This was my 35th Assignment for Australian Business Volunteers - the organisation is about to go through some changes as their contract with the Australian Government expires on June 30, and the future is looking uncertain. Because the travel insurer will not cover volunteers after age 80: if I lived long enough, I only had ten more years left to participate; but: I wondered if I could have made it to 50 assignments before retiring. I may never know?
ANYWAY - back to the international airport, again. This time the taxi driver was of a very unusually ethnicity: he was Australian!!! I like flying Qantas as they have my details on record; they automatically allocate the seat I prefer (window), they print frequent flyer details on the boarding cards which the staff at the gate see when checking in and address you by your name, such as: “Thank you Mr Sharp, have a pleasant flight’ - which is a nice little touch when you know damn well that you are about to be uncomfortable and bored shitless for hours and hours.
I flew to Singapore and stayed overnight in the transit area hotel within the airport - which is OK if you are not too claustrophobic as the rooms do not have any windows. They sell the rooms in 6 hour ‘blocks’ and I had 12 hours; which meant that I needed to check out by 6am and then hang around the massive Changi airport until my flight at 10.45am (could not even check in and get a boarding card until 8.30am).
The toilets in that airport are ‘interesting’ because they have an automatic flush facility that operates as you dismount. However, if you just lean forward, the system makes an incorrect assumption, operates and threatens to give the user an enema.
Next was a flight to Manila, then to transfer from international to the domestic terminal and wait another three hours for the next flight to Cebu. Arriving on an international flight in Manila, and leaving on a domestic flight, you just scale a flight of steep stairs (festooned with seated locals who seem to use the stairs as their private lounge room) and walk a few meters. The first time I arrived domestic to depart international: I fought my way out of the terminal, then was told to wait half an hour on the street in humidity and exhaust fumes for a decrepit bus to convey me on a 20-minute drive through heavy traffic / this time I discovered that you can scale a few stairs and WALK to the other terminal - strange, eh?
I don’t usually engage passengers in the adjacent seat on aircraft in conversation and was pleased that; on the first flight of over five hours, there were two seats together and the one next to me was vacant, so I could lift the armrest and recline diagonally across the two seats. I watched the movie ‘Hurt Locker’ - and was glad I had not paid to see it in a cinema; how on earth did it win an Oscar?
On the second flight from Singapore to Manila there were three seats together and the middle one was vacant - the third flight, on Philippine Airlines, was packed, but that was only for an hour.
As you may have gathered: I’m not exactly enamoured about flying!! But, here’s a (vaguely) interesting story: the Premier of Western Australia (like a Governor in America), resigned a few years ago suffering from severe depression, then his wife died (cancer, I think). Anyway, he was on a flight and seated next to a woman he did not know….to cut a long story short: they are now married.
I think that some of my friends half expect me to return home one day with a brown or oriental lass in tow! I was chatting to the doorman at the hotel on the first morning in Cebu and, in answer to his friendly questioning, had informed him that I was single. He was reiterating how common it was for foreign men to marry a Filipino gal, buy a house and settle in. Then he was offering to sell me a house close by for P500,000 (about $12,500) - in Australia, that would probably be more like 500,000 DOLLARS! The other problem in those situations is that the foreigner marrying a local lass usually finishes up catering for all the new ‘bride’s’ hugely extended family!!! I did note that the foreign men did not necessarily hook up with the plethora of really pretty females abounding in the country.
I mentioned in a previous epistle about noticing advertising for soap in the Philippines promising to whiten women’s skin. I saw an even better commercial on local television: promising to increase women’s breast size by DRINKING some concoction! The commercial included an animation of fallopian tubes and a womb and the drink activating some bubbles therein, that boosted breast size. I’m not sure just how the ‘bubbles’ got from the stomach to the womb to the breasts? I laughed out loud at the strong warning that it was not recommended for men. Mind you - displays of brassieres in this part of the world look like they are aimed primarily at equipping Barbie dolls.
Come to think of it - along with the other ‘old man’ symptoms like a growing midriff diameter and weird stuff like growing hair on top of the ears; my ‘man-boobs’ are getting bigger. I recall an email conversation with Melanie a while ago when I mentioned jetting off somewhere and she said: “Who do you think you are, Paris Hilton?” I did not quite get the connection but responded: “She has more money than me, but I have bigger tits.” She said: “Put that on your business card: ‘Bigger tits than Paris Hilton’.” We are inclined to have what some people may construe as unusual conversations.
As I was forgoing my usual 8km morning walk, I decided to, at least, walk up and down the stairs to my hotel room - 92 steps for five floors, several times a day.
The Philippines is certainly an ‘interesting’ collection of islands….
- I asked to see a contract for one of my client’s activities and then clarified the request with: “I hope that it’s in English?” The response was: “Yes, it’s certainly in English, even we would find it hard to read in our language”.
- As with some other cultures, a foreigner can sometimes get the gist of a conversation essentially being conducted in a foreign language because of the generous sprinkling of English words. Any numbers seem to ALWAYS be spoken in English.
- It was election time (May 10) in the Philippines - for the entire range of officials from national representation to governors to local councillors - a total of 85,000 candidates running for 17,000 elective positions. In some areas there were 50 people running for 10 positions for local councillor, which resulted in some rather huge ballot papers - 2-feet long according to a newspaper. On May 1 - the Army were all put on ‘red alert’ for the duration.
- A statement in a local newspaper included the claim that ‘40% of all tax revenue was siphoned off in bribes’ - that’s a staggering amount? No wonder so many want to be politicians? Interestingly, the article put the onus on parents for not bringing up their children properly and giving them correct values.
- In a national survey: 70% of voters expected active ‘vote buying’, 56% expected ‘cheating’ including the counting of votes, 60% in Mindanao (where there were kidnaps and murders) expected ‘harassment’ of voters.
- There had to be a change of leader (Gloria Arroyo could not stand for another term) and the guy who became the next President of the Philippines (Benigno Aquino) was claiming that the Defence Department alone has been on a US$6.7 billion ‘spending spree’ in just the last two months! Obviously getting in before a change of government - imagine the amount of kick-backs in that little lot? Aquino is saying that the deals will be ‘subject to scrutiny’ if he was elected.
- Three weeks before the election there had been 90 ‘election related’ deaths; leading up to the last election in 2004, there were 189.
- Regularly, there were murders (often described as connected with the elections) reported in the newspapers as minor matters buried in the paper. Now that may be common in Chicago (or elsewhere) - but Australia, there would be screaming banner headlines.
- ‘Communists’ were demanding protection money from candidates to protect them from sustained attacks (by communists).
- A week before the election a candidate was shot dead in Cebu (where I was). The politician was shaking hands with supporters, then a guy he had just spoken to, pulled out a pistol, shot him twice then turned to run away, he glanced back and saw the politician moving, so he shot him four more times, then ran! Interestingly, the newspaper blatantly described the aspiring politician as a ‘drug lord’….
At the end of April, there was an attack on a van just outside Manila that was packed with police. It was blown up with a land-mine, and then they (allegedly ‘communists’) shot at it and threw hand grenades - killing four police. The aspect I found most interesting was that the story was covered in a relatively short report and relegated to page 28 of the newspaper … just another day at the office really?
- On the day of elections, there were only ten people killed! A fact that was reported on television, but did not rate a mention in a daily newspaper.
- AFTER the election, ‘rebels’ in one district ‘ambushed’ a convoy escorting completed voting papers, killing six and wounding twelve people.
It’s difficult for an outsider to comprehend Filipino politics - they seem to concentrate on family dynasties. Politics in the troubled south seems to be controlled by a few ruthless families. The new President is the son of a former President. The out-going President is accused of vote rigging and corruption - but she was newly-elected into Congress. Even more amazing, the infamous Imelda Marcos was elected to Congress AND her son was elected as a Senator AND her daughter was elected as a Governor! I don’t understand American politics either…..
On the night before (and the day of) the election, there was a ban on liquor sales across the Philippines, with many arrests. I had dinner the night before at a restaurant I had frequented a few times - but they served me a beer: disguised in a large coffee mug.
Before I embarked into the new realm of jewelry and fashion accessories (business advice and a detailed marketing plan) for this latest assignment, I said to Melanie that, this time, I was venturing “outside my comfort zone”. To which she responded: “Dad, you don’t have a ‘comfort zone’ anymore”. She could very well be right?
When I advise hotels, I am able to have meals in the hotel’s restaurant; which is not only easier; it is part of the assignment to continually assess the quality and service. But with assignments like this latest one, I was staying in a hotel, but did not have the advantage of partaking of free meals in the restaurant. So, each evening, I usually wandered about a 10-minute walk to a large, modern shopping centre which featured nearly 100 restaurants, with a great variety of culinary options. So, apart from playing Russian roulette when crossing a main road with traffic that seemed to consider pedestrians as a target; I partook of a variety of gastronomy delights, bearing a budget in mind! Being on a tight budget did effect what I would order so I was restricted to checking out menus offering cheaper options.
Isn’t it interesting what some countries celebrate in their culture? In Cebu, Philippines they held a re-enactment on a beach ‘celebrating’ the day (April 27th, 1521) that they murdered one of the world’s greatest explorers - Ferdinand Magellan. Perhaps it would be another idea to ‘celebrate’ the day that Captain James Cook was killed in 1779; perhaps a friend in Hawaii will tell me if you already do that?
I had several taxi experiences through mildly insane traffic. The Filipinos drive on the wrong side of the road: being the ‘right’ side, if you get my drift? If you drive up to cross roads and there is bumper to bumper traffic proceeding in front of you and you need to drive across (or turn either left or right), you just keep nosing your vehicle into the solid stream of traffic until someone either has to hit you or give way. No one seems to get overly excited that they are forced to let the vehicle in, and the traffic merrily proceeds.
A couple of times, ‘my’ taxi stopped at traffic lights in the left lane of a two-lane (each way) road in a queue to turn left. If there was no traffic, they would just turn into the right lane, pass the cars waiting to turn left, drive in front of the vehicle that was first in the queue and angle their vehicle across the lane, ready to turn left when the lights changed.
On two occasions we were proceeding along a divided highway, with two-lanes in each direction and a concrete barrier dividing the road - when we would encounter a vehicle coming towards us on the wrong side of the road.
Even when considering taking your life in your hands and walking across an allegedly ‘one-way’ street, it’s best to look both ways because there is bound to be a vehicle of some sort barrelling along in the wrong direction.
Apart from the few what could loosely be called ‘highways’, Cebu is primarily a labyrinth of narrow roads with no footpaths. Vehicles duck and weave their way through the maze like dodgem cars. Shops proliferate everywhere and customers would be standing on the road buying something from some tiny ‘hole-in-the-wall’ emporium. Some roads were allegedly ‘one-way’ - but just how you would know that, I have no idea.
A vaguely disconcerting habit of drivers was their predilection to cross themselves before setting off on a journey - or after a particularly narrowly avoided collision.
I treated myself to a haircut - about $3 (long way to travel to save $17?). He did a good job though but I had to stop him when he started on a scalp and neck massage … I’ve never understood the attraction of a massage!!! I must have needed a cut in the prevailing short-hair (for men anyway, the women all tended to have long hair) society as even the security officer at the client’s office commented on my haircut - he told me that I “looked younger”.
Life’s full of fascinating little vignettes … The client and all the staff were female (well, the ‘designer’ was male, but he was as camp as a row of pink tents). A slightly awkward moment occurred when I came out of a meeting with the client where we had been negotiating some deals and were standing on the bustling pavement discussing how well it had gone - a guy sidled up and tried to sell me packets of condoms! It was probably equivalent to ‘drugs’ in a catholic country?
I had an interesting interlude toward the end of the assignment -
I was in jail for about three hours!!!
My client (Grace) had an admirable commitment towards giving training and employment opportunities to ‘disadvantaged’ youth and one aspect was that she regularly gave craft lessons to kids in jail. They were in for crimes ranging from murder to what one gay inmate described to us as “shopping without money” - shoplifting. The visit was coordinated with another group of volunteers in Cebu from an organisation called Dekeyser & Friends with participants from all around the world, including: Asia, Africa, Russia, America, etc….(a few days before, Grace had given them a talk.) They were building new homes for people currently living in slums in a rubbish tip who scavenged to eke out a living by ‘recycling’; so they were also giving them instruction in a totally new form of life and livelihood.
The kids really enjoyed the craft exercise, it gave them contact with new people and broke their monotony by creating craft; they were all very friendly, chatty and extremely polite. I found the exercise most uplifting; but Grace told me that I would feel tired next day because I would have absorbed the negative vibes from the inmates - an interesting hypothesis?
As an aside, you have probably seen those YouTube videos of hundreds of Philippines’ prisoners doing impressive, mass-choreographed dance moves - well, they were housed in the penitentiary next to where we were, just over a towering concrete wall.
The kids we were interacting with were aged up to 17 years and 364 days (after that they were classed as ‘adults’). There were ‘adult’ inmates next door on the higher floors, looking at us through mesh grills and over a huge wall - it was fascinating to see that lot communicating by sign language with the kids we were working with - darned if I could follow what any of it meant though.
One form of ‘entertainment’ they had devised was to fly kites made from plastic bags, tethered by what looked like cotton. The kids on our side would get a kite airborne, then the ‘adults’ would get one flying (or vice versa) and they would do battle to see if they could cut the string or somehow cause the other kite to plummet - when it happened there would be enthusiastic cheering.
The drive to the prison was an education in itself. We were driving through the insane Cebu traffic, then we turned off and within seconds might have been in another world; it was suddenly quiet with virtually no traffic. There was unique vegetation, the ‘road’ was unpaved and very rough and began by running through a narrow valley with ‘homes’ clinging like limpets to sheer cliffs The abodes by the narrow roadside were basic and it looked like we had morphed into a poor Mexican village, or onto another planet all together…it was all kind of surreal and even spooky to tell you the truth. We then drove up a narrow, steep road to the ‘fort-like’ structure with towering concrete walls, which was the jail.
On the last night, the client took the staff (and me) to a restaurant for dinner – unfortunately, the meal I ordered was so bad that it was inedible but I did not have the heart to make a scene and embarrass them. Grace (the client) asked each one to make a small speech thanking me and the one that really stood out was a young guy (probably in his mid-20s) who thanked me because of the opportunity to have his first ever meal in a restaurant.
….and so that was yet another volunteer assignment fairly successfully concluded. The client now has her own custom-made 92-page Marketing and Business Plan, plus new accounting formats, a complete HR system (from Employment Contract to automatically calculating pay slips); and in a field that I’d not previously been involved with. The client seemed happy because she was originally told that it was not possible to locate a volunteer for her who could carry out the range of assistance she wanted – but we managed to provide what the business needed.
I love the challenges that each new assignment presents, meeting really interesting people and learning about different cultures....I now seem to know more people around the world than in Australia.
What I’m not all that keen on is the travel. This one required arising at 4am on Friday, travelling (three flights) and arriving home at 2am on Saturday!!!
And back to boring ‘reality’ – my laptop had a small crash and no longer connected to email or internet (not a situation that I’m just not happy with!) and I arrived home to find that the refrigerator in my kitchen had died!
Fix the fridge (one tiny broken silicone chip – so they replace an entire circuit board - $300), get the computer back in action ($230), service the car ($?) – why do I come home? PLUS: back to my own cooking, cleaning.......?
I’d been living in a noisy hotel by a busy street, so it takes some time to get used to the total silence at home at night….as I lay in bed all I can hear is the ‘tin’ valve in my heart clicking open and closed ….. tic, toc; tic, toc; tic toc…..
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Just a few photos (20) on ........