Butterflies, Unicorns and a Pot of Gold

My first rainbow here.
This is taken from the Barangay Captain's
porch where I often go to study after class. 

The wifi has been down at my house for the last week. Fortunately, I got it working and today I got to connect with some people which is always pleasant. I've been in the Philippines just over five weeks now, and I've been in my small town of Baras just over four weeks. It's been wonderful. I'm slowly getting to know my fellow trainees. Which is nice and necessary to have a community, especially when there moments of loneliness. It's nice to have a few people to share and decompress with after a long week of language (I'm learning Waray not Tagalog). I've uploaded some pictures from my last weeks, so enjoy!

Kelly performing at Julio's Jazz Bar last night.
Look at that smile. 

 Last night, a few of us trainees made some time to go to a small local jazz club in Tacloban (the capital city of this island, Leyte). Filipino people love music and dance. Just about every family has videoke (=karaoke). I love the spirit of videoke. It's all about having a good time, and singing. It doesn't matter if you can sing well, it's just about singing and expressing yourself. And, you can't try to pull the "I don't have a song to sing" the response will be "there is a song for everyone".

Hiking up the bukid (mountain) at sunset.

I'm not very religious, but most Filipinos are Catholic.

One day after classes I went hiking up the local hill/mountain with my classmates, Chris & Mark, around sunset. It was beautiful, and felt good to get my body moving since our days have been filled with sitting in language and technical trainings. From the very top you can see small smoke piles. People often burn their trash here - solid waste management is definitely a concern of most communities, but better solutions are still under works. 

Americanos cook a Filipino FEAST

This past Wednesday us youth volunteers and education volunteers got together to cook Filipino food, and it was delicious. I love adobo, so I got the recipe from my family.  It was a great experience to go to the local market and buy all the ingredients to prepare. We even cooked over an open fire outside using dried coconut shells as coal!

Gutting fish heads for patties. I see you, Fsh.

Manok Adobo: half chicken, 3 small potatoes, diced onions, ginger, garlic,  1c soy sauce, 1/4c water, 2 table spoons vinegar, half squeezed lemon/lime all in a pot, submerging the goods, bring to a boil, simmer for 30 minutes, and YUM. 

Manok (chicken) Adobo, my first cooked Filipino dish!

Yesterday we had a get together to welcome a few admin people from headquarters. We played a few grammar activities to show off our Waray language skills. Here is everyone in my training city, Palo.

Palo, Leyte Cluster. 
Trainee, trainers, managers and higher ups all in one place. 

Last week I had a nightmare with my room. It's so warm and humid here that I found multiple things covered with mold!! I washed it, and found some of the same stuff moldy, sigh. I've put away things that I don't need (and really shouldn't have brought with me) in dry bags. Hopefully, I'll find a good way to get it back to the states, but in the mean time I have to keep my senses up to keep mold out of my room. This week has been much better. I'm happy to report, for now, my room is mold free. 

A blurry picture of me in my mold-free room. 

I took this picture a couple of weekends ago when I went for a stroll with my host mom and sister. We sat and had fresh coconuts. The sky is forever beautiful on this island. I'm pretty lucky to be serving as a volunteer in training here. 

The shorline in my neigborhood/barangay, Baras. 

Two Seasons: Rainy & Sunny

Running to the beach
during the rain with my host sister, Yen.
She's wonderful!

At home in California, there are maybe three season with relatively mellow temperatures. In the Philippines there are two: sunny season and rainy season. It's hot here, and humid. Don't mistake, I really appreciate being in paradise and in warmth, but it's crazy to think though that right now is the cooler half of the year (the daily temperature is 75 - 85 degrees F). Perhaps I'll get used to it; the last few nights I've slept without my fan running in my room, and I think I'm sweating less (ew, I know).

My point of this blog: I love rainy season! ("buyag" = 'knock on wood' in Waray - that I don't regret saying this later). When it rains it gets cooler, makes for beautiful tides on the beach, and it's always fun to run through the rain. The clouds and the sky has been a highlight each day. I have all my meals with my host family. We often sit out on the porch to eat and snack (this happens roughly five times a day). If I'm feeling down, lonely, or a bit purposeless I just look up usually and realize I'm in a beautiful place.

McArthur Beach behind my house.
If you look really hard you can see
California on the other side =) 

General update: It's Sunday morning  and I'm sitting in my room, trying the cheaper local chocolate (it's good!). Today I'm just kicking back. Week two of classes are done, and this week was much faster than last. Last week felt long, and the topics we went over during our technical training were really heavy. We have 4 hours of language training in the morning and afternoons for technical training on the social service centers that we might be placed at to work. There are a lot of services for children and the needy in the Philippines, and (somewhat to my surprise) a lot of people who really care and are devoted to the improvement.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of people and children in need, but, there is a lot of hope too. We went to centers for street children, home for girls, a haven for women and the like. There's a lot of support too. This makes me feel optimistic and positive, which I'll definitely need for this type of work! I've heard some say that Philippines is luxurious, and it's the 'beverly hills' of peace corps. There are plenty of challenging aspects in this country, and if not, my work with children and family will be the challenge that forces me to grow.

Random thoughts:
- Next blog project: upload pictures or video.
- I miss rock climbing lots! Esp. my climbing buddies and climbing trips.
- I miss weekends at my Grammy's with my family.
- I called my Baba, conversations with him are always interesting.
- I got a hold of a guitar and had my first lesson! I can play twinkle twinkle litte star, sort of.

Three weeks...

since I left SF. I keep track of my time here by counting the days. Eventually I'll stop doing that. In my mind I actually think of it by how I'm feeling and what I think I should be going through.

Well, really most of my day is filled with eating (which I highly enjoy) and learning Waray words (I would describe it as too many ways to conjugate one verb). In the afternoons I have a few hours of learning about social service centers in the Philippines, particularly the youth and family centers that I will be working at - have I said that's what I'll be doing here? Yes, I'll be volunteering at a youth/family center. Of course, it'll be for a highly disadvantaged population. You know, the people who need it the most.

I tried to upload pictures from my camera and quickly realized that I have too many to load onto my computer! So, I have a project that I need to clean off my external hard drive, upload pictures, sort, and upload to blog. I know reading texts isn't as fun as just scrolling through pictures.

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I wrote a nice blog and actually uploaded two pictures - and then the website couldn't upload it all. Damn. Picture blog will have to be postponed.