Wexistence

Photo from Engrish.com

Got a phone call from someone who claimed to be from the Department of Tourism. He said that they were sending me a card that would give me discounts on on airfare and hotels and various travel-related expenses. He just wanted to verify my mailing address.

Wait a minute, I said. Before you send me anything, how did I come to avail of such a card and how much is it going to cost me? I was referred by my credit card company, he said, and the one-time fee of Php 3,000.00 which would entitle me to life-time validity would automatically be charged to my credit card.

Well what if I choose not to avail of this card? He seemed surprised. I am the first person to express disinterest in the card, he said. Everyone else jumped at the opportunity. It’s not so much disinterest as it it skepticism, I said. I don’t even know anything about this card; I haven’t heard or read anything about it. You can’t just tell me “we’ll give you lots of discounts and stuff!” and expect me to take your word for it and fork over three grand. I want to find out more about this card, and if I decide that I do want it, I’ll let you know. But until then do not send me anything that I could possibly be charged for. Where can I get more information about this?

Sounding vaguely annoyed he said he would email me and then it sounded like he was going to hang up. Hold on, aren’t you going to get my email address? I asked. Oh, right he said. He took it down. We hung up.

That conversation sounded awfully shady to me. I searched the DOT website for any information on a discount card and found none. I Googled various permutations of “discount card DOT,” nothing came up. Hmmmm. Scam?

Father Fernando Cuenca, Augustinian Recollect

While I was in Bacolod over the weekend, I sought to find out more about my family’s progenitor, Fr. Fernando Cuenca (or, as I like to call him, Lolo Friar). What I’ve learned about him so far suggests he was a good priest (the obvious indiscretion notwithstanding) who contributed much to the development of the province of Negros. He was apparently well-loved, as people still leave flowers at his statue in the San Sebastian Cathedral.

Gran bienhechor de Negros; Fundador del molino “la hidraulica”; Medico; Constructor de las carreteras provinciales de Negros y Parroco de Talisay por 50 años.

The inscription on his statue reads: “Great benefactor of Negros; Founder of the hydraulics mill, Doctor, Constructor of the Negros provincial highways, Parish priest of Talisay for 50 years.”

A brief account of “The Spaniards” in the Negros Museum mentions that “Recollect Father Fernando Cuenca modernized sugar production by building the first water-powered mill in the 19th century.”

In the Negros Museum: a photo of Fr. Fernando Cuenca from a book, what looks like a page of his handwriting, and a tile with his name and some kind of coat of arms

There’s a short description in Spanish next to his picture, but I only understood the part about him being “Castillan of the city of his name” and the rest I could not translate.

A few years ago I came across a short paragraph about him in the first volume of “Documentary Sources of Philippine History” by Gregorio Zaide, which says that he introduced the use of geothermal energy in Negros. There were no details but I’m assuming that this had something to do with the water-powered sugar mill.

Somewhere in my paternal grandparents’ house there is a book about him that I intend to unearth when I have more time.

Some notes about the Spanish friar as a historical figure:

We would like to think that the Philippines had flourishing civilization before the Spaniards arrived on the scene. But “civilization” presupposes certain tools: wheel, plow, road, bridge masonry, paper, book, etc. We didn’t have any of those things before the Spaniards came, and therefore we cannot claim to have been a great civilization.

We would not have had those tools if the Spaniards – specifically the friars – hadn’t introduced them to us. We owe the friars for our civilization, and yet the friar is portrayed as the villain in our history. When we think of the friar, we think of Padre Damaso. We think of abuse and oppression and exploitation. We fail to acknowledge that the friars were our economic and cultural heroes.

The friars shaped our economy with the crops they planted: tobacco, cotton, coffee, sugar, melon, guava, and many others. We take for granted that these crops are not indigenous to the Philippines — the friars brought them here. When we broke away from Spain, we did not fear economic upheaval. We weren’t a colonial economy, tied to the factories and markets of Spain. We were economically independent.

They revolutionized our agricultural production by introducing the wheel and plow. Most Filipinos seem to think that the image of a carabao pulling a plow is intrinsically Filipino, but it is not. The pre-Hispanic carabao was meat, not a work animal. The wheel and plow lifted a mountain of labor off the farmer’s back and expanded his ability to produce.

The friars’ revolt against their superiors in Spain resulted in independent friar provinces in the Philippines.

They organized our dialects into grammars. The propagation of dialects instead of Spanish resulted in an independent Philippine Christian culture that is not merely a mirror of the Spanish or Mexican culture.

They opened up and mapped our lands.

They pulled us out of the midst of folklore and into the era of written history.

They built churches, bridges, damns, and irrigation systems that we still used today.

It’s not widely know that there were never many Spaniards in the Philippines and that lack of manpower translated to an inability to commit widespread abuses. Not that there weren’t any abuses in the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but the bulk occurred in the nineteenth century as a consequence of the political strife in Spain and the decline of the empire.

It was in the nineteenth century that civil administrators and soldiers from the colonies Spain had lost came flocking to the Philippines and only then did the widespread abuse become possible. I think that it’s extremely important to make that qualification because otherwise our perception of colonization and the impact of friar influence becomes skewed.

(As an introduction to the historical role of Christianity and the Spanish colonization in constituting the Filipino and the Philippine nation, I recommend the following writings of Nick Joaquin: (1) A Question of Identity: Bringing Out the Invisible Filipino in History; and (2) Culture and History: Occasional Notes on the Process of Philippine Becoming.)

The Pagbilao PMT

We’re moving forward in Pagbilao, slowly but surely. Last year I had such a hard time just getting someone from the LGU to talk to me, now we have a multi-sectoral Project Management Team (PMT) and we’re collaborating on an education program. Getting a new project off the ground is an experience similar to what I imagine birthing a child must feel like.

Setting up before the participants arrive, conducting the workshop

I conducted a workshop with the new PMT yesterday, whose members were handpicked by the Mayor to represent the different education stakeholders in society. The team is comprised of principals and teachers from both public and private schools, DepEd supervisors, the PTCA president, the SK chairman, the municipal administrator and planning and development coordinator from the LGU, the president of the chamber of commerce, and representatives from various social organizations including the senior citizens’ group. It’s such a great mix. The members each bring something unique to the table, and with their combined talents, resources and spheres of influence, I think we can achieve great things in Pagbilao.

DepEd presents a situationer

Pagbilao’s problems in education are not unique. The PMT identified low achievement test scores, low survival rate, high drop out rate, lack of instructional materials, lack of training for teachers, no home-school collaboration, parents who are not actively involved in their children’s studies as some of their major issues. They decided to conduct a series of assessment tests and surveys to determine the extent of the problems, and the data gathered will serve as the basis for refining their work program. There were lots of interesting insights and suggestions that emerged yesterday, and I’m really excited about putting them all together.

Cynthia from Team Energy, Ivy and I with Team Energy’s powerplant in the background

I never mind having to get up at 3:00 am and spending hours on the road to get to Pagbilao. I’m just happy that with each visit we make incremental progress. It feels great to be working with people who are so eager and so committed to education reform. Plus, Team Energy is such a gracious host and the VIP treatment we get at Bayview is a nice perk. Buffet breakfast and lunch FTW! I’m awfully cheap. You can work me to death for as long as you feed me.

Brigada Eskwela

In the afternoon we visted Pagbilao Central School to drop off supplies for Brigada Eskwela (National Schools Maintenance Week). Posing above with the brushes and cans of paint are teachers, Team Energy volunteers and the DepEd district supervisor.

2008 just completely flew by me. Looking back I can’t believe I did so much in what felt like such a short span of time.

January – Bohol

February – Hot air balloons, Corinne came home to visit, Shaws threw a party

March – Samal Island, Davao

April – Hanoi and Halong Bay, Vietnam

May – Dogma, Hong Kong and Macau, Royal Palm

June – Resigned from UA&P, took a break, tried to figure out what I wanted to do next, played a lot of Nintendo DS

July – Turned 27, started working at Synergeia, Pangasinan road trip

August – Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, Bicol

September – Anniversary

October – Plats came home to visit and I had a best friend in the same timezone for all of one week, Shanghai (Misc, Shanghai Museum, Oriental Pearl Tower and Urban Development History Museum, Sex Museum, Yuyuan Garden and Bazaar)

November – Siem Reap, Cambodia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, AIM Course on Leadership for Equitable Societies, met a lot of really awesome people who are making a difference

December – Puerto Galera, Movement for Good Governance, Bangkok, Thailand, met up with old friends, celebrated the holidays with Ryan and my family

+3

It took me a while to find my hotel shuttle, because it didn’t immediately register that “Bela Euñita” was supposed to be me. Take that, Rhayan Sumo.

Having local chief executives call my cellphone to ask me how my flight was allows me to pretend I’m some kind of VIP.

My mom likes to fuss over me whenever I leave for a trip. Not because she thinks I’m a half-wit who’ll forget to lock her door or keep an eye on her valuables, but because it’s her way of showing affection. This morning her motherly admonitions were:

“Dress conservatively ha. Probinsyano mga tao doon. Hindi sila sanay sa Manila girls.”

“Wag ka masyadong mag e-English doon.”

“Text me every now and then so I know you’re still alive. Teka, how will I know it’s you? We should have a password.”

I’m in the hotel cafe using the wifi and having a halo halo. I’m going to go have an early dinner now and then a massage in my room. My grueling meeting schedule starts tomorrow!

The City Mosque in Kota Kinalablu
Kota Kinabalu is a beautiful city, though the experience was slightly marred by my oh-my-God-I-want-to-die stomach pains. Ry suspects I may acid reflux. We still managed to get around the city and see some sights, though I had to down massive doses of antacid every two hours to keep me going.

Tune Hotel is a great budget hotel. They offer “a 5-star sleeping experience at a 1-star price” by charging you for only the things you use. You only pay for the number of hours or air conditioning you use, the room doesn’t come with towels and toiletries unless you request for them, etc. The room is small but it’s very comfortable and the bathroom is impeccably clean, which is what matters most to me. I also liked the convenience of being right next to 1Borneo Mall.

1Borneo has shuttle buses that drop off tourists and hotels guests at various locations around the city. It would’ve been a convenient (and cheap, since it’s free) way to get around, but unfortunately the schedule is terribly unpredictable. They’re supposed to come around ever thirty minutes but they can keep you waiting for hours. If you’re pressed for time, don’t depend on them. Take a cab. Cabs are expensive but the public transport system isn’t easy to navigate. They don’t have a train system, it’s not clear which bus goes where and it’s difficult to ask for directions because not everyone speaks English.

Ry would try conversing with people in Indonesian, and occasionally they would understand each other, but when that failed pointing out a place on a the map to a cab driver usually got us where we wanted to go. While Bahasa Indonesia and Bahasa Malaysia are almost the same thing, Ry says they pronounce some words differently and in general the Malaysians speak too fast for him to keep up with his rusty Indonesian. (Ry lived in Jakarta for a few years when he was younger.)

Shangri-La Tanjung Aru Resort is a beautiful resort and I’d love to stay there someday when we can afford to splurge.

It should be noted that the Airport Cafe serves great Nasi Goreng.

San Roque Power Corporation’s pool
San Roque, Pangasinan
Last week Dr. Guevara, Nicole (my co-worker, not Nix) and I went on a roadtrip to Pangasinan for a series of meetings in Sta. Barbara, Natividad and San Roque. We stayed at the sprawling 600 hectare compound of the San Roque Power Corporation, which felt more like a mountain resort than a hydropower plant. Their guesthouses are not too shabby, they’ve got pretty landscaped gardens, and they even have a pool. Dr. Guevara told me not to get used to it though, because those are probably the nicest accommodations I’ll ever get on the job.

Agno River, Pangasinan
The view from the top of the dam was breathtakingly beautiful. Being surrounded by so much nature made me want to break into song.

Some fun facts about the Agno River and the San Roque Dam:

• The Agno River is the third largest river in the Philippines with a total length of 221 km.
• The dam is located on the Agno River, spanning the municipalities of San Manuel and San Nicholas in the province of Pangasinan.
• The reservoir impounded by the dam extends north into the municipality of Itogon in the province of Benguet.
• The dam is 200 meters high, 800 meters wide and 1.2 kilometers long. It weighs about 90 million metric tons.
• The hydropower plant has an installed rated capacity of 345 megawatts (MW). It can operate year round at its dependable capacity of 85 MW for a minimum of eight hours a day. When surplus water is available, the SRMP can provide extra peaking capacity (beyond 85 MW) and/or generate off peak power.

It should be noted that there are goats everywhere and your car is no match for their sheer number. They are kings of the road.

San Roque goats
This week, I’m off to Bicol for another series of meetings. It’s the first time I’m going to be meeting with the LGUs and the local project management teams there, and unlike the Pangasinan trip, I’ll be conducting workshops all by myself. I’m a little nervous, but it’s heartening that the boss has enough confidence in me to send me out there independently so early in the game. (I haven’t even been with Synergeia a month.)

It doesn’t look like I can go with Ry to Singapore (where he’ll be attending a video game developers conference) in September. I can’t afford to take the time off from work. We still have Shanghai in October, Kuala Lumpur and Angkor Wat in November and Bangkok in December.

P.S. Wanderous rarely gets updated these days because Ry and I have been so busy with work and life in general. We’re still trying to figure out what to do about that. The response to the blog has been great and we’d really like to keep it up.