That's a lot of Bukol

As you could probably tell from my last blog I was feeling pretty helpless regarding the recent oil spill of Guimaras Island. Here I am a Peace Corps volunteer, sent to the Philippines to help people, and the most I could do was write a few organizations and my senators. The later of which sent me the typical automatic email response confirming they had received my email and, “looked forward to addressing the concerns of Colorado citizens” (they probably get hundreds of emails everyday).
Then last Friday I got a text from my good buddy and former language instructor Roli Del Carmen (cool name too), that they were building booms from natural materials to help protect the coastlines from further damage. He was volunteering with several organizations from Iloilo city and they were looking to gather rice straw, corncobs, and coconut husks. He asked me if there was any way I could get a hold of such items being that I was in one of the more rural municipalities of Iloilo Province. I was immediately overcome with excitement at the opportunity to truly do something to actually help with the problem…then I remembered that I was living in the Philippines and that if this was going to happen it would take some time. I asked a few office mates about the rice straw, corncobs, and coconut husks. They informed me that the first two were unlikely due to the timing of the planting seasons. However, there was plenty of coconut husks washed up on the beaches from the last storm. I figured that since it was Friday I might be able to get a dump truck’s worth load together over the weekend for delivery on Monday or Tuesday. I texted Roli back and let him know that I was going to do everything I could to make it happen.
Five months ago I would have been naïve enough to consider that this task would be no problem at all. But since living here I continually learn day to day that things will take more effort and time than my American perspective might lead me to think.
I had quite a few things working against me before I even got started. First of all, and most importantly, I would not have my Nay/counterpart Erlyn to help. She was off in Aklan giving a tour and wouldn’t be back until Monday. She has a way with motivating people, not to mention her contacts and fluency in the language that I still lack. I then looked to Rodel (my other counterpart), but he was tied down with work…and probably thought I was crazy to even consider trying to get something like this done in such little time. Maybe he was right, but because I had seen the mess up close I had extra motivation to at least try to do something. Another challenge would be getting Filipinos to work on the weekend. Similar to the States, the weekend is for relaxing here. If that wasn’t hard enough it is also the rainy season right now. The weather had recently been nice but there was still a 50/50 chance it would rain on any given day. Last of all, I would need approval for the use of the dump truck, gas and a driver to transport any materials that we could gather.
The transport seemed to be the number one priority to me since it would actually cost money and not just time and effort. I was in luck that the mayor was in that Friday and had time to see me about the matter. She approved the use of the truck, gas and driver but also thought I should wait until next Thursday when I could inform all the Barangay Captains at their monthly meeting and they could then respectively organize their communities. A week before any action seemed too long in my mind and I asked if we got the materials by this weekend could we use the truck Monday morning. She said yes but I could sense her doubt that I could get it done.
I then headed out on my bike to spread the word. I had thought about it over lunch and decided to focus my efforts on 5 coastal barangays that were also along the National Road. I figured these would contain a lot of coconut husks being along the beach and also provide easy access for the dump trucks. That first afternoon was a bit frustrating. Language has been one of those things that on certain days I feel really good at and on others I’m completely lost. Explaining that you need people’s coconut husks for an oil spill is fairly complicated just in English. I only knew the word for coconut-nyog, but soon discovered there were at least three descriptions for the coconut husk in Kinaray-a: tapas kang nyog, bukol, and one other that I’ve already forgotten (bitok maybe). Through trial and error I discovered the word I needed to use was bukol, which implied the dried out hair-like portion that would be good for absorbing the oil. I talked with some residents of Purok 1 as well as the barangay captains from Purok1 and Crossing Dapuyan right before a heavy downpour started and I was forced to head home. I felt like it was a good start.
Saturday morning I rode out again to inform the captains of the three other barangays I was hoping to involve. Two of the three seemed eager to help while the third felt like the beach was too far from the road and probably couldn’t get much bukol. I also passed by a guy with a huge pile in Purok 1 who said he would only be willing to sell it. Because people use the bukol for cooking fuel it would be another challenge to get them to freely donate (despite there being more than enough available and a lot of it eventually rotting). I attempted to shame him saying, “Matisting kami magbulig kasimanwa mo. Wara akon. – We are trying to help your countrymen. Not mine.” I figured I had a few more days to let it work on his conscience.
After lunch I headed to Crossing Dapuyan to see if any progress had been made. To my surprise there was actually a small pile of coconut husks gathered in front of the barangay hall. This was a very good sign. The pile was by no means huge, but it was a start and they had done it all on their own. I figured it was about time I got a little dirty myself and decided to spend the rest of the day at Crossing D filling rice sacks with bukol and hauling them from the beach to the road. Of course it started raining again but we worked through the drizzle and rested during the downpour. There was only six of us that consistently worked that afternoon, the barangay captain (a 60 year old woman), the captain’s nephew Edwin, myself, and three little kids that couldn’t have been older seven. Nothing was quite as inspiring as watching those three kids fill a sack half full, and then as a team each grab a corner and haul it to the road. After the day was done I bought them each pamahaw, a soda and some sweet bread as a reward for the days hard work…best 70 pisos I’ve spent in the Philippines.
As rewarding as Saturday was, things only got better on Sunday. For one thing there was no rain until late in the evening. The efforts of spreading the word had paid off and people were more willing to both donate and work. My hardest workers were again youth. Erlyn’s teenage son Huey and a few of his friends helped me transport a huge donated pile to the side of the road. The other three barangays had also managed to gather some husks and a sack of corncobs. By the end of the day I was sure we had at least a dump truck’s worth to deliver.
That night Erlyn texted me a forwarded message from Johnny Diaz of Aksyon Radio. They would be coming to San Joaquin to gather relief materials for the people of Guimaras with four dump trucks provided by the Provincial Government. I thought this was a stroke of luck and that if we filled up the San Joaquin dump truck maybe we could use the Provincial Trucks if they were not full of relief supplies. It turns out that this was more than just a stroke of luck and more like a miracle. The next morning my supervisor informed me that we could not use the San Joaquin truck because its registration needed to be renewed; a very important detail that no one bothered to tell me last Friday. If Johnny Diaz and his caravan hadn’t shown up, by pure chance, I would have been looking at my first major failure…gathering all that bukol with no way to transport it.
As it turned out, we ended up filling all four dump trucks with just husks and then piling up other supplies on the top. As soon as people heard that Johnny Diaz and Aksyon Radio were in town they were doing everything they could to donate and get their name over the air waves. The guy from Purok 1 that wanted money for his bukol donated 1/3 of his pile. I also gave my first radio interview ever, which I was a bit mayha (shy) about. Johnny had been informing Joel, the main DJ, that I could speak Kinaray-a. Of course he decided to ask all his questions in the dialect, despite the fact that he knew English and even used it quite often on the air. I did my best to keep my answers in Kinaray-a but it’s hard to express one’s self in another language, not to mention the self-coconsciousness of hearing your own voice over the radio. I tried to extol the credit to people of San Joaquin, especially the kids. “...Nagkarga ang rako mga bata kang bukol halin sa baybay pa kasada – ....Many children carried coconut husks from the beach to the road.”
By the time the caravan had passed through Miagao (neighboring municipality) all the trucks were completely full of husks, rice hay, clothing, and all sorts of other random relief supplies. We had a crew of about 12 guys working to fill the trucks. At first I thought all these guys were just employees of the government and were getting paid for their services. It wasn’t until halfway to the city that I found out they were just volunteers. Upon hearing this I promised I would buy each of them a beer once we were done.
Once we got to the fishing port where they were constructing the booms, I almost was not able to deliver to Roli. There were two groups building booms, the Philippine Coast Guard and Roli’s group of volunteer organizations. The Provincial Government was to deliver to the Coast Guard but I managed to do some quick negotiating to have them give me at least one truck for the other group. The Coast Guard group seemed to be producing a lot more booms but Roli’s crew seemed to making more durable ones. Either way, I’m hoping it’s all put to a good use.
I’m sorry this turned out to be such a long story but I really was pretty excited about this and felt the need to share. Currently the tanker still containing 450,000 gallons of bunker oil is still 3000 ft below. The good news is that the U.S., France, Australia and Japanese are now working on the problem. A sonar-equipped and remote-operated vessel of the Japanese firm Fukada Salvage and Marine Works arrived this Wednesday to work on the tanker.
Other highlights of late include a 75 kilometer bike ride, my first chicken kill (it was a bit sad having to slice the guy’s throat…but he sure was tasty), and my beach house was approved by Peace Corps. It is a pretty awesome place and I’m really looking forward to moving in and living on my own. I have three trainings in a row starting next week. The first will be my two day Warden Training in Manila. A Warden is basically in charge of contacting other volunteers in their area in case they need to consolidate for some reason. After that I’ll be going to Seafdec in Tigbauan (where I had my first training PST1) for PST2, my technical training. I was a little upset that Seafdec was selected for my technical training because I was looking forward to visiting somewhere new (Seafdec is literally a 30 minute drive from my site). However, I’m looking forward to seeing some old faces and discussing the challenges of the work with other water/sanitation volunteers. After PST2 I’ve got another short little wat/san training involving the construction of a bio-sand filter. Since I’m already going to be gone from site for at least 15 days I’m considering doing some traveling to Bohol afterwards but I’m still not sure. Bahala na – Come what may.