Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has created a lot of chaos throughout the world. Its devastating indirect and direct consequences spare no one. This paper explores the struggles of sidewalk vendors in the Southern Philippines during the COVID-19 pandemic. It seeks their coping ways and insights about their experiences during the crisis. We employed a descriptive phenomenological research design. Ten sidewalk vendors participated in the semistructured key informant interview. The findings revealed three themes for their struggles. These are incapability of earning, helplessness, and loss of income. For their coping mechanisms, small trading, gain assistance, and monetary loans were the identified themes. For their insights, two themes emerged- hopefulness and frugality. Sidewalk vendors were left with no choice but to stop selling temporarily because of the virus's threat. Even if their livelihood is in jeopardy, they became resilient and continued to find a living.