Good Book...

“For the Americans just the sheer visual spectacle of Ifugao was enough to overwhelm those seeing it for the first time: the magnificent rice terraces which turned the mountain slopes into giant staircases and range after range of steep, forbidding mountains, some stark and bare, others covered with luxuriant tropical forests, but all, to requote Captain Patstone, “grand, wild and beyond description.” Ifugao houses, the best-designed on the Cordillera, nestled picturesquely in clearings beneath areca (bettle) nut palms. The people and culture were equally striking: superb physiques, uniquely Ifugao “bowl” haircuts, spear-carrying warriors, gongs pounding out wild rhythms and bare-breasted women dancing at canaos honoring the ancestral spirits, human heads decorating homes of the brave – all these struck the imagination of the turn-of-the-century America. The Ifugao’s ability to make maximal use of their vertical mountains and centuries of backbreaking labor the terraces represented made clear their industry. They were also courageous warriors, honest and straightforward, willing to attack better-armed outsiders, reply negatively to demands that they stop head-hunting and challenge the Americans “to come and fight.”

The White Apos: American Governors on the Cordillera Central
by Frank Lawrence Jenista (p. 47-48)

Flag Raising

Every Monday morning is the flag raising ceremony for the LGU. This involves all of the staff turning out in dress apparel, complete with their LGU IDs (of which I turned in the picture and info for mine two months ago now…) to sing the national anthem, an Ifugao hymn & to listen to announcements from the Mayor and anyone else who has something to say. It generally involves a lot of standing around in the hot sun, or crouching in the shade by the railing with most people chewing moma & generally not paying a lot of attention. Its also all in the local dialect, of which I still don’t know enough to follow along, adding to the enthralling aspect of the whole ordeal. Still it’s a very important bit of the week to attend as many important bits & pieces of info come up at flag raising that have bearing on the week if not that very day. Case in point was the aforementioned going away party, despodida, of the police chief that was announced and carried out that same day. Last week also brought about the dedication of three new LGU buildings complete with the Congressman and a huge party. That was at least planned for that Friday, though I still did not find out about it until I got back.
Today was just another example of last minute planning and the flowing along that comes with the culture. I’m still getting used to being able to complete up-end my day with 30 seconds notice to decide whether or not to go. My tendencies to just diving in have paid off so far and thankfully I didn’t have much planned for the day. I guess an “inspection” was announced of a road project in Alimit, one of the farthest Barangays at 20 odd km away. I did not catch wind of this until the vehicle was just about to leave and someone thought to invited me along as I was standing right there. It turned out to be a great trade off. Not only did I spend the afternoon with most of the Municipal council and the mayor I also greatly upgraded my food options. I traded in the left over bits of pig from Friday’s shindig, including a wonderful dish made of pig ears, tail, brain & who knows what else, for native pig that had been smoked the night before. It was a very good meal.
Not much inspecting got done that I could see though. The whole affair involved sitting around drinking and singing songs for a few hours before we all piled back in the vehicles and headed home. At least this particular spur of the moment did not keep me out for most of the night as the despodida did! I also avoided most of the alcohol this time around. I learn much more from these gigs when I stay sober. I’m not sure I’m ever going to completely adjust to the lack of planning ahead here, but its good for the soul to be kept on my toes.

Not So Personal Service

Sometimes its hard to demonize the World Bank to the extent the radical left tends to. An institution that is willing to, at its own expense, send a small book all the way to the Philippines called “The Little Green Data Book” can’t be all bad can it? Then again they never did respond to my initial request so I actually gave up on them long ago. The joys of large institutions. We’ll tackle the question in a little more systematic way, though, with the next round of readings. The fun begins with Globalization and Its Discontents by Joseph Stiglitz which I’m borrowing from a PCV in Sagada. I love the Peace Corps community.

(PS If the text editor I am working with doesn't let me underline I figure bold is the next best way to deal with book titles. Any other ideas?)

Picking Up Speed

Our 3 month "practicum" period is almost over & in an eye blink month 4 is going to follow. The idea of the Practicum is for us to get acquainted with our communities and to start to make contacts and friends. Or, in their words, a chance to get to learn our surroundings by being a "keen observer" while using our "community entry strategies and tools" to form an "initial snapshot." Except they used a whole two pages to get across the point and don't forget the incessant reminders to not start projects. All in all the main idea of not diving straight into the first potential project you find is good advice, but like most things here, I find it a bit overdone.
For me I think the first three months have gone fairly well. I could have a better grasp on the language, as it took me awhile to find and start with a tutor. I could also probably could have more concrete data via community surveys and such things as some of the other Volunteers have done, but in general I feel pretty good about how I've used my time so far. I'm getting to know my co-workers and community members better. I'm slowing starting to piece together how work gets done at the LGU (which is not the simple task one might expect) and I'm still working towards figuring out how I'm going to fit into that vague scheme. I've visited several water systems and 12 out of the 27 barangays. I've even manage to find the Ultimate community here which is always a plus! Probably most importantly, I've got a good start to setting up and feeling at home here. Not a bad start at all.
As our first three months end we are getting ready for Pre Service Training, round II. This is officially the technical component of our training, though we only get 11 days worth of it, compared to the two months spend on language and community entry. For WATSAN the quick slide into the middle of September and full freedom as a Volunteer has already started. Another Volunteer who has been here a year was building a ferro-cement water tank in Besao, Mountain Province and so all of us were allowed to trek up there for the week and to help/learn about the construction. I just got home from that on Saturday. Nothing like a week of learning construction, hanging out and sleeping on the floor. I even managed to work in a game of Go with Dan, the education volunteer just down the road in Sagada.
The next two weeks until I leave for PSTII in Dumaguete, Negros Oriental are going to be really busy as well. On Wednesday Sheila Chan, the Northern Luzon Regional Manager, is coming out to see my site and hopefully approve my next abode; a native house up on the hill overlooking the main plaza. After her visit the MPDO, including me, will be working on taking a round of photos for the tourism council. Combine that with getting ready for my trip and planning our post-PSTII-first-chance-to-use-vacation-time-we-want-to-go-diving expedition, I'll be fairly busy! We figure since PC will be paying for our flight down to the Visayas and back (read to the beach!) its a great time to get our dive certifications taken care of. I think the group I am joining up with will be heading over to Bohol for the four day course. Then its already the Sept. 22nd and its back to site to begin the moving in and setting up home process. The only down side to my dwelling of choice is that I need to scrounge up and provide all the furnishings. Its pretty much just an empty pyramid shaped structure on stilts. Still, the thought of setting up my own digs is really exciting. I’m sure the joys of cooking for myself will wear off eventually, but right now it sounds like one of the best things on earth. The next month is really going to fly by and from what I hear the rest of service just keeps on trucking along after that. Here we go!

Huaning

They told us there would be days on end where it doesn’t stop raining but that’s really hard to conceptualize in the abstract. Welcome to Tropical Storm Huaning. I mean, its rained almost every afternoon since I’ve been at site, but this is ridiculous. It was raining when I went to bed and when I woke up. Raining when I went back to bed after breakfast because I was feeling miserable & still raining when I woke up again at 1pm. Its also raining now as I write via candlelight. Still not sure if I can blame that part on my new friend or not. Its just a steady drizzle with occasional spots of hard rain and slacking back to a very light sprinkle. Luckily it had kicked way back for my walk home from work but the clouds had moved all the way down into the valley creating a really odd affect. Visibility in the immediate world was only slightly fogged because of the way the road winds around the mountains. You can never see that far ahead of you anyway, but if you looked up there was nothing but a field of white where the beautiful views used to be. On a clear day I can see all the way to the Sierra Madres, now the next hill might as well not exist. Looks like there won’t be any basketball for tomorrow’s LGU games (called Hataw). At least there’s a roofed area where we can play volleyball & rain on the tin roof to lull me to sleep tonight.

PS The link to the right should work now if you're interested in latest SE Asia weather news. Enjoy!

A Cubit of Snow

One of the keys to staying productive & active, & therefore ultimately happy, in this job is to simply keep moving. As I’ve phrased it before, to stay out of the office. More precisely, not to get stuck in the inertia of the place simply because there is no obvious need to be elsewhere. Today was a good case in point, as another power outage, as usual, snuffed out productivity in the office along with the lights & computers. How did we get by again without these funny boxes of light anyway?? After a bit of sorting through notes and chatting with Linda & regretting my Economists current residents at the bottom of the hill I decided this was a fine time to play with my new camera, get some shots for the tourism council & continue to marshal reasons why the PC should approve my desired new abode. (Side Note: Sheila Chan, my Regional Manager (RM) is coming out on the 24th to see my sight! She started with the PC in April, so she has been busy making the rounds to all of her volunteers and seeing where they kick it. Conveniently she will also be able to clear (or not) my housing which PC needs to do before I move in anyway.) Anyway, with all this in mind I set off up the short hill to Acocoy, where the hospital & fish hatchery & the native house I hope to live in exist. I did end up with a few pictures, though nothing too breathtaking on account of the ubiquitous clouds and I even managed to see the inside of the native house, but much more interesting than any of that I got to chat with Ronald from the Ag. Office for awhile. They were there, at least in part, to collect some semen from the boar for AI (which I still want to see exactly how they managed to accomplish that) & I’m not sure what else, but we just sat under one of the houses & shot the breeze for an hour or so. We just chatted about my camera, where I’m from, his life & family, and some of his views on politics. Those boiled down to the problems of corruption & the tension between politicians and career officers. My favorite quote, referencing our previous discussion about having to plow roads in MN, was along the lines of “To move that cubit of snow would cost a million pesos.” Another way to look at our own old cliches of toliets & hammers. This is the “work” I love doing. Listening & getting to know other people’s realities. Its just so much harder here with the language barriers. Not too many people feel comfortable enough with their English to just sit and chat and my Mayoyao isn’t ever going to be able to sustain that level of conversation. But still, the best part of it all is that these “cultural exchanges” are two thirds of the overall Peace Corps goals for my time in this country! (The last goal is to provide technical assistance). I love this “job!”

Street Cred

Another reason I’m glad to be home is to be able to lower the guards of a single white person traveling. I need to find a better, more relaxing way to travel. Its amazing what a drain it can be on the mind & soul to keep up that hard exterior. Holding a certain amount of distrust for the man on the bus next to you, cause if he picks my wallet while I’m sleeping, life gets much more complicated, even with my cash split up. Or if someone walks off with one of my bags if I stop paying attention. It definitely didn’t help the risk factors once I added a digital camera to my two back packs. Its just that to the seedier & more desperate parts of the population I have a huge target on my forehead & bags simply because of the color of my skin. In the States I can easily slip under the radar via dress & appearance, but that is definitely not the case here. On the other hand, too much of a hard exterior can seep inside. I’m also reminded of recent V who successfully fought off some thieves who wanted his bag (with his laptop) along with the phone & wallet he had already given them but got sent home by the Peace Corps. The PC decided he was close to the end of his contract and it was not longer safe for him at his site. I guess also need to pay more attention to what valuables I bring and what I can afford to lose it comes to that. More than anything else though, it just takes finding a balance between wariness & hard, active distrust of everything in the city that moves.

Images of Home

Another L O N G trip home (6pm to 11:30am door to door) & here I am again. Its awesome to be able to move through & operate in so many different realities. I’m incredibly happy to find some disc but I’m also really happy to be back home. Life is much simpler here. Even if work is still amorphous, there’s no questions to the worth of my time. There are so few distractions and that does wonders to calm my always racing mind. There will be plenty of time for life in the fast lane after I find a general direction I want to go speeding in. For now I’m really looking forward to spending time getting to know the people of Mayoyao & sorting out more of all the tangles on the inside. As it is I’m not finding much of the fabled PC free time to deal with. I have a feeling those doldrums will not be lowering the sails much here. And if they do… I always wanted to improve my rowing…
And this really is home now. Maybe it was the bus driver who recognized my dazed soul wandering the streets of Santiago at 6am and who actually motioned to me if I wanted him to stop instead of the other way around (which was a good thing because I’m not sure I could have switched gears fast enough from searching for breakfast to "ride home!" fast enough otherwise). Or maybe it’s the complaining welcome of the cat as I trudged up the stairs. Its also all the little amenities of a house clicking into place that makes such a difference. Having a spread of shoes for various events – hiking boots – Bball sandals – cleats – running shoes – climbing shoes. Having more than the 5 or 6 shirts I brought to diversify the days. A selection of books. A subscription to the Economist. And between all that an iPod with speakers, a laptop & now a digital camera. I’m really roughing it here eh? Bucket showers don’t even count as a hardship, they’re actually rather refreshing!

A Whole New World

Welcome to the big city. From O’Reilly’s via one pleasant but lost cabbie (we had to ask for directions twice) I arrived at "The Fort" & swiftly located the Bellisima Bar courtesy of Joel’s excellent directions. Joel had not arrive yet however, which set up a humorous bit of circumstance involving me eyeing a group of people who looked a bit like well dressed ultimate players & later I found out they were eyeing the dude in the corner with his Martini wondering the same (minus the well dressed part, or course). When I noticed that someone was stamping the hands of people as they came in I was pretty sure these were the kids I was looking for and so started a crazy evening of meeting people & learning about the Manila Ultimate scene.

It’s a wonderful group of people with a surprisingly few number of expats from what I know of the Asian ultimate scene & they took care of this vagabond with grace & style. After the bar I ended up heading home with Rob & another expat named Erick, who lives and plays in Singapore. Both are in their early 30’s. We picked up a bottle of Tanduay (rum) on the way home & ended up throwing disc, drinking & trading stories in Rob’s "backyard" which just happened to be a polo field until 7am in the morning!!

This was not, in fact, some new way of warming up for a Hat Tourney; which was good, as we did not rouse until 2pm. Exorbitant amounts of rain from a friendly nearby typhoon postponed the tourney until next weekend L . As sad as this is, it did provide an excellent chance to get to know some kids from the community here.
Sat afternoon, after breakfast at the polo club, we joined a practice of one of the local teams for a few hours. I know of no better way to deal with a hangover (besides avoiding them in the 1st place) than playing it off with some good disc. The rest of the night Rob continued his wonderful hosting & showed me around some of the town, eventually dropping me off at Dale’s house, another expat, around 1:30am for the night.

The cycle of communities taking care of their own came full circle here as Dale & his wife are both RPCVs from Cameroon in the early 90’s! They both teach now at an International School here & appear to be doing quite well for themselves. The life of an expat! Manila’s a big city, no doubt, but according to the Economist a few weeks back it’s a big city at 40% the cost of living as New York. Dale played for UC Santa Barbara back in the day & made a few urns at Nationals & also practiced for awhile with the Condors post PC. He happens to be running the team we practiced with. Ironically, for me anyway, the team is named Jeepney, and I wonder how many of them have actually ridden on one (Dale tried it twice). They certainly aren’t using them as their main for of transportation. My 1st impressions, backed up by Dale, is that the Ultimate community here is fairly affluent.
Dale is definitely into the disc scene up to his eyeballs & I picked up on a lot of the local gossip & battle lines from here throughout the day. No worries either way though as Jeepney appears happy to roster me, and I don’t live in town so I can hopefully avoid most of the politics. This gives me a place to play for the upcoming league if I’m ever in town as well as a team to play on for the next big international tournament, Manila Spirits, in November. If I needed anymore reason to get back into peak condition I’ve definitely found it here. Now all I need to do is turn that drive into reality back at site. If I pull it off though I should only need one tourney to earn my absentee spot on the playing field. It would be a great chance to travel South East Asia & meet a lot of cool kids along the way. That’s all a long way off though, right now I’m just happy for a place to play some disc.
The rest of the weekend was fairly tame with Dale & Sonali taking excellent care of me. I spent most of Monday camera shopping in the same HUGE mall I was in on Friday, think a sprawling version of the Mall of America that is, if anything, slightly bigger. After that, it was a great lasagna dinner (cooked up by the maid), and off to catch my bus home.
What a weekend for scoring on the material side too! Besides free lodging, plenty of meals and some alcohol I also ended up with:

• One Digital Camera! A gift from my wonderful, visually starved parents who would like proof their child is not starving J . I didn’t realize how excited I would be to take pictures of all this cool stuff!
  
• One International School dark green collared shirt that did not fit Dale.
  
• One Mangina cotton Ultimate Jersey. #2. Open Team from Regina Canada. Much thanks to Erick’s surplus on jerseys and generous soul.
  
• One borrowed book from Dale.
  
• One old school Gunnies Hat. Its not Che, but it will do.
  
• One Puzzle, again from Dale & Sonali.
  
• Life is good.
  

O'Rielly's

A good bar can easily save an evening from the crushing monotony & blatant capitalism. In the end, & actually quite close to the beginning, a big mall is still a just a mall, only bigger. But a local Irish pub has some real style & good alcohol to boot! An Absolut Black Russian to keep my Arab History company and a Tangeray Tom Collins to follow up five games of pool with one of the bartenders (2-3, him). The local flavor is a nice mix of expats with a few locals around. The stories in this bar must be quite interesting to be sure. A great place to finish off the early evening before my cab ride over to "The Fort" where the real entertainment should begin. A quick freshening up in the CR involving some splashing water and clean thoughts, a change of shirt & off we go. Not to mention the good old fashion Guinness hat I found at the mall. With enough time to kill in a mall even I sucomb to captialism.

Caffienating Time

The more time I have to kill, the more coffee I've been pumping into my body. Considering my bus arrived from Santiago City at 4:30 in the morning, that's been a lot of coffee. I did sleep for an hour & a half at the bus station waiting for the city to wake up. It stirs in stages.

Caught the MRT (train) from Pasay City where the bus dropped me off, to Makati. Partly arbitrary, partly its the closest area cover in my Lonely Planet to Taguig - the hopeful destination of the evening. During my unsuccessful attempt to locate an Arabic restaurant for breakfast mentioned in the LP (a would be fitting setting to continue my current reading selection: A History of the Arab Peoples) I happened upon the "Home of the Makati Chiefs", a local Rugby team. I assume they frequent Panama Jack's Cafe often, just not at 7:30 in the morning. Sports highlights & Fox new kept me company for breakfast & two double shot Americanos. Over the next two hours I ate, read, charged my phone, cleaned up in the CR (comfort room), got annoyed with Bill O'Reilly.

Looks like I timed the schizofrantic weather right, as it was bright & dry on my walk back to Ayala Center. Its now pouring again, as it did several times at the Cafe judging by the noise on the roof.

Coffee Shop #2.

Small reg. coffee. 60 pesos.
Why, of all things, should the coffee be of a similar price to America?!?

Last exchange rate in Santiago City: 55.75 pesos to the dollar.

Using some of my $US reserves for this trip as my pin # stopped working.
(checked the number and I did not, if fact, forget it)

Peace Corps sent a new one probably arrived at site yesterday.

The City stirs in stages.

Lots of people, lots of rain at 9:30am.

Nothing but coffee shops & rugby pubs open until 10am.

Equals more coffee with the Underworld covering for the bad pop music.
(Techno music, thanks Meghan)

What to do with an entire day?

10 am. The rain stops again.

Free coffee refill!

Time ticks to the beat. 1st fast, then slow.

Safely Valve texts in letting me know he knows I'm in town.
PUA member who will bail me out if I get lost.
Always good to have.

I'm still not used to the naked displays of power in this country.
The assault rifle at the "Makati Police Assistance Center" pavilion on the sidewalk.
The shotguns held by the bank guards.
The shear number of security guards wandering around with pistols.

Picture every two-bit mall guard in the states packing heat & opening doors for you.
Yeah. Its strange.

What do with a day?
I guess first, I might as well check out this mall.

The Joys of Spontaneity

So here I sit, killing time in Santiago City waiting for the overnight bus to leave for Manila. Sounds be a very exciting 10-12 hour journey into the capital. Why am I trekking all this way? I finally found out the date for the Philippines Ultimate Association's Hat tournament, called Big Phat Hat on Monday and it happened to be this weekend!! For those who don't know, a Hat tournament draws random teams from a brief skill level survey to play in a weekend tournament. Its generally a great time and a wonderful way to meet people in a new Ultimate community. I had touched base with a few people when I arrived in country and caught wind that the tourney would be coming up, but all I knew was August. Luckily there wasn't anything earth shattering going on this weekend, so I was able to skip town. I've also been in contact with someone from Santiago City (though I gather he goes to boarding school in Manila) and they are trying to get a fledgling Ultimate scene off the ground here too. Maybe that will materialize into another tournament in October. We'll see on that one though. Regardless, its nice to know that I can go to a completely different country and key into a part of that world with skills from home. Between my Ultimate and billiards I do alright with my extra curricular. Still, should be an interesting trip. I have the name of the restaurant/bar where the registration party will be tomorrow night and the number of one of the PUA dudes. That should be enough to get me through the weekend. You can always count of the Ultimate world for at least a little floor space with a rough over it. I guess the bus is first come first serve for seats though, so I'm going to catch some dinner and go hang out at a bus terminal.