Tomorrow I will be celebrating my 1
month anniversary in Siaton. This time really is flying by. It
seems only yesterday that I arrived here, not knowing any faces or
names, having no idea what I'd be doing, and ready for an adventure.
Well, really the only thing that's changed now is that I know most of
the faces of people I interact with and maybe 1/8 of their names. I
still don't really know what I'll be doing exactly and I'm still
ready for adventure.
One of the professors at Hope College
has legitimate face-blindness, and I'm beginning to understand how
she feels. All these Filipinos look alike with their black hair and
tan skin! One day I was introduced to a new coworker and had a
really nice 20 minute long chat with him. I really liked him and his
English was really good so that also sat well with me. I thought for
sure I'd have no problem recognizing him. The next day I went to an
organic produce celebration in the city with my LGU (local government
unit, aka my office) and as soon as I stepped out of the truck a guy
yelled over to me and was waving me down. I had absolutely no idea
who he was (I later realized he was the guy from the day before).
Nothing about him looked familiar, but he obviously knew me and
thought I knew him, so it had to be someone I had spent some time
with...but I was drawing a complete blank. I went over to him and
tried to fake recognition as well as I could, giving him a great big
hello and smile. But it didn't work. He looked at me with such a
torn expression and said, “You don't remember me, do you.” I kept
playing along though and said, “Of course I do, the different color
shirt just threw me off!” Such a lame excuse now that I think of
it. But luckily then he said his name again, and it totally clicked
and I felt terrible, but he was nice enough about it. He was my
kauban (companion) the rest of the day and I really hope I'll
remember his face the next time I see him.
The challenge with Filipino names is
that there are so many nicknames! It took me about 3 weeks to
realize that every young girl is called Day (pronounced die)
or Inday (Pronounced in-die) and every young boy is called
Dong or Do-Dong. I was so confused when everyone was being called
that, I thought for sure it was just a super common name. Then there
are the traditional Filipino names that sound really strange (I have
yet to remember one of them so I can't really give any examples).
And most of these names have their own nicknames, and the same person
could be called 5 different things! And it seems like a lot of
Filipinos like to mumble, so even if the name is simple enough I
could remember it, I can't understand them, even if they repeat it 5
times. Then, as is always the case with a new person in a group,
when I met people on the first day they all told me their names, and
of course I promptly forgot them since I met about 100 people the
first day, and they just assumed I knew the names ever since. I'm
slowly learning them one-by-one now, but there's always an awkward
moment when I'm asked if I know someone and I say no, but it turns
out I sit next to that person every day....It's a work in progress.
One exciting discovery I made today, though, was that there are
actually albino Filipinos here and they look like pale red-heads!!
It's really quite interesting.
Onto more exciting news, I've made a
pact with 2 other volunteers to do a half-marathon next year! The
three of us ran together a lot during PST and needed some motivation
to keep it up at site, so this is it! I've never run more than 6
miles at a time though, so this'll be a challenge.
I'm working here in the Department of
Agriculture in the Local Government Unit of Siaton (that's the DA,
LGU-Siaton on my address). From what I've been able to tell so far,
this office deals with all the livestock, crops, and fisheries
concerns. The livestock include mostly pigs, carabao,
goats, chicken, and turkey and I've known some of my coworkers to do
artificial insemination and assist in the birthing of calves (both
things I'd really like to try some time). The
crops here include rice, corn, and sugar cane, though I'm not sure of
the specific tasks the employees do. And the fisheries, my area,
deals with the fishermen organizations, maintaining the MPAs (Marine
Protected Areas), and writing the policies that govern them. Right
now the office needs to write an updated CRM plan for Siaton. This
includes naming the coastal resources present in Siaton (the
mangroves, corals, and seagrass) and the condition they're in (which
means doing surveys which equals snorkeling and diving!!!),
discussing the improvements that can be made, and how we plan to
achieve them.
So now my work, as I said before, I
still don't really know what specifically I'll be doing project-wise.
I'm assuming I'll be working on the assessments for the CRM plan,
but that won't happen for a while yet. It's still relatively early
though and we were told during training that the first 3-6 months at
site are ridiculously slow with nothing to really do. I've mostly
been sitting in the office either working on language or reading up
on materials given to us during training. Occasionally there are
fishermen meetings to go to or other LGU meetings that are all in
Vasayan, so I don't understand any of it, but I'm just trying to get
out there and meet as many people as possible so they know I'm here.
As some of you may have heard, there
was a 7.2 magnitude earthquake here this past Tuesday (the 15th)
at 8:13am. It was my first one ever and actually really exciting!
Here's the story: That day was actually a Muslim holiday so
everything was closed down (schools, offices, etc.) and this was
really a blessing since some schools collapsed in some areas.
Anyway, I didn't have work that morning so I was still in bed, just
between the conscious and sub-conscious stages. When my bed started
shaking I thought I was dreaming someone was shaking my bed, which
was really rude. Then after a few seconds I woke up and thought I
was hallucinating, There's no way it's possible for my bed to be
shaking this much without someone actually pushing it, and I don't
think I'm really pushing it that much just lying here, so it can't be
real. Then I fully woke up and
realized what was actually happening. I got out of bed and got in the
doorway, they do this in the movies so it's gotta be what
you're supposed to do. I think
it lasted for about a minute, though it's really hard to tell since
it took me a while to actually realize what was happening. Anyway, I
later found out the earthquake had originated in Bohol, an island a
few islands away from me. My island didn't have any major damage
that I've heard of, but there definitely was damage in the islands
closer to the origin. One of the Chocolate Hills (a geological
structure in Bohol) actually split! Or so I heard. We've had to deal
with quite a few aftershocks even 30hrs after the initial wave, but
nothing major. It was definitely an experience, but I'm fine and no
need to worry!
That's all for now!
