Karateka fulfills annual humanitarian outreach

BENCHWARMER

Ramon S. Dacawi

BAGUIO CITY -- Coming home from Germany where he has been based for years now has become an annual humanitarian pilgrimage of sorts for former world karate champion Julian Chees who capped his latest visit last week by reaching out to patients in Mt. Province and at the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center.

“Reaching out provides deeper meaning to my annual visit  home,” said Chees, a sixth dan blackbelt and native of Maligcong, Bontoc, Mt.Province  as he was led by a social worker to the beds of patients in need of support at the BGHMC.

Dolores Beniahan, chief of the hospital’s social welfare service, directed social workers Nora Mangusan and Rhea Tabor to pinpoint who among the charity cases were most needy based on their social case study reports.

The multi-titled martial artist first reached out  to 33-year old  patient Marites Laus who is undergoing regular  twice-a-week hemodialysis for kidney failure. Her husband was at the nursery looking after their daughter Francine Scarlet who was recently born prematurely and needed to stay at the infant intensive care unit.

The young mother was reimbursed P3,269.75 reflected in her expense receipts to help her cope with her next medical fund requirements.

Next were patients  Ric Alcantara who received  a cash support of P4,087 to help him cope with epilepsy and encephalopathy, seven-month old Ericka Ferrer  whose mother was reimbursed P2,466.30 spent for the child’s medication, and 27-year old Iris Dawn Plasabas who received medicines worth P8,580 to help her cope with her ailment diagnosed as “acquired hemolytic anemia”.  

Earlier, the 56-year old Chees was in Bontoc where he shouldered P43,000 worth of medicines for  patients in his home province..

Before returning to Germany, the Igorot martial artist paid P3,000 for the school fees of Cherry Ann Realina, a computer technology student. The girl was orphaned when her father, a security guard of the Baguio Water District, was killed several years ago when a pine tree fell during a typhoon while he was on duty at Baguio’s major water source.

Chees also handed over P7,000 to help another dialysis patient pay for his ‘mounting bills for dialysis.

“Reaching out to the sick gives deeper meaning to my annual  journey home,  as I know how it feels to be in need, having been born poor” Chees, a miner’s son who grew up in Lepanto Mines said.

The head of several Shotokan karate schools in West Germany under the Japan Karate Association, Chees over the years ruled numerous international karate tournaments, topped by his topping the individual kata event in the 1993 World Shotokan Championships in Saarsbrucken, Germany.

A student of JKA-YMCA of Baguio chief instructor Edgar Kapawen, Chees started making waves after his arrival in Germany as a civilian worker in a U.S. military facility, by ruling numerous kata (formal exercise) competitions in international competitions.

“The German national team took notice and offered me a slot, I concentrated on kata as I was handicapped for kumite (sparring event) because of my diminutive height,” the five-foot, three-inch tall fighter explained.

His annual reaching back for home was capped by his mission to typhoon-ravaged Tapaz and Dumalag towns in Capiz in the wake of super-typhoon Yolanda at the end of 2013 to distribute rice and cash worth over P800,000 which he and friends in Germany pulled together.