Maobra ko gid!

Wow another month has come and gone and it is already April!

There is good news and bad news to report. The bad news is that my Solid Waste Management project that got approved for funding got postponed. It is still approved and will eventually get done (hopefully) but for now the funds have been “reallocated” to another project that the LGU deems of higher priority. However this news is not all bad. I was feeling a bit overwhelmed before: trying to push the implementation of my solid waste mgt project while also trying to plan when I was going to do coastal assessments, and I have also been busy visiting all of the schools in town, presenting on solid waste and composting. Now I can focus on the coastal assessments and go back to solid waste later once I get the funds again.

Talking to the kids about composting and solid waste management. They laugh everytime I talk in Ilonggo!

They look so attentive don't they..

Also a lot of my time lately has been focused on Solid Waste Management recently. Like I mentioned, I have visited just about every school in Jordan giving presentations on Solid Waste Management and composting. And I recently helped the municipal engineer to establish some composting bins made out of tires at our municipal building. So this will be a nice change of pace going back to CRM (coastal resource management). 

The compost bins behind my office, made from recycled tires.

Physical assessments of the coast is probably most CRM volunteers favorite thing to do because it involves getting in the water and looking at coral reefs and seagrass. However it is also one of the most frustrating things to plan because trying to find all the necessary supplies can be a hassle! Even though performing assessments in coastal waters is mandated by the national government, most LGU (that’s Local Government Unit for those that forgot) don’t have the proper supplies or know-how to do it.

Coastal assessments are important for assessing the effectiveness of established marine reserves and the information gathered will be used to update the Coastal Resource Management Plan. I also want to assess a new area so I can make recommendations for establishing a new marine reserve.

During training we learned how to do these assessments and used supplies supplied by Peace Corps (see earlier blog post - Finding Nemo). Now it’s time to do assessments in my municipality. I have been waiting for the good weather (and calmer waters) of the summer season to do this. But the summer weather was late in getting here and the rainy season is fast approaching. And the next two months are already very full with activities! Next week is Manggahan Festival, celebrating Guimaras’ sweet mangos. It is a full week of events including dance competitions, live bands, mango eating competition, Filipino celebrities, carnival rides and a day of all-you-can-eat-mangos! After Manggahan is Holy Week, ending with a reenactment of the Crucifixion of Christ – whether this will be using nails or rope is yet to be known! I will also be gone for two weeks in May for various PC training events.

All these weeks of festivals and conferences leave me little time to do coastal assessments so I am trying to get everything planned. And the planning process takes a good deal longer here since it takes twice as long for someone to get back to me about supplies and even when someone says they have transect lines that I can use, it doesn’t always mean they actually do. Often times items are misplaced, broken, or in use somewhere else even though they were supposed to be saved for me.

But I digress… I am sure you are wondering what this good news is that I mentioned earlier. Well I moved out of my host family house and am now living in my own place! As mentioned before I loved living with my host family but have also been really wanting to get out and have my own place. This is part of American culture that many Filipinos just don’t understand. “Why would you want to move away from your family?” “Aren’t you scared to live on your own?” These are the questions I get. At the core of Filipino culture is family. Family members don’t move out until they get married, and even then often new couples continue to live with their parents. Even when they eventually do move out, usually they build a house right next store to their parents’.

This is of course quite different from the average American household, wherein parents from day one are raising their children to be independent so as to be ready for that fateful day when you move out on your own. I remember looking forward to moving out and having my own place, and I know my youngest brother is feeling the same way right now. I try to explain to locals that my American family is just as close, we just don’t all live together in the same house, and we strive to be able to be independent. But this is just one example of the cultural differences I run into on a daily basis!

So I moved down the street to a nice little house. I also got a dog and a roommate. My roommate is just for the month of April but it is nice to transition to living on my own here by having a roommate first. And she is a foreigner to the Philippines as well. Chie is a JICA (Japan’s version of PC) volunteer. Her site is in the city but she has a month off and wants to concentrate on learning Ilonggo, so she asked if she could move in with me for a bit so that she could take language lessons with my language tutor.  It is a really neat experience living with a volunteer who is from another country. We take turns cooking American and Japanese foods and help each other with language.

My new house!

The compost bin I set up behind my house, also using recycled tires.

My Japanese roommate, Chie, with my new puppy, Turtle.

I find myself keeping some American ways and practices but also adopting some of the Filipino ways that I have learned while living with my host family. I am also learning how to buy food and cook in the Philippines. Going to the market is an adventure every time! I never know what fruits, vegetables and fish are going to be available or if they will be selling chicken. And many of the produce is new to me so, with the help of Chie, I am learning how to cook different types of food.  Another great thing about having my own place is that my friends can visit me, which they plan on doing for Manggahan Festival. The festival is Guimaras’ highlight of the year and I can’t wait to pig out on sweet mangoes! Yum! I will be sure to take lots of pictures for my next blog entry J

Halong everyone!

Project Approval taste so good... and so do star apples

So again there has been quite a lapse since my last post, but it's definitely a good sign because I have been staying very busy with work and all.

Good news today... I got my project approved for funding! Yeah!!!!

But I guess I should start with what this said project is... a few weeks ago, while doing fisherfolk registration at a coastal barangay, I noticed the waste segregation bins around this particular barangay actually had segregated wastes in them (most of the bins around town have a mixture of plastic and leaves in them, indicating segregation is not really occuring). So I arranged a meeting with the person responsible for the effective waste segregation. He is a councilman in the barangay and we are very well acquainted since he also is the president of the Municipal fisherfolk organization. He gave me a tour of the barangay's solid waste management and told me how he implemented and managed it. There was successful waste segregation but the compost piles were not actually composting, but rather just sitting in heaps of leaves and branches. But the general waste segregation was working so good, I had to try to replicate it on the other barangays.

After finding out what the Jordan Ecological Solid Waste Management Board was and that they also had a yearly budget of 250,000 pesos to fund related projects, I immediatley set to writing a project proposal. The board met today and I presented the project, which would require an estimated 92,000 pesos. The board loved it and it was approved for funding! Although knowing Filipino timetables, I am not exactly sure when the funds will be available for me to start the project, but the big victory here is that it will happen!

So what is this magical project you ask?
It is a Solid Waste Management Project that includes IEC (information education communication) and waste segregation for all of the coastal barangays. I will have an IEC presentation informing residents about why burning and burying (because so many still burn their trash right in their front yard) their trash is bad and why waste segregation is good. I will also teach them how to properly segregate trash and how to compost. Following each meeting there will be a community clean-up in that area. Next we will be implementing waste segregation bins and composting bins throughout each barangay as well. So hopefully what we present, they will implement.

I am very excited about the prospect of this project and will continue working on getting it done. Meanwhile I am also helping my sitemate with a project. Her office (social services) is giving a 2-day workshop in all the barangays on "Effective Parenting" and they asked me to be a resource person for the environment. So I have been giving presentations on "keeping a healthy environment for you and your children".

And I am preparing to move out of my host family's house. I will be moving next month to a house near the nipa hut I discussed in my previous post, and another PCV will be living next door in the nipa hut :)

So that is all for now, hopefully next time I post there will be lots of these in my coastal barangays:

Successful waste segregation in the Philippines

P.S. Shout out to Sam! Miss ya girl and I will be seeing you in Taiwan soon enough!

Halong!

Festival Season

So the days have been going by much faster lately (as is evidence of my lack of posts). Along with continuing to have community meetings in each of the coastal barangays in my municipality, it has also been festival season in the Philippines, filling up both the week and weekend with lots of activities! So here is a recap of some of the goings on:

Tour of Guimaras - 

Old lighthouse left over from the Spanish rule. The markings warn it is not safe to climb the stairs.

Among the lighthouse ruins.

The Pas-Pas, our tour vehicle around Guimaras.

Historic Navalas Church

Buenavista Foundation Day Festival - 

Motorcross racing for Buenavista Foundation Day Festival. It was very muddy!

Yeah Fireworks!!!!

Dinagyang Festival in Iloilo City - 

Posing with some Ati (indigenous) dancers.

Biking around Guimaras -

At the top of the falls.

Makopo falls, right down the street and a short bike ride away from my house.

We also stopped to do a bit of mini golfing... on a cement course. But I did get a hole in one!

And just to prove that I really have been getting work done amongst all the festivals, some pics from some of my community meetings - 

My wheels for work activities.

Barangay Sinapsapan community meeting.

Barangay Lawi community meeting.

Barangay Morobuan community meeting.

I have also been spending time with my host family. Volunteers are required to live with host families for our first three months of service, at which point we can choose to move out. As my three months mark is coming up, and I have found a nice nipa hut to move into, I have decided to stay living with my host family for a few more months. I have come to really feel apart of the family as I help out with cooking dinner, play games with the kids, and have cultural conversations with my host parents, not to mention that I have my meals bought for and a pretty nice room to stay in :)

My host mom, Helen, also works at the municipal office, as the head treasurer. Dennis, my host dad, works the family farm, which includes pigs, chickens and Dobermans. Sometimes in the evening I play with my host siblings, Tricia and Andre. Tricia especially likes playing the connect-4 game that I bought the kids for Christmas. She is very smart and has the highest math scores at her school. Andre is always getting into trouble but he is definitely entertaining to say the lease!

Sometimes in the evening I go with my family to Helen’s sister’s house. Lots of Helen’s extended family lives in a compound down the road from us; we go there a lot for birthdays and other celebrations, where we eat a lot of good Filipino food! And because it is a sin to not have enough food at a fiesta, there is always plenty of food to be sent home with afterwards J

My host dad says Hi!

Tricia is so cute!

Andre, probably up to no good!

My host mom with her niece.

I do want to try living on my own in the Philippines and look forward to moving in to my nipa hut, but I am not in any hurry to move out of the house yet. Though the hut I will be moving into is conveniently located right down the road from both my current host family and sheila, my language instructor. That way I can still come by the house and participate in celebrating all of the family birthdays and holidays that I enjoy so much!

And to end on a side note, Helen bought me and the kids some Lays packs the other day. I was pretty excited for some American chips, or any chips that don't taste like some kind of seafood.

Yummy Lays!......

However upon closer inspection of the chips......

Nevermind. yeah that is def sushi flavored......

Well that's all for now, I will try to post again soon!

Halong everyone!

A "friendly and loving people"

Now that the holiday season is over and people are back to work, I prepare for my month of community meetings. Having meetings with the coastal barangays is something PC encourages us to do initially at site as a way for us to not only get to know the community people we will be working with, and they get to know us, but also as a means for us to assess the resources and needs of the people. I am fortunate enough to have a very proactive municipality who helped me to plan dates for these meetings the first week I was at site. So I have been excitedly awaiting for the month of January and a chance to really begin my work here.

My first meeting was this past Thursday and I will continue to have meetings every Tuesday and Thursday until I have met with all 8 of the coastal barangays in Jordan. I prepared for my first meeting by deciding the activities, making an agenda, translating everything in Ilonggo (thanks to my language tutor who lives down the road from me), making posters, and gathering supplies.

I was of course nervous about how the meeting was going to go especially with it being the first of eight. The fisher families, my target audience, represent the poorest of the poor here. Although English is taught to children starting in kinder, many fisher families cannot afford to go to or stay in school, therefore many of them understand little English and speak even less. Some cannot even read and write. Therefore I was very nervous about my communication barrier, but thankfully three of my co-workers including my counterpart accompanied me and were able to help out in translating whenever I needed. This is also why it was so important that I translate all of the posters into Ilonggo and speak as much of it as I can.

We held the meeting at the local church and when it was time to start the barangay captain rang the bell. And wouldn’t you know it everyone in the coastal sitio showed up, and I mean EVERYONE: fishermen AND their wives and families (I was afraid only the men would show). The barangay captain was there along with BFARMC (fishermen organization) members and kagawad (barangay council) members. 53 total in attendance!

To start things off, I did my introduction (in Ilonggo) and had them all introduce themselves. This served as a sort of ice-breaker so that hopefully they would be more apt to participating later in the discussions (a handy strategy I learned from the best facilitator I know, thanks Becky!) This type of introduction I think is especially important in the Filipino culture, where so much emphasis is based on being part of the community and knowing the people. For this reason I have learned that when I introduce myself I always include what family I am living with. Family is the main tie that holds Filipino communities together (especially since everyone it seems is a relative of everyone else). It is how they think of you as a member of the community rather than an outsider. One of the greatest parts of the PC program is having us live with host families. Not only do we learn more of the language and culture this way, but we also are seen as a member of the community and therefore respected and protected as such.

After introductions, I asked the community members to list resources and needs in their barangay. Then I had a list of activities under columns of how often those activities occur. I asked them to each come up and put a tally if that specific activity occurred: often, sometimes, or never. The activities were things like: small fish catch, needing to travel farther to find catch, commercial fishers coming into municipal waters, trash on the beach, use of illegal fishing methods, etc. And it ended up being my absolute favorite part! Everyone wanted to come up and put their tally. They wanted their opinion counted. And I was able to encourage those in the back to participate by giving them markers and ushering them to the front of the room. It was an amazing sight to see all of them huddle around the poster, reading the activities and adding their tally.It was exciting to watch the community actively participate in identifying and managing their resources. 

The next activity I had them do was to list what they wanted for their community and among the top things was the establishment of a marine reserve. I asked if we placed one there would the community support and monitor it and it was an overwhelming “yes”. Then they made their community map, which they really got into and were very proud of, identifying all of their resources and places of importance, such as school, church, and of course, basketball court (which also doubles as a dryer for crops like rice).

Our final activity was to outline a community plan. This was my counterpart’s idea, to have people list what they wanted for their community. Of course I was thinking they would list similar things that we had discussed during the meeting, like establishing a marine reserve and keeping their beaches clean. However, instead they listed things like “to be a more friendly and loving people”, “to lead their lives according to God’s will”, and “to obey our parents.” I thought it was a very good wrap up for the meeting; we started out with individual introductions, had discussions about their coastal resources, and ended with the community reminding themselves they, above all, wish to live as a “friendly and loving” community – that is the Filipino people for you.

I am really happy with the way my first meeting went and am very hopeful and excited to visit the rest of the coastal barangays in my municipality.

Wish me luck!

Halong as always.

P.S. Shout out to my readers at NA Elementary School! Thanks for your support and helping me to accomplish the third goal of PC: to spread cultural awareness and understanding to my American friends :)

Manogluy-a

Our office Christmas Party was Thursday, ending the work week before Christmas. Everyone was supposed to bring a food contribution. It has been hard to get in the Christmas mood here, being away from family and it being so warm (it feels almost unnatural to be sweating in December) so I decided what I needed to help me feel the season was to do some holiday baking. My language teacher, Bebet, has an oven and she agreed to let me do my baking there. I decided to make sugar cookies and magic bars.

When I arrived to Bebet’s house there was another visitor already there. Her name is Waning and she is a manogluy-a, a type of local healer. There are many types of local healers, referred to as kwak-doctors (seriously that is what they are called). This particular healer uses ginger and so is therefore called a manogluy-a, “manog” meaning “one who gives a service or aid” and “luy-a” which means ginger.

Waning was there to attend to Bebet’s daughter, Sam, who has been sick with fever for some time. Modern medicine was not doing much so Bebet said she called on Waning as a last sort of effort. There were a variety of leaves wrapped on Sam’s head using a bandana, and Waning was rubbing a piece of ginger all over her and talking fast.

I told Bebet I have always wanted to meet a native healer. She asked me if there was any ailment that I would like to have Waning look at while she was there. I have a past of back problems, stemming from mild scoliosis and, what I have been told, a “bulging disc”, whatever that means. Doctors tell me I just need physical therapy. But here I was in the presence of a native healer in the Philippines; why not get a second opinion?

So Waning asked me to take the piece of ginger and hold it in my hand. After doing so, she took the ginger from me and began to rub it all over me, just as I had seen her do to Sam. Then she took the ginger and whispered to it for a while. I could not understand what she was saying, and Bebet told me she was speaking Kinaria, which is a another dialect of Hiligaynon.

Then Waning told me (through Bebet’s interpretation) that my back aches were due to “bad air being trapped” in my muscles. I asked her what causes this and she told me that it is due to imbalance, or as we know it, stress. She said I didn’t need another healer, that what I needed was meditation and a good back massage. Then she proceeded to massage my back and rub menthol oil on it. When she was through, my back felt much better!

After my great massage from the manogluy-a, it was time to get baking! Heart, Bebet’s other daughter, was my assistant baker. She was so interested in learning how to bake and had a real knack for it so I let her take over a lot of the mixing and adding and just helped her to follow the recipes. She found some cookie cutters in the back of the cupboard and we made heart and star-shaped Christmas cookies. Then we dyed red and green frosting. Heart really enjoyed decorating the cookies for Christmas. We also made magic bars, with a few substitutions since some of the ingredients were hard to find, including using Guimaras grown cashew nuts instead of peanuts, still very delicious!  

It was fun to share the tradition of holiday baking and to learn about some of the native local healers here in the Philippines. Now my back feels great and my holiday treats were a hit at the office Christmas party!

That's all for now. I wish everyone Happy Holidays and  a Happy New Year!

Malipayon nga Paskwa!

Pawikan Release!

As I have mentioned before, there is a Sea Turtle Rehabilitation Center in one of the coastal barangays of Jordan. Since I have been here, there have been eight turtles being kept there, only two of which were actually in need of rehabilitation. So I have been talking a lot with my counterpart, Bebot, about having a sea turtle (pawikan) release. And of course he added that we should make an event out of it. So this past Tuesday we had our “Sea Turtle Tagging and Release into the Wild” event.

Originally we only had three tags so we tagged three turtles in preparation. However through a fellow PCV, I was able to make a contact at SEAFDEC, which is a fisheries research center. There is a SEAFDEC facility in Iloilo and in Nueva Volencia, Guimaras. My new friend at SEAFDEC not only was planning on coming to our sea turtles release event, but she was also going to bring a turtle to release and additional tags. So we were able to tag two more turtles for release!

I had invited the other PCVs on the island to come and most of them were able to attend. It was a busy morning, boating people from the turtle rehab center to the beach where the release was going to happen and tagging the two additional turtles. The turnout was really great! In addition to my fellow PCVs, co-workers from my office, and my new SEAFDEC friend, also in attendance were the Governor of Guimaras, Jordan Mayor, a group of local residents and fishermen, and an American ex-pat living on the island. There was also media present and we ended up on two local news channels later that evening! One showed a clip of me and the governor releasing turtles on the beach.

Bebot had also convinced me that I should MC the event. So in addition to introducing all of our guest and speakers, I also gave a short speech about the turtles being endangered and how great it was that Jordan was helping in the tagging and releasing of this animal… all in Ilonggo! Luckily I had practiced that morning with my tita (aunt) and timbong (house help). They made sure to correct me so that when I was talking about the day’s activities, I said ‘an activity like this’ instead of ‘an activity monkey this’. Both words are spelled “amo” but pronounced with different emphasis. I am SO glad I didn’t say monkey!

The morning finished on schedule even though we started an hour late, and we were able to release 6 tagged sea turtles to the sea!

Getting ready to tag the turtles.

Now turtle gets a little "piercing" for her tag.

We were able to release 6 sea turtles: 2 green, 2 hawksbill, and 2 olive ridley.

The Governor of Guimaras releasing a turtle.

Me acting as MC for the event with media near by.

I think she is ready for the sea!

Also this week I was able to take part in cashew planting. Cashew (“kasoy”) is a major crop on Guimaras, along with Mangos, and the organization ”Kasoy for Life” planned a kasoy planting and wanted the agricultural office to help out. Although it is not really coastal resource management, since I work in the agricultural office, I thought it would be fun to help out. After about 17 of us piled into the office truck, we made our way to an inland barangay and went on a short hike through the forest with cashew seeds in our pockets. Using pre-measured bamboo sticks, we planted over 100 cashew seeds each 6 meters apart. My supervisor told me I should come back to the Philippines in 3 years to see the grown trees!

So this week was very productive for me! I helped in releasing 6 sea turtles and planting over 100 cashew trees. All in week’s work!

Getting our cashew seeds ready.

Planting kasoy!

Halong everyone!

So You Think You Can Dance

As seems typical of the average PCVer, I have not posted much since I got to site.... 

Things are good though, the host family is nice and allows me to be independent. I have a language tutor, Sheila, who used to work for PC in the past, there is another PCVer who works in my office. We have become good friends, talking about our adjustment at site and supporting each other through it all. Things at the office are slow but that is to be expected considering I am still new here and it is now December and into the holiday season. So far I have met the Mayor, Vice-Mayor, SB/ Council members, the Governor and many FARMC (Fisheries and Aquatic Resource Management Council) members from my town and coastal barangays. I even have set the dates in January when I will be having community meetings with each coastal barangay. So I am well on my way at site, but I am also getting used to the much slower pace of the workday.

Most of my time spent in the office is socializing with my co-workers and the various people who stop by, we also eat a lot and have numerous snack times throughout the day. After lunch, we have an hour of rest time or we play cards, and we take turns checking our facebook on the one computer in the office with internet. Amidst all this work is done though. The Filipino culture is much more focused on the community and spending time with each other, strengthening community bonds. This is especially important for me since I am a foreigner and I am working with the community at a grass roots level.

A couple times a week I have field days which involves me meeting people in the community, visiting and assessing experimental fish ponds, and going to the marine sanctuary on the coast of Jordan. Last week I was able to ride around with the Bantay Dagat (type of local coast guard) and fully see and appreciate the beautiful coast of Jordan, Guimaras. It is truely breath-taking! The coast is lined in rocky cliffs alternatig with coves of white sand beaches. The water is a clear blue-green and you can see the lattice of coral reef below. Also along the coast are small rocky islands covered in thick jungle. Looking up along the trees of these islands you can see fruit bats and monkeys. This really is an island paradise!

Today I went to tag some of the sea turtles that are at the rehabilitation center in Lawi, a coastal barangay. This is in preparation for the release we will have next week!

I am also often invited to many fiestas and events. I take it as opportunities to be involved with the community I live in and be seen as part of the community. This week was the Fiesta of Bulan Bulan. Bulan Bulan is a sitio within my Barangay (sitios are smaller village-like areas within a Barangay). Many of them hold yearly festivals that usually correspond to the saint’s day for which the Sitio was named.

I still had to work during the day but was told I could leave for the lunch time fiesta and evening Disco Dirby. So at lunch time I left for the Bulan Bulan and had lunch at a community member’s house. It was typical Filipino fiesta food: rice, baked fish, pig lechon (roast), and spaghetti! We ate and moved from house to house meeting all the relatives. However that evening was the main event, the Disco Dirby, for which I was asked to be a judge for. Oh boy.

It turned out to be really fun. I got there early with Sheila, who was also going to be a judge. When we arrived they were finishing up the crowning of the new Mrs. Bulan Bulan (kind of like prom queen). The girls were all dressed in gowns and the newly crowned winner had a sparkling crown atop her head. As is customary, a member of the community was giving a speech about how wonderful the new Mrs. Bulan Bulan was, complimenting each of her features. This guy was a little long winded and as he was comparing her nose to some kind of pointed object (it was in Ilonggo so I lost some in translation) a little girl in a white dress walked out in the middle of the arena and in front of the stage. At first everyone just ignored her and kept the program going. Until she made her move. She proceeded to lift her dress, pull down her panties, and squat. Yes she was attempting to relieve herself right in the middle of Mrs. Bulan Bulan’s crowning. Among the audience’s laughing and gasping, the mother finally came to claim her child. Sheila just whispered to me, ‘well she is just a young girl, she is used to relieving herself whenever she needs to.’

Yes, in the Pines, small children squat alongside of the road and men of all ages stand to relieve themselves pretty much wherever they are. I probably see at least three men standing along side the road or water every day, with their backs to me and a stream between their legs. It is a sight you just have to get used to.

But back to the fiesta and dance contest.

It was really fun. There were three dance teams made up of all guys. They had matching dance costumes on and did real dance moves and lifts, and even had little skits in between. I felt as though I was on Randy Jackson’s “So you think you can dance” show. In the end we awarded our winner their cash prize. I will add it was a tough job being a judge. It was hard to grade and judge the teams when they all had worked hard on their routines and all were very entertaining. But there was one group above the others that really moved like a dance group in sync with each other and were simply the most entertaining, so they came out the winners. I wish I had pictures or video to share but my camera is still broken so its left to your imagination.

I hope to attend more fiestas like this one and am sure I will. However maybe next time I will remain in the audience and not at the judge’s table.

Halong from the Pines!