PCPhilippines Update #74

Education To The Test:  Have you ever been at sea in the middle of a rainstorm?  There is a perfectly round bubble surrounding the vessel with a radius that matches the distance of visibility in all directions.  It’s kinda cool to be in the middle of a rain bubble . . . kinda.

Galynn, Alana’s younger sister, trekked out to Dumaguete to spend almost a month with us.  In an effort to get out and see another part of the country, we took a 3-day hiatus to a little island on the northern tip of our neighbor island Cebu called Malapascua.  Malapascua Island is famous for Thresher Shark dives  and we were blessed to share water space with one.

We stayed at classy, well-managed, three-year old dive resort on the beach called Evolution.  They had quaint accommodations, excellent and healthy food, and a very friendly and helpful local staff. On the second day we headed out on the Evolution boat, the Haldane, a 36-foot Filipino cruiser, for a day trip to Gato Island.

When we woke that morning we were unsure the Haldane would set out because it was raining, or we at least thought our 9:30am launch time would get pushed back.  Not a chance.  All the dives we had been on so far were with one of the two Irish owners, Dave.  He may have made the decisions to cancel or postpone after looking at weather forecasts, considering safety, and such, yet he was taking the day off.

Alana and I headed out with four gals from Ireland, a young man from England (Daniel), a young woman from Spain (Belan), and one of the two Haldane boat/dive crews.  The local Haldane crew consisted of a captain, two deck hands, and two dive instructors.  All of them had seemed super capable and competent so far and our dive expeditions had seemed very routine.

As the thirteen of us wheeled around the southeast corner of Malapascua we could see Gato Island straight ahead shadowed by a towering rainstorm.  Gato is an uninhabited island about the size of four football fields and someone on the crew told us it would take about one hour to banka (boat) there.

There were decent size swells coming at us and about half way there we were entering the rainstorm, which had by now engulfed Gato Island making it difficult to see.  I wondered for a few minutes if it was safe to dive during a storm and figured as long as there wasn’t lightning, which there wasn’t, heck, we are going to get wet anyway, what’s the difference?

Less than 10 minutes later the wind picked up considerably and I figured out what the difference would be . . . cold!  The Haldane’s pace slowed down a bit, the stinging rain was nearly horizontal and advancing directly at us, and all the guests were scuttling into their wetsuits for protection from the elements.  The Haldane started feeling like a 15-foot Sunfish in the waves and our situation started to feel a bit dodgy.  The foreigners were looking slightly nervous while the locals continued displaying those standard, deadpan, Filipino faces.

By this time, even though we were two-thirds of the way there, Gato had been swallowed whole by the storm and was nowhere in sight.  To make things worse, it was obvious by the wave direction that the captain was swerving back and forth as if he was guessing which direction the island was in.  I looked over to see if he had a compass.  He did, a nice looking hand held model sitting on the boat dash, yet it didn’t appear he was using it.  I thought to myself, “What kind of boat doesn’t have a built in compass? . . . Pinoy!”

I started watching for signs of confidence or terror on the crew’s faces . . . nothing.  They just stared into the storm as if they had experienced it thousands of time.  As Alana and I started to talk about the situation, I shared with her my emergency plans; if the boat went down we would grab our scuba gear which would keep us afloat and give us air to breath if we needed to bob on a rainy and wavy ocean surface for hours.  I could then also save other people because I had breathing gear if they panicked and held me underwater.  I was starting to envision myself as some superhero in a 007 movie as I my mind was trotting away from me a bit J . . . ego check . . . I digress.

As the adventure continued to deteriorate, all the guests, fully uncomfortable now, started making sarcastic comments and jokes about our situation out loud yet no one, not even the Haldane crew, suggested we turn around.  I wondered what was going on in everyone’s minds because we had slowed down considerably and were feeling lost as the crew looked around for signs of the island. Even though it was possible we were four-fifths of the way to our destination, continuing further from Malapascua in the relentless storm didn’t seem like a good idea to me, yet I wasn’t saying anything either because I didn’t feel it was my place to do so.

Alana mentioned, “If Dave was here he probably would have decided to go back a long time ago and it feels like the crew is lacking leadership.”  We started talking about the boat crew’s critical thinking abilities.  Aged between 20-30 years old, I was fairly sure I had some idea about the quality of education they had received, if they had gotten through school at all.  Obvious that they had been trained well, I realized none of them would have cancelled or postponed the trip that morning because they don’t think that way . . . they are taught to carry out the task they are given by whomever is in charge.

In general, the education Filipino youth seem to receive have nothing to do with higher order thinking, analyzing, evaluating, reflecting, problem solving, decision making, communicating, time management, feedback, or self-confidence.  Their education seems to be about other worthy areas of development; work ethic, positive attitude and faith, following directions (especially from authority), being a team player, mimicking/copying, and flexibility/adaptability, none of which seemed to be helping in our current situation.

A few minutes after I told Alana I was convinced none of the Filipino crew would make the call to return to Malapascua, the young woman from Spain yelled out, “Why don’t we turn around!” and the boat came to an immediate stop.  Not more than 10 seconds later, one of the dive instructors announced, “We will turn around and find another dive site at Malapascua.”  Wow . . . very insightful to watch this process . . . and it wasn’t over.

Have you ever been at sea in the middle of a rainstorm?  There is a perfectly round bubble surrounding the vessel with a radius that matches the distance of visibility in all directions.  The visibility we were experiencing was about 200 meters and at a stop, it was quite tranquil and at the same time surreal.

The Haldane’s engine cranked up and we whipped around.  This would have been a good time to reverse our bearing on the captain’s compass because it was only obvious we were headed back by the new direction of the wind and waves.  Again, nothing was in sight outside of 200 meters as the rain continued to pour down.

A few more minutes of the captain swerving back and forth across the direction of the waves and we were once more at a full stop.  The captain and a dive instructor started reading the directions to the compass and a crewmember went to the front of the boat and started looking for the sun . . . through the stormy rainclouds!  Not a good time to be taking a bearing now when we can’t see anything!

The guests exchanged disoriented looks while splurting out giggles of unbearable anxiety.  One of the Irish gals licked her finger and held it up to the wind.  I felt blessed with the ability to laugh and wanted to make sure we weren’t disrespectful to the locals who were “running the show” since we didn’t seem secure in the conclusion of our adventure thus far.

A few more minutes of reading and looking around and crewmembers were suggesting all kinds of different directions for the captain to continue in.  This didn’t instill confidence in any of us.  One of the crew pointed like he had seen land and the captain immediately heading that way.  It was painfully obvious to me, with visibility still around 200 meters, that the crewmember had seen nothing.  At one point a seagull flew by and I thought the captain might even start following her.

Finally, the bloke from England looked enlightened, scurried to the dry box, and popped out his iPhone 4S.  A half dozen taps later he was showing the captain a GPS screen and our fearless leader, who throughout the entire ordeal maintained his stony look, adjusted to what seemed to be our most informed heading yet. 

All went well and Malapascua Island finally popped into view.  There would be no 007 capsized boat rescues for me on this day.  Thank goodness for Apple and thank you Steve Jobs (rest in peace) for your relentless and unequalled vision of technology being an appendage to every human on earth . . . or at least every bloke.

PCPhilippines Update #70

Little Things:  Somehow, I was strongly invited and decided to spend two straight weeks at the Consuelo Shelter with the 20 young men, ages 13-17.  These are a few little things I saw or experienced while I was there.

Joseph, age 14.

Joseph put some of his clothes in a bucket, was in his tighty whitey dark blue underwear, and had filled the bucket with water on the slab of concrete behind the house in preparation of doing his laundry when some of the boys called him over to the basketball court for a 4 on 4 game.  When it started raining players scattered off the court to shelter, except for Joseph, he was planning on getting wet anyway.

It started raining so hard that the water coming off the roof where two big slabs of roof met in a 'v' sounded like a waterfall.  When I looked over, Joseph was standing in the roof waterfall taking his shower.  A few minutes later he did his laundry right out there in the rain and appeared to enjoy the process as he kept turning back to me with a big grin on his face.

Michael, age 13, with every-
thing he owns in this world.

Michael is a very small boy in this group, with a well earned chip on his shoulder, who gets picked on a lot and is tough on adults in his life.  One day he had on his soccer shoes and asked me to go play with him.  I reluctantly agreed; don't really like soccer and didn't want to sweat.  After kicking the ball back and forth a few times I suggested I be the goalie and he try and score a goal.  He attempted about 50 goals in the next 15 minutes.  I was just standing still blocking them and would toss the ball 20-30 yards out where he would need to run for it and run it back in to attempt to score again.  He didn't score one goal (long arms) and seemed to be okay with that.  Seemed like he just needed some one on one adult attention.

Later, when he was building a structure out of bottle tops, another Michael purposely threw something at the structure and knocked it down.  Michael didn't say anything however gave him a bad look.  I watched it happen to him again, and again he handled it well.  When I said, "Wow Michael, you handled people being disrespectful to you very well both times."  he spurted out a whispered, "Yes!"  It is obviously something he has been working on.  The rest of my days with the Consuelo boys Michael and I got along just fine.

Writing Sponsor Letters

Riimark, age 17,  with Sponsor Letter, 

Once a year when school is about to start the shelter youth all write thank you letters to the people back in America who sponsor them.  It was nice to experience this process, how much thought they put into the letters, how important it is to spell things write and to use correct sentence structure, and how many times they are willing to rewrite the letter if something is wrong.

Edwin, age 14.5, Grade 3.

Edwin is the student I believe I've mentioned in previous updates who is 14.5 years old yet going into grade 3.  I guess when they took him off the streets at age 11 he had not yet been in school.  His father is dead, mother is on another island, and older sister lives in Dumaguete.  He is a very smart young man, especially in mathematics, game playing, and problem solving.  I often wondered why they didn't let him do two grades in one year to let him catch up to his age group.

When Edwin first brought his letter to his sponsor to me to read over and correct with him I learned the answer to my question.  While some of the older boys who are in high school had very detailed and descriptive letters about what they had done this summer, how they were looking forward to school, and gratitude expressed for the care and concern their sponsors had for them, Edwin's letter had five very short, very simple, very broken sentences.  He was as concerned with the content of his letter being appropriate and meaningful so we worked on it together until it was.

Jessie, age 14,
with his mother.

None of the water inside the shelter runs.  Four spigots on each corner of the house is where all the water comes from.  The well pump on the cement slab works fine and this time of year the water table drops so low they cannot access water with it.  I was working on something with a few other young men and looked over and Jessie, age 14, was positioned on a Harry Potter book sized rock with his back against the house underneath one of the water spigots.

I wasn't sure what he was up to, it looked like he was going to grab an awkward drink of water.  He turned the spigot on and it ran over his head and down his body.  Then I thought it was obvious he was just cooling off and knocking the dirt and sweat off his body since he had just finished playing basketball.  Wrong again.  He grabbed a bar of soap and took a full on spigot shower.  Before I knew it he was clean and dry and folding his laundry.

Aqua-Ponics Livelihood Project

The Consuelo Shelter has a new 'livelihood project' called aqua-ponics.  It is a contraption that circulates water using a small pump and a lot of gravity through plastic reservoirs and PVC pipes and keep worms, big leaf plants, small starter veggies, and fish alive and growing.  Hard to explain . . . pic attached.

Smith and Alex

I walked by it one evening and saw the fish gulping for air at the top of the water level and knew something was wrong.  The water was barely circulating in their tank and was overflowing from the rock and worm garden at the top of the system onto the ground.  I spent the rest of the next hour brainstorming the problem, taking apart and cleaning the contraption with Smith and Alex who knew a lot about how, where, and why the water flowed; they had been trained.

It was fun and a challenge to touch nothing and only ask questions as they dug into the problem.  "Okay, the fish aren't breathing again."  "Why is there water coming out of this?"  "What do you feel when you reach down into there?"  "Are you sure that's put back together tight enough?"  "What will happen to this piece when the water starts flowing again?"  Two of the major drains were clogged with mud and once they discovered this, cleaned them, and put the whole thing back together again everything was happy; big leaf plants, worms, smaller veggie starters, and fish.  Very intelligent and innovative young men.

Rakim, age 16, with every-
thing he owns in this world.

Wanted to go to the market today to get a screwdriver for a house project.  Rakim ended up walking with me 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) one way.

Rakim is known for 'escaping,' which means leaving the property without permission, so he was excited for the opportunity to leave with permission.  When I asked him where he went when he 'escaped' he said to his friends house, where they go around the neighborhood stealing mangos from neighbor's trees.  He kept a pretty good pace walking with me to downtown.

Rakim doesn't have parents or a peso to his name and lives with his Aunt when the LCP shelter youth have a break to go home.  As soon as I started looking for and picking up centavos off the side of the road he was onto it as I watched him continually scanning the ground.

Whenever I'm with a shelter youth one on one I try to find situations where they can make decisions because they just don't get a lot of opportunity to do that in this hierarchical culture.  As soon as we hunted down and bought the screwdriver (I let him choose which one to buy), a knife to trim the banana plants at Consuelo, and 4 batteries for 62 pesos ($1.50) all, I thought something to cool us off was in order so I offered to get drinks at Jolibee's, a local burger place.  He wanted McDonalds and I was excited and impressed he was assertive enough to ask.

Once in McDonalds I didn't catch that he was having trouble reading the menu and in the rush to order, I insisted he order for both of us and gave him the money to pay, he awkwardly and reluctantly ordered the same thing as me, a coke float . . . hold the ice.  We sat down in the awkward setting, many white foreigners around talking and laughing loudly (free coffee refills), people dressed much nicer than us (here, McDs is a prestigious place to hang), many apple computers and iPads (free Wifi).

When we finished our coke floats, we headed to the market.  I gave him 50 pesos ($1.20) to buy everyone (21 people that day) something at Consuelo.  I told him it could be fruits or vegetables and was expected to be shared by all.  I could see the wheels turning and he hesitated and roamed for about 20 seconds then made a beeline to a fruit vender who sold him 31 bananas for 50 pesos.  He seemed happy with his buy and we quickly calculated that everyone could have 1.5 bananas for all except one person.

On the way home he was really scouting for centavos.  We got up to 1.20 pesos and I was thinking I would flip him for the one peso and the looser could take the extra.  At one point we split up and worked both sides of the road on our 4 kilometer walk back to the shelter.  We had just hit the 1.40 peso mark when he bent down and found a 5 peso coin.  He was pretty excited and I cheered him on for looking so adamantly for thrown away money.  When we got back to the 100 meter shelter driveway I flipped him for the peso and he won that too.  Six pesos and 31 bananas . . . not a bad walk.

Edwin and Genno on Basketball Court

Sitting around watching TV with the boys, I really get a chance to see the authority pecking order.  I'm not sure yet if it is according to size or age yet when Edwin indicates to Genno that he wants to sit down in Genno's seat, Genno gives no resistance.  He just gets up and gives his seat to Edwin and looks for someone else to displace. 

This seems good for me since I am by far the oldest and the biggest out of all the 'boys' here :-)  They consider me huge, every time we are on the basketball slab in their side yard they say to me multiple times, "Uncle Jac, dunk!" like them saying it is going to mysteriously make it happen . . . not a chance.  What's your guess about the pecking order?  Did I participate and use my age and size OR model something different?

Besides watching them move each other around to get the best seats, it is also hilarious watching them watch TV or movies around little screens.  Alana and I brought a small projector from America and play movies for the different LCP shelters at least once a week.  We project the movies onto the walls from the computer and it is the best thing they've seen in years.  It also gives us another opportunity for them to choose as we come up with creative ways to discuss the movie options and vote.

15 Inch Screen / 18 Boys  = .83 Inches of Screen per Boy

One night Alana had the projector at another shelter when the boys asked me if there would be a 'movie showing.'  They didn't seem to care if the projection would be 6 feet wide and were willing to watch the movie off my computer.  I set it up on a shelf in the commons area and they gathered around the little screen and watched Parana, their movie of course :-)

Lita is one of the housemothers.  She is 37 years old, looks 25 years old, and has 6 children of her own, ages 1-20.  Tough schedule for a mother because they work 48 hours on and 24 hours off.  I guess that's why she is moving on at the end of the month,  says she wants to be with her children more.

I just got her name down a couple of days ago.  I barely know her yet she found a picture of Alana and I in a photo album I brought to the shelter for the boys to look at and asked me to write her a note and sign the back for her.  Bold move for a Filipino to pull a picture out of someone else's personal photo album, claim it, and ask for a note to be written on it.  I never cease to be surprised here.

I'm starting to see the pattern.  They hang out in the house watching TV, playing card and board games, and nap until the sun gets low enough for them to hit the shady soccer field or basketball court.

Consuelo Shelter Boys on Basketball Court at Consuelo Shelter

Today it looked like a heard of bees chased them out of the shelter.  By the time I got to the basketball court they already had a game going, 7 on 8, no referee, no shoes nor shirts, no fouls.  Just a glob of boys running around, screaming, laughing, and releasing of energy.  Young people seem to be very much alike all around the world in that aspect . . . especially young boys.

Another pattern I'm experiencing here is that everything is broke.  Because people are poor, if they get anything new, it is as cheap as they can get it.  If it breaks they can't afford to fix it.  As a result, there are tons of 'things' in these young boys lives, including plumbing and electricity, that doesn't work or is broke.

I saw two of their soccer balls flat so I brought our bike pump (thanx Steve) and patches to fix them only to find out the balls had multiple holes in them.  I brought the bike pump home because I saw they had one at the shelter and when I went to use theirs found out it was broke also.

I wanted to clean the grill to the ceiling fans in one of the boy's dorm room and couldn't take it apart because there was no screwdriver on the property.  There are no tools in this house at all.  Went to help Michael fix the bike tire his father had just left him and couldn't get it off because there was no wrench or pliers to be found.  This shelter is tool deficient.

The boys ride my bike constantly and are hard on it.  The young boys, ages 6-12, at the LCP campus (Robert Hanson Shelter) had already worn through two tires.  I found out they were the cheap tires, 65 pesos ($1.50) each and had them replaced with a better quality tire for 235 pesos ($5.60) each, which would have been nice to have on the bike in the first place (another story).

Yesterday I went to have lunch with Alana and found my bike on the side of the Consuelo Shelter.  When I went to ride it, it was broken, something to do with the back sprocket, and the pedals wouldn't turn the back tire.  I pushed it 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) to the bike shop, riding it like a skateboard, and they replaced the sprocket with a better quality part, 365 pesos ($8.70) instead of the 95 peso ($2.26) part it originally came with.

I did miss lunch with Alana and was bummed about that yet while waiting for my bike to be fixed it hit me hard how things just wear out and break and I have the money to fix them and these boys I'm spending time with just don't.  I'm keeping my perspective; I also grew up in a different country that provided me with privileged opportunity.  I have an education.  I am not a 14 year old.  I remember being a 14 year old and was about as poor as they are except my parents weren't, so I had access to things.

All that being said, I don't just want to provide entertainment for the boys that they will just use hard, wear out, break, and think they can leave in the bushes like all the other things they've run through.  I wrote my new plan on the entrance whiteboard for them yesterday; I just spent 365 pesos to fix my bike.  I don't mind that it was broken.  I do mind that whoever road it last didn't tell me it was broken.  As a result in not knowing, I missed my lunch date with Aute Alana.  As soon as I get 100 pesos from you (Consuelo boys) so that I can fix my bike the next time it breaks, you (Consuelo boys) are welcome to start riding it again.  If my bike does not break by 15 June 2012, I will give you (Consuelo boys) your 100 pesos back.  Haven't seen a peso yet.

Nerry, before haircut.

Rogelio, LCP Barber.

Nerry got a really nice hair cut.  Rogelio cuts almost everyone's hair here.  Mercy, the social worker in charge of all the boys at Consuelo Shelter, pays Rogelio 10 pesos (24 cents) per hair cut, sometimes in advance.

Rogelio has been the only person to cut my hair in the Philippines since our training when I plugged the 110 volt clippers, brought from America, into the 220 volt Filipino wall socket and blew it up.  The Consuelo boys use to have really nice clippers to cut with and then they just disappeared one day.  Everyone assumes, accepts, and understands that some adult took them and sold them for money.  The last time Rogelio cut my hair it was with a pair of school scissors and he did a really great job.  Last month Daddy Glenn bought them new clippers and they are back in business.

Mercy, mother of them all.

Nerry was talking to me about school and mentioned that he had to return again in the afternoon to register because they wouldn't let him register the day before because his hair was too long.  "Are you flippin' serious?"  I couldn't hold it in.  His hair was not long at all in American standards.

Wow!  We are not concerned with if the youth we are charged with educating are actually learning.  We are not concerned with preparing them for adulthood by being able to think, make good decisions, and take care of themselves and all the babies they are destined to bring into the world.  We are not even concerned with helping them discover their passions and interests or developing their dreams and talents.  We are concerned with how long their hair is.  What's next?  Skirts below the knee and bubblegum under the desks?

When will I learn?  Alana and I have come to the conclusion that in this Filipino culture the more we try to push things to happen the more they don't.  Conversely, the more we just sit around and do nothing the more we seem to get done.  It's a weird thing.

I was sitting around doing nothing one morning at Consuelo.  There were no activities planned.  I had been thinking of doing something about the trash on the ground around the house.  The Consuelo boys live on a 4 hector lot and that is fenced in with a big wall fence and a front gate.  The 20+ goats enjoy the open grassy area of the property and have their own fenced in area, about 40 square meters, where they spend nights under a roofed shed.

The shelter (home) is really nice, about 2 years old, and donated by an American non-profit called the Consuelo Foundation.  It had very nice landscaping, about 40 square meters, is also fenced in so to get to it one needs to go through two gates and fences from the road.  The property also has a small garden, about 50 huge banana trees that produce, a few papaya trees, a dozen pineapple plants, various bushes of calamungui, lemon grass, and silis.  It's a great place for young men to live.

The bummer part about this property is that there is trash all over.  When Alana and I first got to the Philippines the amount of trash in the streets, ditches, and just all around on the ground was a bit overwhelming for me.  Sadly, now, I'm kinda used to it.  Yet I have noticed it on the Consuelo property and wondered what a little trash cleanup would do for the place.

As all the boys were just hanging around doing nothing I announced I would be picking up trash around the house and whoever wanted to join me could.  Off and on I had four takers, out of 20.  Even though the place looked clean from a distance, we found trash everywhere, especially around the water spigots; toothpaste caps, candy wrappers, tooth brushes, old pieces of clothes that had been blown off of clothes hangers long ago, q-tips, plastic that held soap and shampoo.  The boys seemed to have been using their windows as trashcans and there was loads of junk underneath them in the landscape.

After we picked up a big bag of trash around the house I called out "Activity!"  This means that all the boys are to get together for an activity or announcement.  They got together, I dumped the trash out on the cemented front porch where it wasn't hidden by landscape or grass, and we talked about what was biodegradable and how long things took to turn back to dirt.  They willingly agreed that they have access to trash cans and could put trash in them instead of the ground.  I was thinking . . . "progress."

Then I announced I would be picking up trash outside of the house fence on the bigger piece of property where the goats eat and again anyone who wanted to could join me.  This time I had about a dozen takers and we combed the property picking up shoes, plastic and glass containers, bags, clothes that had been left on the ground and were now covered with grass and dirt, rubber, broken toys, old balls of all sort, all kinds of things.  We collected quite a pile.

Then I ran into a huge pile of clothes and shoes.  When I asked Alex who they belonged to, thinking it was a youth's clothes who had left Consuelo Shelter, he said something like, "Ricket."  After a few times of getting him to repeat it I realized he was saying, "reject."  These clothes and shoes were items the youth were finished with and had rejected them onto the lawn in a corner of the yard.  Wow!

Alex and I found a big rice sack and finally got all the "reject clothes and shoes" into it.  Now we had a rice sack and two big bags of trash picked up and the property did look nice.  I was wondering what we would do with all the trash when Rakim announced he would take care of it.  I inquired what he would do with it and he said, "Put it in the hole" like I was stupid for asking.

Come to find out they put all their trash in a hole in a corner of the property behind the goat shed.  When I walked over to it with Rakim I noticed there were piles of trash all over by the goat shed I had not seen before, blowing in the wind, sometimes held down by the rain, sometimes being burnt by the piro-youth, and just scattered all around.  The hole in the ground reminded me of the sink hole we used to dispose of trash in at the Atchafalaya Basin camp . . . I guess it just keeps eating trash and dragging it down into the earth . . . or not.

As I was walking back to the Consuelo house all I could think of was that the property will undoubtedly look just as trashy a year from now, again I'm the only one who cares, the youth will probably pick another spot closer to the house than the trash hole to deposit their "rejects" into, I am sweaty and dirty from picking up trash for absolutely no reason and could have been playing backgammon the whole time with Edwin, and if one youth got something out of our efforts that stuck with him maybe it was all worth it . . . maybe . . . who knows?

InHarmony,

- Jaco

J Jacques Fournet II

US Peace Corps Volunteer

Philippines Batch 269

Daro, Dumaguete City

Negros Oriental

NORSU

LCP

Jelo playing backgammon.

PS - Alana and I are huge backgammon fans.  Did you know that backgammon is one of the oldest two person board games known to man?  Excavations in Persia show that the game existed around 3000BC!  I've been playing backgammon with the boys at the Consuelo Shelter and it is amazing to watch them learn.

I don't tell them how to play, just a few of the simple rules, and they learn as we play games.  The pain of loosing is a great motivator and they don't seemed to be deterred by it at all and are hungry to play more.  They are really into it and the game has been being used about 10-12 hours a day when they are home, remember they are on summer break.

I've also built them a board out of cardboard with Coke and Sprite bottletops for pieces and right now they like using Alana and I's board.  Jelo, Edwin, Rogelio, and Jessie are getting really good and Jeffery had beat me twice in the past few days.

School's Out for Summer

It’s Monday, May 21, 2012.  We returned to LCP this morning after being away for over two weeks.  There was a small crowd of college scholars hanging around the gate as Jacques and I arrived on our bikes.  When the boys saw us their faces lit up.  They immediately lifted their hands for high-5s and simultaneously shouted “Welcome home!” 

Welcome home.  Home. 

I’ll rewind a little. Jacques’ site placement at the university is challenging.  I get frustrated just hearing about the seemingly backward policies, impossible learning environments, and ego driven decision-making models; I just hear about it… he has to sit in it day after day.  If you know him, you can imagine how difficult it is to observe without giving input, analyze without making adjustments, and strategize for improvement without the ability to implement.

 The summer months for students in the Philippines are April and May.  Since Jacques would have these months off from “teaching” at NORSU, he opted to spend his free time at LCP especially focusing on the boys living in the Consuelo Home shelter; ages 14- 18.  He had already been creating activities for the boys once a week for the past year so this was a very natural fit. 

LCP has provided a welcomed change of pace.  The boys love him.  The social workers want to hear and understand his feedback. Our supervisor admires and appreciates his insight.  He of course dove in to reading the “Shelter Manual”- page by page- to fully understand the mission, vision, and policies guiding the shelter programs.  Simply stated, at LCP Jacques is able to be his dynamic self.   

To kick off the summer, Jacques suggested we host a “Fun Day” at LCP.  We came up with a series of short activities in which the shelter youth could compete.  They balanced brooms on their fingers, tossed coins in coconut shells for points, and jumped around to remove the “junk in their trunk”.  

  

 We then got to spend some quality time with a small group of girls that were unable to spend Holy Week with their families.  Not wanting to miss a chance at meaningful “learning opportunities”, Jacques suggested we provide the girls with choices for each day’s activity.  “Why not let them have some power and control?”

The highlight of the week was taking the girls snorkeling for their first time.  They literally shouted through their snorkels, "fish, fish, fish!" and cooed, "Oooh it's beautiful." 

Somewhere in this time, Jacques also started planning an adventure for the youth in Independent Living (18- 21 year olds living at LCP while attending college).  We knew we had a full schedule ahead, yet Jacques really wanted to create an opportunity to connect with this particular group of youth.  

As plans for this outing began to unfold, Jacques joined me for six days during an environmental awareness camp.  The first 3 days involved training our youth leaders.  Jacques served as "camp cook" and prepared snacks and dinner for 16 of us each night.  He spent hours biking all over town collecting ingredients, cooking large quantities of Jambalaya and his famous tuna spaghetti, and in his spare time helped me plan for each day.  During camp, his sole focus was to collect photos and footage to create a closing ceremony video.  It was a perfect 40-minute video with features such as lyrics to strategically selected songs being sung at the opportune moment to match a specific picture and photos changing in precise time with the background music.  See a brief video review of our camp here: 

 With a small window of free time, we were able to take the Independent Youth on their adventure.  We hired a jeepney and rode 2 hours to Lake Balanan.  Some from our group had never left Dumaguete.  None of them had ever been to this particular location.  We spent the day eating, playing in the waterfalls, eating, swimming in the pools, and eating some more.  Jacques has made it his personal mission to introduce as many Filipinos as possible to the joy of PB&J.  In the land of fish and rice, I am not complaining.    

Following these grand adventures, we left LCP for two weeks to participate in a "Mobile Education Training".  Along with 14 other Peace Corps volunteers, we facilitated education sessions to teachers from all over our island.  I facilitated one and a half hour Classroom Management and Vocabulary sessions while Jacques presented 3-hour lessons reviewing his in-depth research of the brain.  At the end of my very last session, a woman remained in my room.  She thanked me profusely (teachers seemed very grateful for the entire conference), and then went on to tell me she had also been in Sir Fournet’s brain session.  She told me in great detail how she learned her brain is sometimes hijacked by certain events; and how she now better understands her students’ brains so she won’t get so frustrated with them when they look hot and tired.  She told me she would use some new techniques she learned for getting students’ attention and for engaging both sides of their brains.  She seemed authentically excited to share out loud the new information she had absorbed.  It’s exciting to think even a small part of her new-information-high would continue into her classroom. 

Following the conference, Jacques and I took the weekend to get a way.  It just so happens the Philippines provides beautiful and inexpensive tropical settings for a little rejuvenation.  In times like these, it’s easy to forget we’re in the Peace Corps.  We swam, we kayaked, we dove, we ate, we slept… we enjoyed peaceful time together.  

And then we headed home.  This morning, the warm greeting at LCP’s gate quickly washed away any end-of-vacation blues I may have been carrying to work with me. 

When I started this journal entry, I intended to review April and May’s events.  As I reflect on this whirlwind of experiences, I realize it has become a tribute to Jacques.  While this was not my intention, it makes perfect sense.  We have had a very awesomely… maddeningly… amazingly full summer mostly due to Jacques’ creativity and ability to “make things happen.”  I’m grateful to have selected a partner that has a knack for consistently improving himself (and me!) and the atmosphere around him.   

The boys this morning summed it up best…  when I’m with Jacques, no matter where we are in the world…  I am home.