The end of our experience as Paulinians

Sunday, January 25

Today Sir Sunshine Troy was allowed a morning off of wake-up call duty as we awoke to the sound of the drums of Dinagyang. I have come to notice that when Filipinos celebrate, they celebrate. Just when you think they have completely outdone themselves you hear and feel the vibrations of fireworks. Dinagyang is only one of the many festivals that take place annually. This festival is to honor the Christening of the native people and to respect the holy Senor Santo Nino (Holy Child Jesus). Each group creatively honors Senor Santo Nino by incorporating a figure of him within their dance and chanting words honor to His name. We spent the morning at one of the 5 stations that all 17 groups of dancers and drummers march between to perform their dance. By the end of the day I am sure they must sweat off a good portion of the black or brown paint they have coated their bodies in to portray the look of the particular tribe. Each group had something like 60 dancers, 30 drummers, and support staff; some groups begin practicing as early as October to prepare the dance, music and costumes for the competition. At each station there are judges who evaluate each group according to various criterion such as choreography, costume, synchronization, etc. I am not sure if there is prize for the top groups, but as each group has sponsors, I am guessing that finishing in the top would increase the likeliness of sponsorship. Sponsorship is a great way to advertise as people come from all over to watch the performances. Among these people are some who live in remote areas with little money and resources. They come to the festival to beg as there are many festival attendees passing by. After the festival they return to their communities with their slim makings. The array of people in an array of different situations is overwhelming. I think Morgan is planning on writing more about some of our thoughts on this more in the excerpt of our return to Manila.

Note: Today Ma'am Sue left us to go back to Manila and then onward back to Canada. We are going to miss what a great teacher, mother, counsellor, and various other support forms she has been to us in preparation and during this trip. We've already warned her that she has got herself into 6 reference lists on 6 resumes.



Monday, January 26

A culminating activity this morning marked the beginning of our goodbyes. The culminating activity consisted of BP monitoring, weighing and measuring children, assessing any sick children, bathing children, exercise, games, health teaching on topics such as rabies and making of SLK (a cough and cold herbal remedy), and of course there was food. Culminating activities are always done at the end of a community rotation to bring closure between those particular students and the community. After the festivities were over we thanked the community for sharing their time with us, returned the babies to their mothers and took our last walk back through the rice patties. Goodbye to Janiuay.

After lunch we participated in the greatest cultural practice that we would all like to adopt: a siesta. I guess a full morning in the sun did more to us than evidenced by Troy’s lobster face. We went a little overboard and zonked out; I mean dead to the world zonked. When you are that far gone, it takes time to recover and come back to life. Life however doesn’t always want to give you the recovery time that you need; it was straight from pillow to dance floor for us. I don’t think the girl who volunteered to finish teaching us this Filipino folk dance was prepared for our zombie-like state. Somehow we polished up the steps though with only a few moments of hopelessness. After going through the whole 2 minute struggle of a dance a few times we were satisfied with just being able to get through it. We may regret this when we have to bring the dance out of the closet later on in Antipolo. I was relieved to see that the traditional costume was a skirt that would conceal all my mis-steps throughout the dance. This was before I tried it on though. As our hips and good new honest friend Hansel tell us that we eat like Filipino men, I had to pull the skirt so high in order to do it up that my feet were exposed. Humbug.

For supper we were privileged once again to dine with the Sisters in the convent. I could eat in the company of the Sisters everyday and not get tired of it. They are a great hospitable bunch each with their own character. I think they were happy to dine with us also because at every special event ice cream is served. Tonight I realized that I need to be cautious in how much I express my appreciation of the Sisters though because now that my singleness is revealed I am a prospect future Sister. The fact that I am not Catholic is only a minor detail. With enough prayer by the Sisters I will be back with a habit on before I know it. Thank you to the Sisters reading this, we enjoyed your company thoroughly. Communal dish washing is a new love of mine!

The rest of the evening was spent with the student’s at Carmelle’s beautiful home for one last hurrah! The people at SPU have all really made Iloilo our home away from home. As Jazzper (one of the students) put it: “it’s like we are old friends who haven’t seen each other in a long time.” It’s comfortable/we click. The students outdid themselves once again by generously presenting to us a slideshow of our stay along with personal gifts from our buddies. We hope they all know that we are serious about their longstanding invitation to visit us in Saskatchewan. See you soon?

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

This evening we will be departing Iloilo to move on to Antipolo so as at the end of every course, evaluations were in store. The top two things that stick out to me from the evaluation discussion about or experience in Iloilo are the importance of the mutual relationship/attitude and the need for a longer length of time to better understand the process of community health at SPU. We are all very impressed by the authentic experience that SPU facilitated and could not think of much more that we could ask for. We have learnt so much about health and culture through the experiences provided and through the conversations within the relationships that we were able to build.

The afternoon was spent shopping with the students. Since I am not much of a shopper I don’t have much to add. We ended the day with a hug fest and exchange of emails and we were off to the airport. Salamet SPU! We are honored to leave here as the title given: Canasians.