One Year and Thoughts

This post is going to be a little different. It’s going to be more stream of consciousness. I’ll talk about some of my thoughts on being in the Philippines for over a year now, about development work, and about me. I’ll give a forewarning that a lot of it’s not positive. Then again, if everything were bright and sunny I wouldn’t exactly be doing my job. Whatever I say below are challenges I’ll either be taking head on, trying to move around, or accepting as a part of life, probably in that order.

I’m still committed to being here, and I don’t regret joining the Peace Corps at all.

One Year

I’m not the kind of person to hold a lot of weight to anniversaries. I’ll probably celebrate my birthday but only because my coworkers are insisting. The one year mark in the Philippines came and went, and the day wasn’t that different than any other. I’m of the mind that if you want to celebrate or party, do it for the sake of itself when you want. Don’t wait for special days, and don’t be afraid to make days that aren’t special more meaningful.

So of being here a year in and of itself hasn’t really offered any revelations, no deep insights to pull from.

My Role as a Development Worker

The first thing is that the Peace Corps's primary goal is not development. Of three goals the Peace Corps has worldwide, only one is sustainable development, and it’s the least important to its mission. The other two are about cultural exchange. The Peace Corps is primarily about improving relations, about making a better cultural awareness on both sides. During my service, I will be an ambassador for the US, when I come home I’ll be an ambassador for the Philippines.

Of course to many of us volunteers as individuals including me, it’s the development aspect that drew me to the Peace Corps. However, whatever I accomplish on that front is really extra credit to my organization.

Most of the projects I have proposed on my own have failed, or are still having trouble getting off. From morning stretches, to teaching about presentational skills, to trying to youth to do service projects, they’ve yet to be successful. Those that have worked, or show more promised have come from my coworkers and community. It makes sense. They know a lot more about their culture and wants and needs than I do. My best bet is to use the people of Dupax to come up with what they want changed, what they want the end result to be. My role then is going to be to show them HOW to do it. How to organize, how to recruit volunteers, how to create a system of responsibility to ensure people go through with what they say. It’s the one area where I have more experience than them, running successful programs and projects.

The Hardest Part

The hardest part of a Peace Corps service isn’t cross cultural communication. I just try to learn from my mistakes, accept that I won’t always be right. Not a big problem. It’s not the work. Once again, not everything I do is going to be successful. Things get pushed back, things turn out differently. It’s all okay too. The problems that really plague us are the same personal issues that affected us back home. Strained relationships, dealing with our own personal shortcomings, losing faith now and then. In the end the thing that kicks our asses the most is just daily living. There’s one small twist though.

In America I have family and friends to fall back on. I have my favorite food and relative luxury to cushion me. I know my place in America, and that supports me. Here it’s not so easy. When I’m so clearly on outsider by my appearance if nothing else, when the food’s for sustenance more than comfort, when sometimes all I have is the four walls of my apartment, I have only myself to look at, and my own thoughts to dwell on.

And boy do I make amazing company to myself!!!

But seriously it has made me question a lot of myself. My own hubris for one. Questioning my passion for both development work and politics and the general direction I want to go after my service for two. Whether I’m up to accomplishing my goals personal and professional for three. I know these question are a hell of a lot better than if I’m going to have enough to eat, how can I pay the bills, the sorts of things many people here, and back in America are asking. Still, it does weigh me down from time to time.

Then there’s unrequited feelings. I’m not going to go into a lot of details, but just to say that in the Peace Corps, there’s only so many people you know who share your culture, your dreams, and who can understand you when you talk about the challenges you face. We’re not the saints the media sometimes likes to portray us as, optimistic (or naïve) young people giving up our luxury to live in squander. Most of us are here to build up professional experience, and though we’re lacking a lot of luxury from home, we have more going for us than you’d think. However, there are still a lot of special people here, and though we’re not saints, it does take a special kind of person to do this. It’s a shame that things don’t work out sometimes, and it’s damned hard to find peace within oneself and the world when the wind stops pushing your sails, but it’s those times when I can see myself more clearly.

And boy am I perfect!!!

Or far from it. Regardless, the past few months have been the most challenging, but I think I’m getting myself back up. In fact…

What I Want to Do

I really want to get cracking and work right now. The whole municipality is pushing the Child Friendly program now that we have some regional evaluators. Naturally I did not find out about it until the day before, still needing a week to get my own ideas together. My goal is to push the municipality towards dealing with problems I’ve had the local youth tell me about. Youth alcoholism, lack of opportunities, child illiteracy. If I can point the Mayor and the others to speaking about that, I can help. If not… back to square one.

I also want to really pick up on my reading. Fiction and non-fiction. Use the time I have here to learn as much as I can. I have some books on entrepreneurship, appied economics, work with children, ecology, and a couple others. Break it up with some fiction, and hopefully I’ll start reading more and more.  Also, want to make my dance lessons more regular. Really want to get good at that. Enough to where I can show off some stuff and look good and confident while doing it. I want to pick up some capoeira cause that stuff looks really fun (though that’ll be on my own, we don’t have it in Dupax). Finally, I’m going to try to be modest with my working out, and build it up slowly. It’s a far cry form my usual push myself until I burn out, but I am trying to adapt and learn from past mistakes.

To do it I’ll have to drop time on the internet. Having regular access to internet at my site is a blessing and a curse. Drop most (but not all) of the frivolous stuff, and replace it with being more productive. Need to sleep earlier and quit staying up late cause I’m thinking about too many things. Also going to need some more self discipline to pull from somewhere.

The Philippines

Never, ever underestimate anyone. It’s one of my credos. Filipinos are NOT* stupid, they’re not ignorant. The Philippines is infamously known by the development community as not growing in proportion to the aid given compared to other countries, like Mongolia who’s soon looking to end the Peace Corps because they’re doing so well.

A lot of the problem is corruption. I feel confident saying this because it’s what Filipinos tell me. If you look it up on your own I’m sure you can find more information on it.

There’s also ningascogan, a Tagalog word that describes people saying they’ll do a project, or act interested, but then don’t show up or give up. There’s not a strong emphasis on getting the job done. The intent is there, the ideas are there, but following through takes a commitment that isn’t taught to them. It’s the thing I keep stressing to people in my community as the problem, at least the one I can help with.

There’s also critical thinking. Ask an American child their favorite animal or color, and they’ll go off on what it is and why. Ask A Filipino child the same question and they’ll be confused, or they’ll point to whatever color they’re wearing. Once again, it’s not that people don’t think critically, but to do so one has to step outside of what they’ve been taught.

I’m not sure how to address the above yet. The corruption I can’t touch, it’s strictly against Peace Corps policy. The other two… I’ll be having a lot of conversations with the locals to get some ideas.

It’s About Making Things a Part of Who You Are

It’s not a big deal to go to ride in a jeepney, or to have a conversation in Ilokano. I went to a 4^th of July function where the Ambassador was. Shook his hand, and took a picture with some other volunteers. That wasn’t that big either. Definitely cool, but not eye popping or jaw dropping.

I’m trying to live as part of the Philippines to the best of my ability and background, as opposed to living opposed to it, or even beside it. It’s by making those little things day to day natural, that I can focus on what’s really important, like all of the above. Cause frankly, if I let the little differences weigh me down to, you may here of  a case of spontaneous combustion in the Philippines.

What’s to Come

More than any other time I’ve been here, I’ve had less of an idea of this. Knowing the unpredictability of things, and with so much potential for success and failure with projects, and choosing my priorities for my own goals of self improvement and growth, a lot’s up in the air. I think I’ve mentioned it before, but I’ll help train the new batch which have arrived already at the end of August. Humility will be the word I’ll emphasize.

I don’t think my second year in the Philippines is going to be anything like my first. I do think it’ll be better, and I think I’m heading in a good direction.

Also, send me recommendations for music. I’ll check it out on youtube. Music’s antoher thing I’m trying to get more into.

‘Til next time

PS And forgive any typos, I’ll try to edit those out next time. Figured I’d post it now while I have the time, and revise later.  

*My original posting of this update lacked the word "not", which made it look like I was calling Filipinos stupid, the exact opposite of what I was trying to say. Suffice to say my experiment of posting without revising proved why my English teachers were right all throughout grade school.