Liza Avelino, a Filipino domestic worker in Hong Kong, is climbing Mt Kilimanjaro in aid of HELP for Domestic Workers in August 2017. She hopes to raise HK$150,000.

Liza, who is known for her sense of adventure, whilst holding down a full-time job looking after a family, is the first Filipino domestic worker to scale Mt Kilimanjaro, following her previous climbs in the Himalayas, Malaysia and Japan. She was also one of the domestic workers featured in the gripping documentary, The Helper. We talked with Liza about her motivations and tips for fellow domestic workers. Thank you, Liza. You’re an inspiration to us all! 

HELP: How long have you been in Hong Kong and what brought you here?

Liza: I arrived in Hong Kong in 1996 to work as a domestic worker. It was the first time I travelled outside of the Philippines. Hong Kong in the 1990s was a prime destination for foreign domestic workers. It offered better working environment and higher salary compared to other countries in Southeast Asia and the Middle East. I was one of the thousands of hopeful and brave people flocking the city to earn a living to support families back home. 

HELP: What inspired you to start mountain climbing?

Liza: Hong Kong's beautiful hiking trails motivated me to become a mountain climber. But it started a long time before I moved to Hong Kong. You see, growing up, I was so poor that I couldn't even finish secondary school. But I am a dreamer and I had big dreams. That dream was to travel the world and see places, people and cultures. When you're ten years old and penniless, those dreams seem hopeless. But then it doesn't cost me anything, so I kept on dreaming. I’m an avid reader and love to read anything I can get my hands on – old books, magazines, piece of newspaper, etc.

It was that habit which took me to the library one Sunday during my day off, after I started working in Hong Kong. In 2004, instead of sitting at the square doing nothing, the library soon became my shelter from sun and the rain. There, I found a book, Discovering Hong Kong's Cultural Heritage by Patricia Lim, which described self-guided walks of the WWII defense of Hong Kong. On my next day off, I set out on one of the trails mentioned in the book that leads up to a hill overlooking the city, and the hiker in me was born.

I have been hiking every weekend since. I joined a local hiking group and later became a volunteer hike leader. In 2010, I started to participate in the 100km HK Oxfam Trailwalker to challenge myself. During my vacations, I did short hiking trips to Mt Pulag (Dec 2012), Mt Guiting Guiting (July 2010), Mt Hibok Hibok (June 2011), Mt Kanlaon (Feb 2013) and Mt Arayat (Sept 2013) in the Philippines, Mt Yarigatake (April 2014) in Japan, Mt Kinabalu (Feb 2015) in Malaysia, Mt Hallasan (Dec 2015) in South Korea.

Those short trips made me realise that I am living my childhood dreams. With a boost in my confidence and a strong belief in myself, I figured I could do longer trips and higher altitudes. I summited Everest Base Camp and Island Peak Base Camp in April 2015, and Everest Base Camp and Island Peak's Crampon Point in Nepal in May 2016.

When I'm standing at the summit I feel a sense of freedom. It makes me feel closer to heaven, literally.