Thanksgiving

This plan for Thanksgiving had been, for many weeks, to travel way up north to Sagada. Sagada is know for its cool air, good food, and being home to some of the Ifugao people. Sadly, because of some poor planning a few were unable to go up there, and so we made the best of it down in the Visayas.

The three of us had a great time in Dumaguete though. We met some wonderful people including two Americans living in Korea, two Swedes, and a group of Filipino singer/songwriters. They were the ones who really made the weekend so memorable. I think if we had been up north with the other volunteers we would have gone through the same range of topics that we invariably always do: work, struggles at work, stupid people at work, things we don't like about being in the Philippines. I am in full support of volunteers being sounding boards for their fellow volunteers, but after a year its time to move to some new conversations.

While in Dumaguete we went snorkeling, which was absolutely amazing. My favorite part about snorkeling is that you pull up to this island and the water is beautiful and see through and all that. But looking at the water I would never have guessed the kind of party going on below. While snorkeling we saw lots of "Nemo fish" some big angel fish, beautiful corals in all the colors of the rainbow. But the best by far was seeing two sea turtles. We saw one and starting following after it, and while moving we saw this huge turtle just hanging out on the seabed. This second turtle was probably around 4 feet long and probably weighed a lot, but it moved through the water like it was flying. It was an unexpected surprise to see something so large move so quickly and so gracefully.

Anyhow, here are some pictures:
The Boulevard in Dumaguete from Silliman University

Getting ready to jump in!
You wouldn't guess it, but there's turtles in these watersOur last adventure was a short hike to see another beautiful waterfall

A Year at Site and Nothing To Say

I've reached me real one year mark now. On November 7th 2008 I was sworn in as a real Peace Corps Volunteer. On that same date one year later what was I doing? Watching old Seinfeld episodes in marathon. A week after the date I'm sitting in the office of my supervisor listening to essentially the Filipino version of Kids Say the Darndest Things (which is even less funny when you only get 80% of the conversation). In between stories she says, "Oh Justin, you know your one year anniversary just passed?" I say, yes I did realized that. She goes one with her stories.

The unceremonious passing of this day at work kind of seems to encapsulate the feeling of one year in the Philippines. In the first year I was learning new things, going new places, and making new friends. Everyday there was something new.

Even when I meet new people now (like the lady who lives down the street from me and has seen me in the neighborhood for the last 9 months, but finally got the courage to ask me something) react differently to my one year. When you've been here less than a year they're always so interested to make sure you're having fun, enjoying, or making observations. At a year though you'd better have your act together.

I wish I had more to say but life here is just life. Sadly that consists right now of nothing blog-worthy.

MassKara 2.0

MassKara 2009 has come and gone. This year's theme was "30 Years of Smiles". This being the 30th MassKara Festival in Bacolod I was expecting something bigger than last year. Certain group were way more amazing than last year. Others were incredibly bad. One thing that was cool this year was that I knew more about the folk songs that were used in the music. The song this year was SO much better than last year's too. Maybe because last year was our first year and we were still in training we were more excited and awed by the whole experience. This year, as insiders we had higher expectations. It was still a great weekend though. Below are some of my better shots from this year.
This is probably my favorite mask. Brngy. Mandalagan

Good action shot


These guys def. win the award for most disturbing costume. It was like someone had thrown up a bag of Skittles all over a 1970s Cher costume.



My favorite shot of the day. A picture of my barangay's dancers!

Some Pics

So I was a little complain-y in the last posts. So here are some pictures of my more fun and productive ventures:

Several of us went for a hike to see the 7 waterfalls at a resort named Mambukal. We met these three 9 year olds who were our tour guides. They were so funny and great.


Shortly thereafter my students in speech class had their culminating activity. A culminating activity is a program where the students will apply what they've learned in lieu of a written final.
This is a picture of my students doing verse choir. They take poems and other texts and then recite them as a group with actions. Its a very Filipino thing.
A beach I went to near Roxas City. It was very pretty until it started raining.

A rare post on the struggles of a teacher trainer

I was recently doing some work with some high level teachers to prepare for a teaching methodology training that I will be facilitating in the coming month. Between the 6 of us we were asked to lead 12 session. We had 11 all picked out and so there was room for one more. On the table was the redundant (but often wanted) remedial reading --we were already doing a session on teaching reading in general-- and my suggestion of a session on reflective practices.

In my humble opinion, the reflective aspect of teaching is one that is crucial to becoming a better teacher. It is through reflection that we see into our successes and failures within the classroom. Often times I hear that an activity test or assignment was failed by the majority of students because "they're the slow section" or "they didn't study enough because they're lazy". Besides being horrible things to say about your students it also takes the blame off of the teacher, who, after all is the one guiding learning. Any number of things leading up to the assessment could have been the reason that students were not able to succeed on it. I view the need for remedial reading programs in this country as a direct stem from poor teaching practices, not student ability.

I was turned down from my idea because the Filipino had no idea what the session would look like. They tried to assure me that its in the teacher's nature to reflect.

I've been here a year. I know that its not. Filipinos want to come back from a training and tell their supervisor they learned how to help those non-readers, not that they learned how to think about how other people think and why you weren't able to meet that need. The teacher at the training may not even have the initiative of want to teach those non-readers, but dammit she's trained to do it now. Reflection is something that everyone can do, its easy, and doesn't require a lot of work.

Teaching these teachers (yet again) about how to do remedial reading in a classroom is like watching a drag show--its flashy and sounds fun, but its really just trannys dancing around and singing the same songs as usual. However without reflecting on their poor practices they can't see that all they're doing is the same Tina Turner routine over and over again.

With a reflective personality and better "regular" reading activities I think the quality of teaching could be improved. But even if you fixed this one thing you'd hit the brick walls of lack of flexibility perceived in lesson planning, poor resources, and a management hierarchy that holds the best teachers down.

I don't really like posting about the nature of the Filipino educational system because it is such a complicated issue with no clear solution, other than a complete overhaul, that at this point I try to avoid even thinking about it on a day to day.

As a reflective person, I've been thinking about my observations from the past year. I've seen that the teachers of the Philippines need something new. The ideas that we're peddling have reached a wall and there needs to be some new pieces added to reach new conclusions. In my future sessions I'm going to try include some new topics that all teachers could use, but I know I'm going to hit more resistance....

A Travel Nightmare

I have the worst luck when it comes to getting to the Bacolod Airport. Because of poor transportation timing I have had to change flights, sit at the airport for 10 hours, and pay cabbies far too much for their services. The main problem is that our airport is not actually in Bacolod but 30 minutes north in Silay. This means that to get to the airport you have to ride a shuttle van. As far as I can tell though, there is no set schedule for the vans. They just leave to get you to your flight on time.

Because I refuse to pray at the beginning of my classes with my Catholic students, God hates me, and thus will not allow me to get to the shuttle on time. So I missed my shuttle and had to pay a driver to take me to the airport (at double the cost of the normal shuttle price). Not only that but in negotiating the ride I was getting dangerously close to missing the check in time for my flight. Thank goodness for my driver who drove like a demon and made our 35 minute drive in 20.

So I'm at the airport in time waiting with everyone else who is trying to go to Manila. Because its the Philippines everyone is carrying giant boxes of pasalubong (like souvenirs, but food) and are all over the baggage limit. So the line is long and not moving; and because I freak out about missing flights I'm about to have a conniption in line and start yelling at the mother who won't keep her morbidly obese child on a tighter leash.

And then because I don't even bother to stand up during the school prayers, and God likes to play tricks on my kind of people, my plane decides to board early. So I'm stuck behind super-mom and her zeppelin-like son while they're calling for all passengers to board. So then I get the ticket, get through the minimalist security, and am power walking my way to the plane thinking about how nice it will be to get a nice little nap on the plane to take the edge off of the last hours of horrendous mishaps.

But because I blatantly don't pray, and I'm sure my students are praying for their poor, evil, Sir Tabor's soul, God has other intentions for this flight. The first thing being that I am greeted on the plane by Christmas music. The fact that Christmas music is even a genre of music makes me upset, let alone playing it in September. It is not beginning to look a lot like Christmas, and I don't want to hear music about it, thank you. Only slightly more annoying than the Christmas music is the sound of not one, but three infants crying. And this wasn't plaintive "Mom, I need a new diaper" crying, but the loud, intense "there's something wrong with me!!!!" crying of a baby in pain. The three babies seated within four aisles of my seat take turns crying for the entire hour and half flight, making sure that the cabin is never quiet enough for anyone to rest, relax, have awkward conversation with their neighbor, or even enjoy their Skymall in the peace which they are accustomed to.

So then we land and I bolt out the door of the plane to get away from these people who have clearly been sent by God on behalf of my worried pupils to set me on a right path. But just be sure that the point is clearly made my bag is the last one on the merry-go-round.

What my return trip will be like....I shudder to think.

Batch 268, Butterfliles, and Dancing Prisoners

Last week, while I was celebrating my one year anniversary away from home, I was also in Manila as part of the welcoming committee for our new batch of volunteers. 10 current volunteers were chosen to spend the week in Manila to act as resources for our 68 new trainees. As a group of resource volunteers our biggest revelation was that the only thing more boring than filling out visa paperwork, is watching other people fill out visa paperwork. Besides sitting in on info sessions on policy and culture we also got to answer hundreds of fun questions. Overall, it was a really fun week and one that I hope will be of value to our new batch.

P.S. every time someone calls them the "new batch" I'm reminded of this classic movie:
From there I went with a few of my friends down to Cebu to see what is slowly gaining a cult following, The Dancing Prisoners. They're gaining popularity through YouTube, especially because of their excellent Thriller dance and the Death of Michael Jackson. At this prison and rehab center they've hired a choreographer who teaches the inmates new dances and every month they present a show. They were so amazing! We all thought that there would be lots of distance (and bars) between us and the dancers, but instead we were within arms reach of them. After the dance they all line up for a photo op. By the end of the show you kind of forget that most of them have killed someone or something equally bad.
We had some extra time so we also went to a butterfly garden in the middle of the city. It is run by a man whose father was an ardent butterfly lover, artist, and explorer. His son has inherited the family house and continues to expand on his father's work. Besides seeing some beautiful butterflies we also got to see his father's art projects. His father was an avid painter and combined his love of butterflies and art and starting making art out of the wings of dead butterflies. He did 11 portraits of famous men out of small snipits of butterfly wings. The intricate details and tedious nature of working with butterfly wings made the art really special to see.
Needless to say I'm happy to be back home resting and prepping for my school's foundation week. Sept. 6-12 we are pulling out all the stops to put on a week of programs and dinner and speeches to celebrate our 12th year of operation. Its going to be something special. I'll let you know how it goes.