COS

Our Close of Service (COS) conference took place for a few days around the 13th of April. Our entire group got together at Island Cove, the same resort we went to our first days in the Philippines. We had a great time. In the mornings we had sessions on health and paperwork and things like adjusting back to life in the States. But most of the afternoons we were free to enjoy ourselves and say our goodbyes to each other. The resort also had a waterslide park, a bowling alley, pool tables, videoke, and in our rooms, air conditioning and cable tv. We had lots of ways to spend our free time. It was a really nice way for us to bring closure to our two years. Most of the people at the conference we weren't going to see again before leaving the country.

Going Postal

The people at the post office know me quite well. They know my name, where I live, what I'm doing here, and what my mom sends me in the mail. They are very friendly, and this makes all the difference.

Last week I decided it was time to send home a box of stuff I didn't want to have to haul around in my suitcase. I got the box together, and took it to the post office to find out how much it weighed and how much it would cost to send. It weighed 10.7 kg. The package man told me I could make it heavier, and still be under the limit for sending it via 'air parcel' - the limit is 20kg. So I took the box home, and added stuff to it. Yesterday I brought it back to the post office, and it felt like it weighed a ton!! I can't imagine how it got so heavy!

The package man put the box on the scale and it read 10.7kg. Uh-oh. We took the box off, and he pushed down on the scale, and it stopped at 10.7kg. so really, we have no idea how much my box weighs, or weighed the first time! Package man called over Delivery man, and told me that Delivery man would take me and the box in a trike to somewhere where they have a bigger scale. Apparently the post office only has the one scale. So we loaded up the trike, and then Delivery man left for a minute and came back and unloaded the trike saying we couldn't use the other scale after all. We took the heavy box back inside. There was only way to solve this. We unpacked most of the box until it weighed 10kg. Then we weighed all the stuff we took out of the box, and added it all together. We arrived at 20kg. More or less.

I told Package man that there were some heavy books I didn't have to send, I could keep them out and make the box lighter, and therefore, cheaper. He said just wait. He calculated how much it would cost to send, and it was expensive. Then he called the main office in Bacolod to ask how much the cheaper way would cost, and they told him. So then I said again about taking out the heavy books, but he said no, they allow a little extra weight for packing materials. what?? okay, well I didn't want to have to weigh everything minus the books again, recalculate the weight, and call bacolod again for a new price. anyway, package man is in charge of saying how much the box weighs, so whatever, I threw in the heavy books.

Time to seal the box. I brought my own clear packaging tape for the purpose, but first the package man used the post office tape on the box. I think he thought he was in a competition for the 'hardest to open package' because no one will ever get that box open again. He started the tape across the top of the huge box and just wound it around and around and around, then he did it again lengthwise. then on the sides. Then around all the corners. Then he used my clear tape to seal it some more. It was ridiculous! Also it was really hot, sitting there while he taped the heck out of my box.

So now it's an hour since I arrived. I bet you've never waited quite that long in line at the post office. I forked over 5 months rent (no joke) to mail the box. In the states, no matter how much a package costs to ship, it gets a little label in the corner. Not here. It gets stamps. 7peso stamps. I paid 9,550 pesos to mail the box. Can you figure out how many stamps that is? Well, I can't, but it was hilarious to watch. The stamps covered three sides of the enormous box. Here are some pictures of Delivery man applying the stamps to the box. Wow, so finally the stamps were done. I was waiting for my receipt when delivery man had to go through and cancel all the stamps with his rubber stamp. I really couldn't stop laughing. He got a workout that day, between carrying my box all over the place, and applying stamps and canceling the stamps....he should thank me for all that bicep work.

I got my reciept, and then package man took my clear tape again and started covering the stamps so none would come off. (like anyone would know! Who on earth would count that many stamps!) But he quickly ran out of tape, which i felt could have been avoided by not using so much earlier. The box was already sturdy and the sides were staple-gunned together; this was no second-rate box. But he wanted to do his job as well as he could for me. They do like me there at the post office.

An hour and a half later I left the post office, but it was a pretty enjoyable afternoon.

The Boat Christening

Here's my latest cultural adventure!

My counterpart, Mrs. Sarabia invited me to the christening of their new boat, which will be a ferry between Victorias, the next town south of us, to Estancia, on the island of Panay. We left right after school and took a trike to the boatyard where it was. The boat was nice, shiny and new. I climbed around in it with Mrs. Sarabia’s kids. The main area has rows of benches like pews. Upstairs are some more benches in a covered area, and a large outside deck for cargo. We played around in the pilothouse which had a real ship’s wheel like you would expect to see on a pirate ship, and a GPS and a radio, a compass, and one green button and one blue button. That was it. We sat around for a long time.

Eventually we saw a lechon being brought onboard, (see the next post down for more about lechon) and people gathering downstairs in the main cabin. We went down and got seats and waited some more. The christening ceremony finally began after some Mormon hymnals were passed out. Someone led a prayer, and then we sang a hymn. While we were singing, they began butchering the lechon at the back of the boat. There’s nothing like singing a hymn while a steady thwack sound is coming from behind you. After the hymn, Mrs. Sarabia’s husband said some things about the boat, and the people who helped build it. Then we had another prayer, another hymn, another prayer, and another hymn.

Then we ate! We had lechon and other party food. I ate so much I was still full 2 days later. I had no idea a boat christening was basically a church service plus pig. But now I know.

Lechon Baboy

Lechon Baboy: The ultimate Filipino party food. When there is a celebration of any kind here, you get a lechon. Lechon Baboy is the roasted pig; Baboy means pig. So this lechon we had one day at lunch at school. You can see our amazing world map in the background. The teachers got their yearly bonuses, and to celebrate, got a big lechon and we had lunch in the library. Mr. Gabayeron is chopping up the pig.

Christmas and New Years

Christmas this year was spent with my fellow PCV, Erin Dowe, at our training host families in Iloilo. Christmas in the Philippines was a pretty big letdown. The lead up is great, lots of Christmas carols and parties and decorations, but the actual day, not much happens. However, it happened to be my host brothers 6th birthday, so we had a big party with lots of food on Christmas Day after all. At children's parties here, one of the traditional games is one where a lattice of bamboo has prizes and candy tied to it, and is lowered and raised above the children's heads. They jump and try to grab the prizes.

After Christmas, Erin and I went to her site, Roxas city, and met up with our friends Eva and Page. The four of us celebrated Eva's birthday by having a seafood feast on the beach.

Then we all headed to Boracay, the most popular beach spot in the Philippines. It is a total tourist area, tons of foreigners, and lots of good food and beach activities. Around 30 volunteers came to New Years on Boracay, which is a huge group to have together at one time. We had a lot of fun, and at midnight they shot fireworks off from all along the beach. It was great to see so many of our friends and we had lots of fun. We also played some our favorite group games. Here is Page and I playing the adverb game, in which we had to act out 'aggresively sailing a ship.'

Class Party and Miss Minewa

More Christmas events at school. Just before the Christmas break we had a class party with my fourth grade students. It was lots of fun. Everyone brought food, and there were games and prizes. One game, you can see the kids playing here, is called 'The ship is sinking'. the kids get in groups of 5, and each person is assigned a role, like President, VP, Secretary, etc. The MC calls out 'The ship is sinking! Save your President!' and the rest of the kids in the group have to get the president off the ground. The MC might call out any title, up to four people at a time, and the group has to figure out how to save them. It was very fun to watch and the kids could get pretty clever on how to save their classmates. I also took a jar of candy and had each kid make a guess on how many were in there. The closest guesser won the jar. The kids also had a gift exchange.









The next day there was an event at our school called the Miss Minew and Mr. Zerowas competition. This is a good thing in theory, it promotes environmental responsibility and solid waste management. Every class has been collecting trash all year and we sell it to junk dealers and earn money for the school. So the class that collected the most won the competition. But there was also a costume competition, where each grade made a costume out of recycled materials, and they were judged on creativity, most earth-friendly, etc. The ceremony lasted for hours and was a huge waste of time and money, as they gave everyone 2 trophies, and ribbons and awards. Here are the fourth graders in their costumes, which i thought were really cool. The teachers spent hours making them, out of beads made of rolled up pieces of magazine sewed to rice sacks.

Physical Fitness Day

If any of you saw the 'Thriller' video on Youtube featuring the inmates of a Philippine prison, you might understand that dancing is big here. Espcially choreographed dancing. The schools recently held their physical fitness days, which, as far as I could understand, was to demonstrate that the students are all physically fit. What that means is that each grade practices a dance routine for the 2 weeks leading up to the big day, and then the whole morning is spent watching all the final routines. Some classes even hire choreographers. It was pretty fun to watch (once), but since they practice all day outside the library, I knew the routines and songs pretty well by the time the final day came around. It isn't a contest, there are no prizes, just everyone dancing. I took this video on my digital still camera, and edited it on Windows Movie Maker, the worst editing program in the world, so the quality of this video is below my usual standards. But hey, I'm in the peace corps. The first three clips are during practice days, and the last clip is during the finals. Every class had matching outfits for the final day.

Tira-tira

Kids here play lots of games that require very little equipment. Rocks, flip-flops, rubber bands, and tin cans can be used in dozens of games. There's a game the kids at school have been playing lately called Tira-tira. I'm not sure of the finer points, but basically there are two teams of two. the throwers, and the not throwers. Each person chooses a rock. The not-throwers put their rocks on a line, and the throwers stand at a line about 6 feet away. The throwers try to throw their rocks at the not-throwers rocks, and knock them off

the line. If they knock them off, they get to keep throwing. If they miss, the not throwers take their rocks and become the throwers, and the throwers put their own rocks on the line and become the not-throwers. I think it is a game with no scoring and no end, but they like to play it. It's also kind of dangerous to walk through the school yard at recess cause rocks are flying all over the place. Here are some pictures of kids from my 4th grade class playing the game right in front of the library door.

UN DAY

It's UN day again here in the Philippines. At West II, there is a program held at the end of the month. Each grade represents a country (or alaska or hawaii...) in a native costume competition, and then a dance routine. This year, we started really late, so all the dances got cut out, otherwise we would have been at school way past dark. But they crowned the winner, Ms. and Mr. Australia. I also got to hand out the certificates of appreciation I made for the kids who did the world map project with me. (And it's finally finished!!) Here are some of the costumes at UN day. The regal looking girl with the gold gown is Australia. And the poor kid in a winter coat and rubber boots is Alaska. And yes, it was pretty hot that day.

Thanksgiving 2007!

Hooray for Thanksgiving! We had a big blow-out with about 25 Peace Corps Volunteers, other foreign volunteers, visitors from the states, and Filipino friends. We killed and roasted 4 turkeys, and had lots of other delicious food. Homemade mashed potatoes, lots of pies, macaroni and cheese, green beans, stuffing....yum! It was one of the best thanksgiving meals I've ever had. The house was on the beach, so people went swimming, and we played lots of games, including cranium and turkey trivia, and we sang lots of videoke. It was a great time.

An Extended Vacation

After I dropped my parents off at the airport, I spent a few days in Manila working on our volunteer newsletter, The Kwan, with my three other co-editors. One of them is Anna, my good friend who lives in Capiz, on the island of Panay. When we finished putting together the newsletter, I flew with her to her site, which is more rural than my site. We hung out in her native-style house, and walked through the mud to the small port, where we took a tiny, very tippy boat out to an even more rural barangay (neighborhood) to go to a community meeting for planting mangroves. But when we got there, a big storm hit and nobody came to the meeting. During my visit we also took a field trip to the next town over and went searching for a mummified woman Anna had heard about. We found her! She stays behind glass in somebody's house on a dirt road near the beach. It was a bit of an adventure. I also met her co-workers and neighborhood children and a snake that we found in her house.

My Parents Visit!

My parents came for a visit earlier this month, and we had a great time! We first spent some time in Bacolod, the big city near my site. They took me and some of my friends out to dinner. They might have been hoping for a nice Filipino meal, but we all wanted pizza...so we went to Mama Maria's and shared the country's largest pizza. After that we did videoke, a favorite pastime here. My dad and my friend Anna did a lovely duet of 'El Paso', a song I have never heard before. After Bacolod, we went to Sipalay, to an awesome beach resort called takatuka, and spent a couple days relaxing and swimming, and lying around in hammocks. After Sipalay, we visited my site, including my school. Unfortunately, that day there was a mini-typhoon, and we didn't get to see much. But they met the teachers i work with and saw the library briefly.

After Cadiz we went to Bohol and stayed at the amazing Bohol Bee Farm. We ate wonderful delicious organic food, and saw all the tourist sites, like the chocolate hills, tarsiers, and the Loboc river cruise. The bee farm was really cool, and they grown their own herbs for use in their dishes, many of which include, obviously, honey. All too soon it was time to head back to Manila and say goodbye. I had a great vacation!

Masskara 07

So it's Masskara again. The big festival in Bacolod. Like last year, some other volunteers came over and we enjoyed the street parties, cool costumes, and good food in Bacolod. One night we got a private videoke room and had a good time singing. The plaza, the new mall, and the main street through the city were all shut down and filled with vendors, street dancers, food, shopping, and live music. One night we got an up close table to a drumbeat competition, which was pretty neat to see. We mostly enjoyed ourselves, and I was happy to see some volunteers I rarely get to see.

I'm teaching

Here it is: proof that i sometimes teach! This is the warm-up part of a reading lesson about a blind man. (perhaps you know the story? it's the one in the bible where Jesus heals the blind man. It's in chapter 7 of the Grade 4 reading textbook) So I'm making a couple of the kids 'blind' so they can see what it might be like to be a blind person. I made the first kid cross the room to meet me, which he successfully did. But he wasn't able to give me a high five, and on the way back he walked straight into the blackboard - none of his classmates yelled out for him to stop!

Then I gave some kids different things to try and guess what they were. A sponge, a shell, and here is Kenneth, about to guess the silly putty. (He guessed clay, which I thought was pretty good. These kids have never even seen silly putty.)

This was part of my team teaching with Mrs. Sarabia.

Happenings Around West II Elementary

I've been keeping busy at West II elementary with various projects lately. I don't have pictures of the co-teaching, but I think it's going pretty well. (When it goes.) A couple times a week I teach fourth grade English to two classes. The students seem to enjoy my part of the lessons, and I try to make it fun so maybe they will learn something. It isn't easy.

Last month was Filipino month, so we had a big program at the end of the month, celebrating Filipino culture. Here is one girl in the 'Traditional Costume' competition, Angelina. And three fifth grade students, Michael, Pearl Ann, and Ervino, doing a kind of dramatic reading about a lawyer, a judge, and a farmer. The lawyer and farmer are in some kind of dispute. I actually didn't know what was going on most of the time, because the program was in Filipino, not Ilonggo. But I wasn't alone, many of the kids, especially younger ones, don't understand Filipino. The MC asked everyone to stand for the National Anthem, and then she had to repeat it in Ilonggo for the large majority of us who just sat there.

The world map is going along great! We are almost done! I have a handful of fifth graders who come in everyday to help paint, and we are about to start labeling countries. This is Elaine and Noredel, standing in front of their work. Isn't it beautiful!?

And finally, I've been giving a computer lesson to a teacher everyday after school. This is a picture of me and Mrs. Cada (my host mom.) She is learning how to use the mouse. It can be hard to teach this, because using a mouse is just second nature for me! But she has a good sense of humor about it, and laughs most of the time when she can't get the mouse to go where she wants it to. I think next week we'll start basic Word. Some of the other teachers are a little more advanced, so we've been working on how to use Excel (which I barely know how to use myself) and little things like keeping folders organized.

So my work is going well, which always makes me feel good about my time here.