because it is just like saving and actually earning nothing. Raising a pig is just the same with keeping a piggy bank. With the former, one spends so much time and work saving – not really earning. While with the latter, one saves with ease. It is wiser though keeping a piggy bank than raising just a single or couple of pigs. And most of the time, fattened pigs end up as thanksgiving offering on festivities and birthdays. Well, our piggy is butchered for a number of times already. It has been filled with coins for about six months. Clankity-clankity-clank! We have counted 1,340 pesos savings less some coins which are returned into the piggy, “supertitiously” to attract more coins and, in order not to starve the piggy for a week because we are going to spend our savings on a planned vacation to Cebu. Saving in the bank is only one scheme and keeping a piggy bank is another and perhaps more effective in teaching kids the value of saving. In our case, “butchering” the piggy is a kind of a ritual. Kids, including their playmates who happened to be around, are asked to assist in counting and piling the coins extracted from piggy’s belly. After we have counted the earnings, each of the kids is given a share. And they know where the rest go. We will spend it all on our vacation. Thus our savings in the bank is for investment and savings in piggy is for our squandering and gratification. How do we manage to fatten piggy? Every time we go home, we empty our pockets with coins into piggy than leave it on cubicles and tables open to child pilfering . Is it not true that we spend so much coins over paper bills? That is why we are afraid to spend our papers bills because when they are converted into coins they are easily and readily spent? So is it wiser then to keep our savings into piggy and let us say later, that we have indeed saved a lot because we have spent less on coins? Another is, we sell ice-in-cellophane to our neighbors which sales go into piggy and so with some of Lj’s earnings. I still remember the three of us were still in college when we had our first vehicle, a 4R stylish mug-tired topless jeep. We wondered how could it be because our parents’ earnings could hardly meet our college expenses. We have soon found out that it was purchased out of our mother’s savings kept in the many figurines that littered in our house. Figurines of different animals, serving as decorations too, are lined up on the railings, on top of aparadors, fridges and tables. It was truly an amazing story. I heard stories too that our elders were wont to use side poles of bamboo stairs as their savings bank. In case a fire razed the nipa hut, Granny could easily locate where the stairs once to retrieve her savings. Or if Granny left this world without leaving a word, her children and grandchildren would race against each other to find out where the savings were kept. If the hut was completely made out of bamboo, all erected poles would be tapped hoping to hear a tick or a clank, then Bingo! A survey was recently conducted among Filipinos to know their savings and investment acumen. It was found out that 7 out of 10 Filipinos do not actually know how to invest their earnings. That is why most of us end up buying unnecessary and useless things, not knowing if these are really good investment to earn us a decent and dignified future. This goes true with savings. The formula of 60-40, i.e., 60% savings and 40% spending, does not mirror the Filipino lifestyle. But I truly believe if it is religiously applied, a difference could be made to alleviate living conditions. In saving one learns to delay gratification which is its greatest value.