Friday, February 08, 2008

Happy Belated Holidays

I’m not going to go into detail of why its been since November that I last updated my blog. I think it basically comes down to the same reason I tend to be writing less and less in my journal- things just feel too normal. Nothing really seems all that exciting or adventurous like it once did, hence I feel less inclined to write about it. But there was a lot that happened the past few months that might excite the few people who still check up on this blog.

Thanksgiving Rocked! We got together at the same house (MANSION) on the beach that my parents stayed at. There was about 25 volunteers total which mostly consisted of my Western Visayas homies. I also had two very special guests come all the way from the US of A, Cam and Brady. It was really a special time for me personally to have not only all my PC buddies and two friends from the states, but also people from San Joaquin like Bong, Gert and my Nanay Erlyn to share in the feast. Basically we had all the usual Thanksgiving trimmings as well as 6, count them, 6 pumpkin pies….eat your heart to those PCVs that went north to Sagada…WV ROCKS!...and we did rock the videoke. It was good times.


Brady helps Lloyd pluck the feathers from 1 of our 4 turkeys

I Love Pie


We were satisfied with the meal


...so was Scott

The fun continued with Cam and Brady’s Philippine Adventure. First on the agenda was a cock fight. As I’m sure I’ve mentioned before this is the closest thing to a sporting event here and they both seemed to get into it.



The next day included an intro to diving with Gert. The visibility was poor and only worsened when Cam managed to throw his lunch up under water (he was ok after a few hours back on land). However, I would say my two friends were pretty lucky getting to see a sea snake, Napolean Wrasse, Baracuda, and a nice size Parrot Fish on their first dive. I consider myself lucky to get to see Brady in this sexy little number:




Cam practices breathing with a regulator




Yours truly enjoying the underwater world


Then next morning we decided to hike the little mountain Lipdan Bulan in my barangay.


Me and Brady wanted a pic of Cam on a Carabao since he did a little bull riding back in his college days…he’s still got it.




At the top of Lipdan Bulan


I was a bit of bone head and didn't bring enough water for the three of us but we soon quenched out thirst with fresh buko juice


Later that night my friend Bong prepared a meal of caldareta ayam (dog). I should let my readers know that we don’t usually eat dog here in the Philippines. People down here in the Visayas only eat dog when there is nothing else to eat, which does happen when times get tough. Brady and Cam had passed through South Korea before visiting the Pines and were disappointed when they could not find a restaurant in Seoul offering dog. So my friend Bong obliged and found a disobedient canine that warmed our bellies. After the meal we sat down to a classic drinking circle of Tanduay Rum with a little Balut (10 day year old incubated duck egg…we do eat this regularly and its not that different than a hard boiled egg). Cam downed his like a champ and I had to finish off Brady’s.

The next day we did a little spelunking in the nearby island of Guimaras….actually this wasn’t a real cave but we still took lots of action shots. That night for dinner the options were grilled fish or grilled pork…we chose fish…and the next night chose pork. Throughout the whole trip both of these guys were totally adaptable with the food choices and were up for trying lots of new things, which was nice.



Brace yourself for sexy waterfall pics:



I think this one truly captures the essence of Andrew "Cam" Amend
The last night before Brady and Cam headed back to Manila was spent in Iloilo City. I took them to a place you can get a nice hour long massage for only P250 ($6). We then proceeded to have some beers and videoke the night away…Overall their stay was really good for me just to spend some quality time with two of my closest friends from back home. Thanks for visiting guys!

I somehow got ringed into playing on the Municipal Government’s basketball team last December. Our record ended up being 2-5 (I was only able to play 3 games since I left during Christmas and New Years…but yes that means they still lost one game even with me). We were the “old guy” team with an average age of about 35…here is a nice shot of one of my teammates.



Christmas was also Rocking! My girlfriend Kelly and I decided to spend a little time on the island of Bohol. We did a little relaxing and swam in the Loboc River at a resort called Nuts Huts. Then we checked out the Chocolate Hills but it was a little rainy so we used a pinoy umbrella (banana leaf).




After mainland Bohol, Kelly and I headed to the island of Panglao to do some more relaxing and a little diving. We headed out to really nice dive spot called Balicasag Island. The coolest thing we saw was an enormous school of Baracuda that almost seemed to be following us as we drifted with the current. Alona beach on Panglao was truly a beautiful place to spend Christmas together.


After Bohol we headed back to my house for a few days and then went up to Boracay to meet up with some other Peace Corps Volunteers. Much like last year this was one big party complete with fireworks, and a white sand beach


As if that wasn’t enough fun, the month of January equals Fiestas galore on the island of Panay including my own town San Joaquin. I’ve seen enough dance performances with drumming over the last two years that the memories are beginning to run together. However, one thing about my own town’s fiesta that is quite special is the Pasungay competition with the carabao, bull, and horse fights. This year I made sure I went out on the field and got some pretty good shots.





Battle Wounds
Last year I wasn’t able to attend the Iloilo city festival of Dinagyang due to a training I attended. It was a good time this year…




So now that I’ve updated you on all the good times I feel I should mention what I’ve been up to with work. Me and Bong started making Biosand filters at the beginning of December. We were able to make 10 using the tools and left over materials from last summer’s training with the students. I’ve been making brochures and other little things to help him out but he still has not made a sell. I haven't been able to devote my fulltime to helping him due to other work at the Local Government but I feel I've taught him everything he needs to know and its up to him to make the project his own. In his defense he’s been quite busy with his usual livelihood of selling puto for the various fiestas. We’ll see how the next couple months goes (it is the Philippines…things tend to move slowly here :)).

Arvin and Bong placing the concrete in the BSF mold

I also helped out a little with a Biosand filter training in Iloilo City conducted by the NGO A Single Drop that trained me. It was fun and I think I learned a lot more than I actually helped with. One of the things I talked about with the trainers from A Single Drop was the success rate of their trainings. I was surprised that despite cooperatives soliciting the NGO for a training, and then having the start up funding provided by Rotary International, the trainers estimated that only about half of the projects proved to be sustainable. And even those that were sustainable often had subsidies provided by Local Government Units or Rotary Clubs (i.e. development work is hard even with money and an organized cooperative). I plan on following up with the group in Iloilo when I can.

I’ve been really interested in doing some water testing on the BSF at the local University in the neighboring town of Miagao. There have been numerous water testing studies conducted worldwide on the filters to prove their effectiveness but I think a local test might help prove its validity to Filipinos. A very supportive professor has offered to help me do this, pending incoming funds for a separate project he’s working on.

The past few weeks I’ve been working with members from the Municipality, Department of Environment and Nat. Resources from the Province, and my good buddy Gert to do Coastal Resource Management Planning for the coastal barangays. There are a lot of problems in San Joaquin but this one really hits home for me since most of my friends in my barangay are local fisherman and their livelihood is in serious jeopardy. I’ll have a lot more to say on this in the next Blog.

Last thing to mention in this update is that my good friend, and in many respects mentor, Lloyd Banwart finished up his service last December. Lloyd was a PCV from the previous batch and was assigned in the neighboring town of Miagao. He was always willing to meet up and offer his words of wisdom when I really needed a fellow ‘Kano’ to talk to. We had a lot of good times diving, biking, and sharing our love for Filipino food. Lloyd is currently biking SE Asia with his buddy Tin Tin for the next few months. It’s something we both daydreamed about and I’m hoping to take a similar trip when my service is over next June. You can check out the current adventures of Lloyd and Tin Tin on Lloyd’s blog http://www.lloydbanwart.blogspot.com/. There is also a link on his site to a series of short videos that are pretty entertaining.
Ok that’s all I got for now. Hope everyone had a good Holiday season and you’re starting the New Year off right.

This Carabao fight gave me a little scare :)

3 Comments:

At 6:08 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Well son it looks like you have a tad of Streeks Rodeo in you, since your Great granpa George and great Uncles Marty and Fred wer steer roping champs. Yet they did it on a horse. Perhaps you are more of arodeo clown? thanks and love- Dad.

 
At 6:04 AM, Blogger Erin said...

Nice, I especially like the waterfall shots. Sexy.

 
At 1:12 PM, Blogger Andrew S. Gingerich said...

Ian,

Glad to see another post from you. Looks like things are going well out there and don't get to comfortable with the day to days over there, we are all looking forward to seeing you back in the states! Always thinking about you.

Gangles

 

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