Carnival Mirrors

I was once told by a Volunteer Leader (a Peace Corps Volunteer who extends his or her service for an entire year, and takes on extra duties and responsibilities) that the Peace Corps brings out things in people that they never knew about themselves. It was more than just learning a few more likes and dislikes, but more on the lines of what true strengths and inner demons you possess. Having a vastly different diet, being in an unfamiliar work environment, and being surrounded by people with starkly different values then me has made me learn a lot about myself, things I could never have learned in the comforts of my own home and culture. It’s not that I’m a different person than who I was before, but it feels like looking at myself in a carnival mirror, where I can definitely tell it’s me, but things are very distorted from what they once were.

Learning how to Live from Scratch

I moved into my new apartment January 7^th. Got my stuff in, slept the night and… things got more difficult. The most prevalent challenge was that I expected I would be able to have the freedom to live closer to how I had back in America. Unfortunately that’s going to be something I have to earn. I tried really getting into a good, solid workout plan, but then forgot to make a diet to accommodate that new workout plan. Suffice to say I didn’t get too many days in before I crashed. So, taking a step back, remembering to consider my health as a whole (not just the working out part) and I’m going to give it another go here pretty soon.

Cleaning my apartment was another challenge to face and one I’m still getting together. Although I’ve made my initial sweep (as well as a secondary and tertiary), but I’ve got a bit to go before I’m satisfied. In particular, the ants have been a major obstacle. My honest estimate is that I’ve sprayed between 1,000-1,500 of the little monsters. They are starting to appear less frequently, so I’m crossing my fingers.

Oh, and to say my apartment was unfurnished is an understatement. I had a sink, a faucet in the bathroom and one outside, and they gave me a bed frame when I asked. That’s it. No fridge, no stove or cook top, no cabinets, no closet. I’ve gotten almost everything now (and I’m really, really glad I saved my money during pre-service training). Only things left are a mirror, a pot, a non-stick pan (have pan, but it’s not non-stick), a large bucket, a plastic holder for all my dishes and silver wear, and decorations for the wall. Also might need to get something for a guest to sleep on if I intend anyone to come over.

I’m really glad I did spend the year alone my senior year of college to help me get at least somewhat prepared. Though I’m learning how to cook without a microwave or oven. Learning how to do laundry without a washing machine. Learning how to shop at a town market instead of a grocery store.

Getting Sick

One night I felt really bad. My head hurt, and I felt a little queasy. The next day I went out to meet some other volunteers for lunch, and as the day went on my headache turned into a blinding migraine, and I couldn’t even get halfway through my lunch. I went to the doctor, and for the next few days took some pain medication, and had my blood drawn to test to see if I had Dengue.

Luckily it turned out just to be a virus (a nasty one) and it passed. However, it was a bit stressful seeing as my white blood cell and platelette count dropped from one day to the next. Also, as someone who has probably had less than five migraines their entire life, I learned what it’s like to have enough pain in my skull to make even walking really, really hard.

I relied heavily on the Filipinos at my site and was really grateful for their hospitality.

Peaches

When I studied abroad in China, we had a guest professor speak to us during our orientation to Peking University. He told us that the Chinese were like coconuts and that Americans were like peaches. The Chinese are very hard on the outside, and not caring of strangers. However, once you pierce that outer shell they are your dearest friend, will share everything with you. Americans on the other hand are soft on the outside, willing to show compassion to people they don’t even know, but they have that hard core they won’t let anyone get into. We Americans have that “true self” that we protect, that we don’t let anyone into. 

Obviously this doesn’t describe everyone, but I think it’s something which accurately describes me. I’m more prone to say a cheesy joke than to let out my deepest thoughts and feelings. My time in the Peace Corps has challenged this, and I’m glad for it. Recently we had a debriefing where nine of sharing the same sector (Children, Youth, and Family volunteers) and in the same region of the Philippines (northern Luzon) got together to share our experiences and concerns, an event organized by the staff at headquarters. At the end, we went around in a circle and we gave compliments to one another. Never in my life has a group of people so unanimously figured me out.

My fellow volunteers brought up not only things that I had done during service so far, but complimented me on things that I’ve striven to be, yet haven’t told anyone about. One girl who trained with me told me about how I really work on trying to be a better person, that I’m always trying to improve myself. Another volunteer, and of those at the debriefing the one I felt I knew the least, told me that I give off the vibe of ‘we can all get along’, but does so in a way that isn’t patronizing and the she can sort of believe. The ‘why don’t we get along’ sentiment is at the heart of my political and societal views, and to be told that I express it naturally, just giving it off as a vibe, was a very powerful moment for me.

Comparing countless times of when I held back a though because I thought it was too serious, or not interesting, to that debriefing session when I felt that my fellow volunteers had me figured out, I don’t think I want to be a peach anymore. 

Visiting a Friend

This last weekend I visited a fellow volunteer in Cagayan, the far northeast of the Philippines. It’s about six or so hours from my site. In the Peace Corps travelling time is a lot different than back home. America, or at least the American suburbia I’ve grown up in, is about convenience. It’s about short trips to the store, to the movies, to a coffee shop. A friend or family member six hours away is a long, long ways away.

Not so here in the Philippines.

Don’t get me wrong, I have made some Filipino friends. I enjoy hanging out with coworkers, talking to people in the community, but the people I have the most in common with are my fellow volunteers. They are the people I share common problems with, share a knowledge of back home with, shared experiences with during pre-service training, and share the Peace Corps with. Although I can’t take a six hour trip every weekend to see other volunteers, it wasn’t a very hard decision to make this time around. Twelve hours of travel time wasn’t so bad for hanging out Friday night to Sunday late morning.

I hope I can keep this change in me when I go back to America.

Volunteer Advisory Committee

The Peace Corps has several committees and groups volunteers can join on top of their work at their respective site. These aren’t groups like a high school clubs where anyone can join. Everything from the HIV/AIDs awareness group to the Peer Support Network to the Diversity Committee all have a vetting process. Some are the Peace Corps staff selecting the most qualified volunteers, at least one has its new members determined by the members from the previous batch. The Volunteer Advisory Committee, the group that determines policy change and works and communicates between volunteers and staff, is determined by voting.

My batch of now 52 (I think) volunteers had a total of five VAC representatives to pick, one for each sector (education and child, youth, and family) and one for each region (northern Luzon, southern Luzon, and Visayas). I ran for my region (northern Luzon) and luckily enough ran unopposed. The other four races all had competition.

So now I represent 25 (including myself) volunteers as far as letting the staff know our wants and needs, and trying to improve and strengthen the Peace Corps Philippines program as whole. First meeting is in March. I’m really hoping I can do a good job.

What I See in the Mirror

The month of January has been about self reflection overall, and I’m happy to say most of it has been positive. There have been some negative things. I’m not happy to learn how challenging just taking care of myself was right after moving out, though I’m getting the hang of it. Also can’t say I’m pleased with how a bad migraine left me hunched over, sitting down, not wanting to move a muscle (I’m supposed to be a badass who can handle any amount of pain, darn it!).

Still, I’m happy right now, and my recent trip has helped me get focused so this week I’ll be pushing hard on all the projects I’ve been talking about, of which only one so far is now underway.

Whereas the self reflection of January has been great, I’m hoping February’s theme will be something more on the lines of getting things done at my work place, and getting the community active and involved.

Pictures, Pictures, PICTURES!

So, my number one fan (my mom) has really wanted to see more pictures, so I got most of the good ones (and a couple bad ones) to show off the first six months! Here we go...

 First picture! This was back during our Initial Orientation, a 10 day period where all the volunteers were together. Take a look into the IIRR. I think it's just in Asia, but still some pretty cool stuff they do.

 And here is roughly half my batch during one of the conferences later. As you can see we're all drinking Red Horse, strong beer that comes in Litros.

 This narrow walkway was just one of the many obstacles from going from my host family's house during pre-service training, to the classroom.

 This interesting house was also along the way. It's a good representation of a lot of the homes in the area, and the Philippines

"Beware of Dor -She Knows Kung-Fu". The Philippines (like anywhere, really) is full of all sorts of fun, little gems if you keep your eyes open for them.

 And here are the La Trinidad "Spice Girls" The three one the left were my cluster mates, volunteers who studied and trained with me throughout pre-service training, and the young lady on the right is a volunteer who's been here a year who helped with our training for a week.

 During training, we did a lot of after school sessions with youth.A lot of it was impromptu, including the day I taught the girls pictures the "Do Re Mi" song from A Sound of Music.

And here is one of my better pictures. I am studying Ilokano, the regional dialect, and my buddy Kels is studying her lunch.

 This message was all over La Trinidad, in front of every lot. It seemed to work quite well actually.

 This picture was taken on my birthday, and after the roughest day during PST. Not much sleep, two major events that day. News both good and bad from home. Still managed my dashing smile though!

 During our Supervisors and Counterparts Conferences during PST, we stayed at a place that had this waterpark. Not sure how my peer got himself turned around so.

And here are the five of us "cluster mates" at Faces, a bar in Baguio City, the "Summer Capital" of the Philippines. Behind us is our Margarita tower.

 And here's a better pictures of us sitting together like a family. Honestly, we spent on average around eight hours a days together, everyday, for the better part of two-and-a-half months. Good thing we got along.

 Every training site had to do a cultural presentation. Naturally we went for a tradional dance. There's the four of us dashing men in La Trinidad, showing our bods.

 Here is quite a few of the pre-service training staff. My two were the second and third from the right. Behind them is Denny, Country Director, head honcho in the Philippines.

 I was selected to represent the Ilokano language group to give a part of the volunteers' speech during our swearing in ceremony that graduated us from trainees to volunteers.

Here I am at my welcoming into my permanent site. My supervisor Nereo is on the far right, and my site mate (volunteer who works in the same area) Laura next to me.

 I work with the LGU at my site. Here is out Municipal Hall on a bright and sunny day.

 Here is our office, which is actually the Motorpool (where people park) as well. We'll move out once the second municipal building is finished which is set for December 2012.

These five lovely ladies behind me are my coworkers, the members of the Social Welfare and Development branch of Dupax del Norte.

Here is the house of the host family I stayed with once I arrived at site.

 This is the view when stepping out of the house. Rice field right in front and ahead, and the small mountain in the distance.

 This is actually a picture of a bridge in Ifugao (the province north of mine). My area was hit bad by the typhoons, but I didn't think to bring my camera in the rain. So, here's a picture of what happened in an area that got hit even worse.

Speaking of Ifugao, I was part of a group of volunteers, who with some Filipino college students, performed a traditional Ifugao dance for the Peace Corps' 50th Anniversary Celberation in Manila. I'm the tall, white guy.

 The Grand Kanyaw is the cultural day of Dupax del Norte, a part of the festival week of its foudning. This year was its 37th Anniversary, 37 years after it was split from not-as-good-as-us Dupax del Sur. As you can see, they gave me a vest, a bag... and a spear. The man next to me in the green in the Vice Mayor, the woman on my other side in the Mayor.

The Youth Leadership Summit! Here we have a picture of the volunteers and staff who helped make it run. Thanks again everyone!

This is a picture after I pulled one of my fast ones over the youth (me pulling fast ones over the youth is going to be a running theme of my time in Philippines). After I assigned their teams and told them to build me the tallest tower they could using the materials, each team built me one. It was at this point I asked them why they built me eight towers when I wanted THE tallest tower. Here they are combining their towers, learning teamwork beyond "teams". See? My pranks are informative.

 One of the numerous activities was the "Icerberg". People put traits above, below, or on the water line depending on whether the personal attribute can be seen on the outside or not. Originally learned this activity during a diversity session in pre-service training, and applied it to my session on observation. I'll touch more on this in my next blog post.

This is Munya. As you can see not only is he running the traditional "blindfold" activity where one partner gives verbal commands, he is actually moving the chairs around, placing them directly in front of the blind. This is why you give freedom to the people you work with, so that they can take your ideas (or activities in this case) and make them even better with their own twist.

 Another session was "Having Fun". Honestly, those questionnaires I got back from the youth told me they thought leadership was all locked jaws and commanding voices. One of the activities within that session was having the youth create their own game using the objects given. So yes, this... interesting picture is actually a "game" created by the youth.

 Ahahaha! Another ruse by yours truly. I lured the youth to my camp promising it was free. Paid transportation, paid meals, no entry fee. However, in my hand, and theirs, is a packet containing a step by step process of running a service or community project. The purpose is to give the youth a chance to actually apply what they learned at the camp, and to help their community. I may not be charging them money, but they'll pay the municipality back with their time and effort. I gave them until July 1st to complete it.

My good friend Pat from college voted on my latest poll to see sexy pics from me. Sadly, I realized after the results came in that I have none. I'm not a hussy. So instead here is a "shake face" picture. What you do, is (after a few drinks) shake your face right and left as fast as you can and someone takes a picture in the middle of it. This is my best one to date. Don't judge me. It's Peace Corps tradition here.



What's to Come?
The new year has come, and things are revving up again. four or five new projects in the brainstorming stages. I have my own apartment. A lot more thoughts about volunteerism, and about me have come to light. A couple hobbies I'm picking up. Should be a good read.

'Til next time.

First Annual Leadership Summit of Dupax del Norte, 2011

As I said I would, here is the rundown of the leadership summit I helped organize and run, my first major project at site. The good, the bad, the ugly, and the obscure.

Where it All Began

Some time ago there was a law written where the youth took charge of the government for a week. Unfortunately it wasn’t implemented. The last time it was done according to my supervisor was 1993, roughly 18 years ago. The leadership summit was not my brainchild, but that of my supervisor and of the Mayor who wanted to get the youth more active again. When I met my supervisor for the first time during pre-service training where we found out our permanent sites, he brought it up to me as something I would be doing. So although it was the will of my site to have it done, I was put in charge of creating the module for it, and organizing it.

One of the hardest things to do for a project like this is to actually build enough interest to get it started, to talk to the community leaders and your supervisor and convince them it’s a good idea. I was really fortunate to not only have a site that was more than willing to be active, but who already had a project ready for me when I started.

First Step: I Don’t Know What to Do

One of the challenges of the Peace Corps is going to a foreign country and a foreign culture and figuring out how I can help. Heck, what do I know about the Philippines or Dupax del Norte? What do I even know about what’s working and what’s not? Well, that’s part of what the two year is for, to figure that out. However, with the leadership summit in December, I didn’t have much time. I tried to talk to one of the youth leaders to get a feel of the leadership capabilities of the local youth, and from that conversation decided the best course of action was to write a questionnaire and distribute it across the different schools. Rather than ask the youth “Are you a good leader?” or “What do you think leadership is?” I went for more round about questions. They were…

·         Think of one or two people you believe are good leaders. What makes that person or persons a good leader?

·         Considering your answer to question 1, what leadership skills do you share with your chosen person or persons?

·         Considering your answer to question 1, what leadership skills do you wish to learn?

·         Do you intend to participate in the Youth Leadership Summit this December? Why or why not?

·         Are there any topics you would like covered in the youth leadership summit? Why?

·         Why are you interested in leadership?

With those questions I was hoping to get some insights into the youth. I also wanted to give them at least some input as to what would go on during the summit. I was ready to send it out first thing October. Then came the typhoons…

Pedring, Quiel, and a Long, Long Wait

Pedring was the first of two major typhoons that hit the greater region. Schools closed down, there was flooding, and things just all came to a halt. When things finally started to get back to normal, Typhoon Quiel came and rocked the area even harder. Though the rain was as hard, the flooding was significantly worse. Flooding got up to six feet or more in some places, there was a landslide on the road that cut off most the mountainous, rural areas, and there was mud everywhere. This led to more school cancellations, and my time was busy helping the relief efforts of putting together bags of food for people, and for being present when we distributed them.

Then came a weeklong break.

Then came one more week of setting it up to give the questionnaires to the school.

Then we finally got them passed out.

By then we were into November, the time I wanted to have the module of the summit finished by. Under my original timeframe, I’d be done with the module by early November, and have the free time to plan ahead into 2012, and would have a lot of time to tweak the summit as need be. That plan fell through. I got about half the questionnaires back around November 20^th or so, and from those created the module.

The Module Itself

                From reading the questionnaires I came to the conclusion that most of the youth had zero experience with leadership, even those who had leadership positions within the schools. There seemed to be a lack of confidence, and an overemphasis on discipline being synonymous to leadership. I made the decision to keep the camp to the basics. The original summit went something like thus…

Day 1

·         Teamwork: There was an activity I ran in late October where I had two set teams and told them to build me the highest tower. When they finished, I asked them why they built me two towers, when I wanted the highest one, which could only be accomplished if the teams worked together. The purpose was to open the youth’s eyes and show them that just because they belonged to a team/school/province/etc didn’t mean they couldn’t work together. It was a success before, so I included it in the summit as well

·         What is leadership: Seeing how some youth didn’t have a solid grasp on the concept I let the first session be a basic coverage on leadership. Who are leaders? What are skills leaders have? Basically the same stuff in the questionnaires.

·         Understanding Yourself, Each Other, and Community: Next I included another simple session where youth wrote to themselves about leadership, learned about and recognized each other, and drew a mural to understand what their community meant to them

·         Self Confidence, Expressing Oneself: Knowing confidence was an issue, I tried to include a session with lots of compliments and getting the kids to shout out their name with pride

·         Roleplaying challenges facing youth: I wanted to get the youth thinking about what challenges they faced and to act it out

Day 2

·         Discipline, Having Fun, Observation, Communication: These four sessions were what came out of the questionnaires, mostly. They wanted Discipline. I added one Having Fun because the youth did not seem to appreciate that aspect of leadership. Observation and communication were also basics to touch upon. I tried to make each session active, but with some downtime in each so that the youth could have breaks during the day

·         Obstacle Course: It was a camp, so why not have an obstacle course to get the youth to do some critical thinking?

·         Videoke: Knowing the second day would have a lot, I wanted the youth to be able to sit down, relax, and socialize with each other

Day 3

·         Evaluation: Both handing out evaluations, and going over the importance of evaluating one’s actions

·         Tree Planting: Something my site wanted, so I included it

·         The How: How to plan step by step to achieve one’s goal. Goal setting is not a strength of the Filipinos.

·         Service Project Packets: My brainchild within the summit, I created a packet to lead the youth step by step to running their own service project. It’s my belief that leadership is gained through practical experience, and I want the youth active in the community, so I set some time to explain it. More on this later

·         Elections: Going back to the purpose of this summit, to get youth ready to get junior leadership positions within the government for a week, we needed elections to pick who the leaders would be.

Recruitment and Challenges

                For the number of youth, I settled on trying to get 100. I decided that I wanted eight groups to do the sessions at most, about 12 youth per group at most. Rounded up it came to 100. So, I asked for eight volunteers, one for each group. For this camp, I tried to keep it to the nearby region. One problem I came across was that I wanted to get some of the veteran volunteers who had been in the Philippines a year or more, but the ones I asked all had Christmas plans with family either in America or the Philippines which interfered with my December 16-18 camp. So, it was exclusively my Batch of volunteers who were recruited. I facebook messaged them to original copy, and all the edits. Speaking of edits…

                Nothing ever goes exactly how you want. The first thing to go was overnight staying. I wanted the youth to stay overnight to avoid Filipino’s infamous problems with punctuality, and so we could stuff at night. Sadly, it was not to be, so I had to drop the roleplaying. I also discovered they wanted to end the summit earlier on Day 3, so away went the session of the “How”.

                Another challenge came when we were starting to expect well over 100 youth. The schools were promising to send a lot more youth than we had allotted. I had designed the sessions with a certain amount of youth in mind.

                Probably the biggest challenge was stress. Boy howdy did I get stressed. I didn’t miss any meals for it, but my portions were about half.

The Summit Comes and Goes

                I won’t go into every detail, but here are highlights of the summit

·         One of the eight volunteers was late due to her obligations at her site, making so I was both trying to facilitate one of the groups, and keep track of the big picture. It went okay… but I don’t recommend it.

·         Belance, a school and barangay (local government unit) from the mountains had the most youth present despite being an hour’s ride away

·         Losing almost half our youth during lunch the first day

·         Combining the eight groups into four for Day 2

·         It turning out that my session I wrote for Discipline went a lot faster than the others, making the two volunteers running those have the improve a lot

·         Losing not a single youth the second day, even during the lunch break

·         Though wanting to start at 8:00 each morning, not getting started until 9:00

·         The youth actually enjoying themselves

·         Overall some good feedback from the youth

·         A girl telling us that we were the first people to sing her happy birthday. She turned fifteen that day.

·         Not having two of the five high schools because we had thought no one had school on the Friday, but it turns out only three of five had the day off

·         Also not having the SK (local government youth leaders) because of yet another schedule conflict I did not know about

·         About 60-70 youth who showed up for at least part of the summit, about 40-50 who were there throughout the whole summit

·         My stress level dropping step by step as the summit went on

Goals for the Summit

                I am a perfectionist, and I set the bar really, really high. I am always trying to think how I can get the most out of something, how I can accomplish the most with what I’m doing when it comes to work. I achieved quite a bit, but other objectives I had fell short.

                One thing that fell short was the numbers. Throughout the summit it was about half of what I wanted, however, it was fine. I told people even getting half of what I wanted would be a success, and I stand by that. Giving a summit for about 40-50 youth is still not bad.

                One major success was the sustainability of the leadership summit. Sustainability is big in the Peace Corps, to make sure our assistance lasts even after we’ve left. The youth, as Junior Elected Officials, passed a resolution to institutionalize the leadership summit as an annual event. The next challenge will be to work with people to get them to be able to create, organize and coordinate the summit, but I have time for it.

                Which bring me up to another goal that fell short, that to have my coworkers work as counterparts to the Peace Corps Volunteers to get more experience facilitating. In the end my coworkers helped with logistics such as cooking, cleaning, doing sign in, helping fix the microphone, and some even had work they had to do during the summit. It was in part my fault because I did not keep my office mates in the loop throughout the process of making the summit, and in part because I underestimated how much manpower the work behind the scenes would take. I’ll work towards getting my coworkers at my office to take the lead for later projects.

                I did get at least some of the youth to learn something. After the elections, the young lady who was elected as Junior Mayor gave a thanks to us Peace Corps Volunteers for helping, and had said that although the different groups of youth didn’t know each other well, maybe after a week as Junior Leaders with the government they would get to know each other better. It was a call back to the Teamwork exercise. From what I heard, the youth lived up to that, and the teenagers who never knew each other (cause they live an hour away) are keeping in touch via texting now, bringing the community closer together. Also, the youth opened up so much from the start of the summit to the end.

                Things did not fall apart. That was also a goal that was met.

                Probably the biggest goal I hit was this being a gateway into more projects for the community. The biggest cause of my stress (other than me getting overly worked up over stuff) was that the success of lack thereof would be a big determination as to how my site saw me. I really wanted this summit to go well to prove I could help, and get more people involved. The Monday after (the 19^th) saw a few more projects land on my desk. They want another similar summit in April or May for the SK who could not make it and for the out of school youth. The teacher from Belance who went with the youth to the summit each day wants me to help them get grants and to get started up on their own school volunteer projects. This is exactly what I wanted, for the summit to drag out opportunities.

Service Project Packets!

                As I said earlier, I handed the youth service project packets near the end. I explained to them that although the summit was “free” they still needed to pay us back. For being given three days of lessons learned, for food, for having the opportunity to be elected as Junior Officials, they needed to utilize the experience we gave them, and give it back to their community. Speaking maybe 70% in Ilokano, the rest in English, I walked through the service project step by step. Whether they absorbed it all, and whether they do it remains to be seen, but I think it’ll work out. Here’s a list of lofty goals I have for these service projects

·         40-50 community projects: Why should I do one service project for my community when I can empower the youth to do scores of them?

·         Leadership experience: As I said, the best way to get leadership is through practical experience

·         Making the youth believe in themselves: I want the youth to know what they are capable of doing

·         Making the adults believe in the youth: Showing the adults of the community what the youth can do given the opportunity

·         Have tangible evidence of youth accomplishments in the form of the filled out packets to show my supervisor, the Mayor, Peace Corps, the Governor, etc

·         Discovering further projects I can help with by seeing what the youth accomplish

·         Make it about the youth, not me: I keep getting congratulated on for MY youth summit. Hopefully the service projects shift the focus to the youth, and away from me

Thanks, and What’s on the Horizon

                Want to give a shout out to the eight volunteers who came: Alex, Amber, Austin, Becky, Chelsea, Ebonee, Kelsey, and Munya! You guys were rock stars!

                So what’s next? I’m nearing the half year mark of my time in the Philippines. Among what I mentioned above, I may do some more on leadership with a nearby university. I’ll be talking to and working with the out-of-school youth. I may also start working with the local government unit I’m with and run a few programs for them to help deal with stress management, marketing, goal setting, and a couple others.

                Next post I plan to get a bunch of the best pictures from my first six months and post them, including many from the summit.

‘Til next time!

Five Months Done... How Many to Go?

So I’ve been in the Philippines for five months now. Once again no pictures. I’ll try to deliver with a bunch for a Matt Hirschinger Blog Christmas special or something. Just need to get all the pictures from my coworkers and pick the best ones. I’ll aim for about twenty-thirty of the best. In my defense, I’d also like to point out that a buddy from mine from college also in the Peace Corps has no pictures on his blog, yet unlike me, doesn’t give false promises to put some up. Just saying…

Hot Stuff?

So, let’s start with the juicy part. I have come to accept that I’m apparently a catch here in the Philippines. Coworkers keep asking me if I have a girlfriend or not. Nagwapo (handsome in Ilokano) is often said. Yesterday I met some high school girls who literally screamed when I stepped outside like I was a five member boy band. However, as much as I’d like to think I’m the [insert attractive male Western celebrity here] of the Philippines, I’ve been self imposing a reality check. Being an American is a major, major part of it. The assumption is I’m rich, or at least going to be rich later on in life. I’m 24 years old now, and the screaming girls were like… sixteen? Yeah, just smile awkwardly and maintain professionalism. Also to note I’m in a rural community where I’m probably looking like an easy ticket to see the world. Plus there’s my rocking bod and glistening eyes. So, though I’d like to think I’m hot stuff… I’m inclined to take it with some salt.

Unfortunately though, this attention has been a distraction professionally. Since arriving in Dupax mid-September, I have fought hard for the focus to turn from ‘look it’s an American’ to ‘look at the WORK the American is doing’. I have no intention of getting married while in the Philippines, so as flattering as the attention is, it’s also chika chika waiting to happen (chika chika is the Filipino term for gossip, gossip being a staple in Filipino society). Also, I can’t help but think that when I return to America, it’ll be a letdown if I get too used to the attention here.

The Grand Kanyaw

At the end of November, we held the annual town fiesta that marked the anniversary of Dupax del Norte’s founding. It was a week of late nights, early mornings, and lots and lots of traditional dances. The first night was Barangay night. (Although I’m pretty sure I’ve covered it, a Barangay is the smallest form of government in the Philippines, usually with a few thousand people). There are fifteen Barangays in del Norte and each had their own time to take a picture and shake the Mayor’s hand, their own performance, their own intermission. It was great, but I left at 1PM with a lot still to go.

The next night was a spiritual night. A guest speaker who had studied leadership and religion in America gave a half hour sermon. It also included a little bit of the new age style of a rock band and a singer doing modern Christian songs.

The morning after was the parade with kids from most of the schools in marching bands, government officials, local organizations, the Jolly Bee mascot (Jolly Bee is the McDonald’s of the Philippines). There were more people in the parade than on the streets. That night was the Talent Contest. Unfortunately I had reached my limit at that point and slept in early.

Fourth morning was the official Grand Kanyaw. Now only did they sacrifice over ten pigs, but a caribou as well. A little note about sacrifice pigs though: as culturally interesting as it is, pigs are not quiet in their death throws. I don’t consider myself squeamish, but I was not 1000% comfortable. The other Peace Corps volunteer who has been in Dupax for a year and I were adopted as a son and daughter of the town. We were given a basket, a vest, and a spear. Yes, a legit spear. I don’t know what to do with it. Then we did a traditional dance in front of a couple hundred people, while taking sips of rice wine (rice wine is strong stuff). That night the Mayor gave her address to the people about what she had accomplished, and what her plans were for the next year. Without the awful and annoying clapping every half minute that our State of the Union address has, she covered a lot of ground in fairly short order.

Then came the fifth night. Don’t get me wrong, it was a great week, but I was tired, and the final night was the beauty contest. Part of my work is trying to emphasize things other than beauty contest with the youth. So, I was right depressed when the beauty contest (for girls ages 15-19) got a larger audience than any of the other events. I mean, only the parade came even close, and that’s just because we had so many people told they had to partake in the parade. I’ll touch on this at the end of this post.

Challenges at Site

Disclaimer: I am doing just fine. I am very happy here. However, I do want to share that my time here is not just some fun and whacky adventure, and that there are serious challenges to living abroad. That is why I’m including some of the challenges I’ve been facing.

Probably the biggest challenge at site has been the hospitality. Filipinos bend over backwards to treat their guests, and I am a guest of guests, an outsider of outsiders. So, wherever I go, they want to stuff me with food. Wherever I go, I’m doted upon. Wherever I go, even mentioning trying to help with clean up is stopped and thwarted immediately. The challenge with this is twofold. One, it’s in direct contradiction to me trying to integrate into the community. The second is that it’s making me way too comfortable and complacent.

Another challenge has been the pace. I’ve talked to people, including my Dad, who has worked with foreigners at length, and for the most part we Americans are just about the most hurried people in the world, for the most part. That includes me. So, when I wrote a questionnaire to give to the youth about the leadership summit I’ll be running, to better understand what they want to learn about, and their current capabilities in early October, I was surprised when I finally got them out, and got half back mid-November.

Also, there is the language barrier. Although my Ilokano is improving, there’s still so much I don’t know. Although I’m lucky to live in a country with exceptional English skills, I’m still dealing with a foreign language being the most commonly spoken. It’ll come eventually.

The last challenge I’ll mention right now has been trying to stay in the loop. Once in La Trinidad, and once here I’ve been asked to ride along for something I didn’t know what it was… until I saw the deceased lying in a casket. Although those two incidents have been rare (well, twice since I’ve been here), I’ve constantly been asked to just come along, not sure about the destination, the purpose, or what I would be doing. Luckily the adventurer in me has said, “Why not?” I know this is something I should work on, at least trying to be more prepared and in the know.

I’ll keep you all updated on how I solve (or don’t solve) these issues.

Product Review

Product Review! This is where I advertise for free, things that I think are helping me a lot in the Philippines. I suppose I could also bash a product, but I won’t be doing that today.

The first tip of my hat goes to quick-dry products. Towels, shirts, shorts. They are so much easier to wash, get dry very quick, and are generally made of higher quality material. After I get home, probably all my workout clothes and towels will eventually be quick-dry.

The second nod goes to FitDeck, which you can only get online at www.fitdeck .com. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the end all of workouts, but considering I’m in the rural Philippines without a gym, the fitdeck cards have been invaluable in staying in shape. I recommend them for anyone looking to add a convenient workout they can do at home, or just want more ideas for workouts. I plan on buying a few pieces of equipment like a resistance band, and a pull up bar, and hopefully starting in January I can get on a more consistent workout schedule then ‘how about this fitdeck today!’

The last shout out is for Prezi. Although I haven’t actually made one yet, I’ve gone over all the instructional video, and it looks amazing. I will definitely be using it in the future. It is free (though you need the internet). It is exponentially better than PowerPoint as a presentational tool, and it looks so simple to use. After having to endure so many PowerPoint presentations during training, and seeing this shining beacon of light that is Prezi, I don’t know if I can go back again. Check it out.

What’s to Come?

Well, the leadership summit is December 16-18. I’ll have a large piece on that once it’s finished. I have several things on the horizon for next year included working with a nearby university’s program for extracurricular clubs and activities, I’ll start working with the out of school youth, probably try to start up some weekly leadership courses for youth as I can’t get all of them to the summit (nor can I cover everything I want). Hopefully I will also start working with the local government unit I’m at with a few small, but hopefully impactful ways to improve the office (such as using Prezi!). Perhaps more, but we’ll see.

A Note on Society: Cheap Entertainment

So, back onto the beauty contest for girls getting more of a crowd than the Mayor’s speech, the official Grand Kanyaw, and the spiritual night combined. This isn’t something different from America. More people in America probably know about the Cardashian’s (sp?) weekly drama than about the Euro crisis. And you know what? That’s all right by me. We all have our guilty pleasures, forms of entertainment that serve little more than to entertain us. Not everything we listen to or watch should make us wiser, smarter, or more physically fit. However, what worries me is when all of our entertainment turns into that.

You don’t have to listen to classical music, read thought provoking novels, do yoga, and keep up with international economic news. However, I personally think it’s important to pick at least one or two of them, or something else more enlightening. Perhaps I am overreacting, but what I’m worried about is not that so many people saw the beauty contest, but that many of those people didn’t attend anything else but that. Don’t know what I’ll do with this yet at site. However, with the Mayor’s “Character First” program, I think I might put my two cents in about this, and see the reactions I get. See what we can do about not knocking down the beauty contest necessarily, but promoting the more culturally enriched events as well.

‘Til next time!   

First Session, Street Children, 50 Years, and The How

First Session

I finally held my first leadership trying here at site Saturday October 29^th. My supervisor’s wife is a Professor at a nearby university, and asked if I would participate in a leadership/teamwork building camp that was being run on two levels, with adults training the college students, and the college students helping out younger children. I was asked to give a two hour lecture on leadership. By “lecture” I naturally interpreted as two hours worth of activities that involved making sure the students were as active as possible.

Not really having enough time to develop something in depth,, and chose four general categories that I thought might be useful, that being Teamwork, Self Reflection, Appreciation of Others, and Self Confidence/Expression. Overall it was a pretty successful (though I need to revise my Appreciation of Others part) and it appears that I will be involved more with the college in the future. I’ll share two of the highlights.

The first activity I ran I dubbed “Breaking Boundaries: Building a Tower”. I split the 20 students into two teams of ten and asked them to build me the highest tower they could. I had two separate piles of paper, glue, and scissors, and gave them ten minutes. Afterwards, I asked questions such as “who made the decisions” and “who had the scissors” and “how did you strategize?” Once the group was getting confident in responding to my question I asked them why they built me two towers. After all, I wanted the highest tower they could make, so why waste time making two of them. The catch was that just because I split them into two teams didn’t mean they had to only work with their team. Just like in real life we are told we belong to certain teams from our school to our city to our political party, doesn’t mean we can’t work with people on the “other team”, that there can be one team. After we discussed it I gave them the opportunity to try again. This second time I only gave them five minutes, heh.

The other highlight was after my session was over. The youth were in turn running teambuilding exercises with the younger kids. They asked me to try out one of their activities which involved crawling through the dirt under some ropes tied to chair legs. I’ve done it before in the Boy Scouts, I was wearing a nice (and light colored) shirt, and I frankly didn’t feel like getting dirty. However, I went ahead and did it. Got a mild rash on my arms which last a few hours, scraped my elbow, and got my shirt very dirty (though luckily it came off when washed). So why did I do it? It’s about respect and setting an example. I could have easily flaunted my age/nationality/and position as their instructor to say no. However, part o being a leader is doing what is asked of you in turn by the people around you, and I really wanted to have a good standing with the youth, and did it. Crawling through the ground was in no way crossing any professional boundary between them and me and it wasn’t that bad.

50 Years

I went to Manila between the 2^nd and 5^th of November to celebrate the Peace Corps/USAID’s 50^th anniversary at the Mall of Asia. I introduced myself along with twenty or so others to the World Director (big honcho) of the Peace Corps Aaron Williams. Also went to a cocktail party and briefly met the US Ambassador to the Philippines Harry Thomas. He was chatting to five of us for about a minute of the normal “thanks for your work” when two ladies dropped by to say “goodbye”. Naturally that goodbye dragged on for fifteen minutes or so.

One thing I’m going to need to get over is my disdain for networking. Frankly, I don’t like it. I feel cheap when doing it. As much as I like to flaunt my great features to those around me (and to the ladies *wink*) when it actually comes time to be serious and to try to make an impression on the movers and pushers out there, I take a half step back. I feel it comes across as fake to introduce yourself to try to get ahead. Still, networking is an important part of most fields of industry, and as long as I’m aware of myself it might not be so bad. I’ll talk to a few of the staff to get some pointers on it.

The celebration itself took place on that Friday. Once again I danced in the traditional G String. Just can’t seem to keep out of it. I picked up a bunch of information from USAID for some inspiration and possible collaboration in the future. Saw a lot of the friends I had made during pre-service training. I talked to some of our staff at length. Ate a lot of American food using the money I haven’t been needing to spend at sight. Then there was the street children…

Street Children

First off my stance is not to give anything to any beggars while I am here. It’s my job to help development, not encourage handoffs. My job is to teach people to fish more than give people fish (take it as a metaphor given my province is landlocked). This is also a stance shared by my Sector Manager through the Peace Corps, Ambet, who is such a BA that he’s just getting back from a month in Washington DC training other staff and such.

So when I was in a taxi leaving the Mall of Asia, I did not pay the two street children that did a dance routine when we had to stop at the intersection. I also did not pay the street child that approached me when I was walking back to the hotel after running an errand.

In the latter case, I had to stick my hands in my pockets because after I declined, his friends came up on both sides of me. I doubt any of them were older than eleven, and I just kept walking as they tugged at my arms, trying to dislodge them from my pockets so they could grab at my phone and wallet. Suffice to say I was stronger than the street children ages from about six to eleven, and after less than a minute (I’m guessing about 40 or so seconds) they gave up, and I proceeded. Afterwards, I need to clean my arms which had streaks of dirt on them.

At this point I’m not sure what the point of this story was other than it happened, and that it happens in the world. It’s not easy to swallow callously ignoring the little girl pressing her face against the window of the taxi, or just walking and ignoring half a dozen kids trying to steal from you, but part of the job (and just general living) requires the ability to be professional about the issues in the Philippines and not let my emotions (whether pity, anger, sorrow, etc) get the better of me.

Manila is a city I’d recommend to anyone who wants their eyes opened. It’s what happens when city planners don’t separate the rich from the poor, and almost everywhere you go you are faced with both. It makes for a stunning visual for a Westerner like me.

The How

This may end up being the best thing I do for my site during my stay. After talking to other volunteers and the staff, it seems a pandemic of not being able to ask “how are we going to do this” or “how can we get what we need” when developing projects. The people know what they want, they know why they want it, but figuring out how seems to be an afterthought, if a thought at all. Please do not mistake me to say nothing is being done. During the first week here in Dupax I sat in on a project that will move around 50 families into more Typhoon-proofed housing away from the river that floods every year. It’s just one example of things being carried out.

However, I also have some examples of great ideas that have hit a brick wall here. Therefore over the next couple weeks I’ll be talking to a few of the local leaders and trying to address that issue of The How, and see what comes of it.

What’s to Come?

Hopefully more pictures. I’ll admit it already that I’m bad at taking them. It’ll be a process but I swear I’ll get better. More projects. More thoughts about development and things in general.

As a parting note, I’ll address a question that I heard in Manila of “Why hasn’t the Peace Corps been able to help the Philippines solve its problems in 50 years?” To me, that is a poor question. First of all, it puts all the pressure on the Peace Corps to solve all of a country’s problems which isn’t exactly our role. We’re to help, not carry the entire burden. Secondly, it is too busy pointing the finger at the problems, and not the accomplishments. I can point my finger to anyone trying to do anything and ask “why aren’t things fixed yet?” True merit lies in what has been done and to what extent. It’s like trying to rate a wine with the space between the cork and where the wine starts.