The Dark Days

More rough times and more spectacular times! The best parents in the world sent me a care package with a lot of necessities, plus nutella and my favorite Oreo Cakesters! Talk about a treat! Since my willpower concerning sweets is very lacking…none of it lasted very long, but every morsel of those Golden Oreo Cakesters (proud of my product placement) was the best moment ever for my taste buds! They have gotten so accustomed to rice, kalamungay leaves, and tabios (black lentil like beans.) That is my lunch at school every single day. Something random and funny, before Gangnum Style went all on the rage here, it was “Teach Me How to Dougie.” If you do not know this song, it is a pretty explicit rap song; it is quite amusing to have it blasting cuss words during school presentations. Also weird, spider fighting is becoming a big problem at my school. Kids will bring them in matchboxes and make bets on who will kill the others. Speaking of, I saw a larger than tarantula creepy spider in our kitchen the other day, biggest one seen yet, my sisters screamed and ran away and I gagged a little, but it scampered off quickly.

A positive note, my Glee students are so amazing! They performed for the first time in front of Cathy and me last week. A group of 5 boys sang, “I’m Yours” acoustically with one drum, and it literally made me teary-eyed. Sooooo cute and good!  I got all of the performances on video, so be looking for them being posted soon! They must have spent a lot of time practicing since some of the groups actually created dance numbers along with their songs. I was so so proud, and I can’t wait for what is ahead for us! My plan is to create an original musical!!! I know this is rather ambitious, haha. I also really feel like I am making progress with my classes. I had a few overwhelming days when my co-teacher was absent with a toothache, so I had to take over her 4 classes, giving me 8 for the day with no breaks, and 3 of those are the grade 7 kids where there is no curriculum yet, so lesson plans have to be created from scratch. Stress overload which brought back my ear infection…but taking the good with the bad! There are also many other annoyances that come along with Cathy not being around, and the only 3 other English teachers don’t know what when there is a big event (like Education Week this week, where the English Dept. is in charge of planning an activity/challenge/celebration for every day next week), acting like nervous sheep without their shepherd, leaving me to do even more work and planning, but I don’t want to get into that now, we will see how next week goes.

The Trouble-Makers...

They are so cute and silly

Funny.

I had quite a terrifying experience the other night. I was walking into my little bathroom area and I look through my curtains and see a HUMAN HAND through the bars on my window. I think I yelled, “Hey, get out of here!” in the heat of the moment. I did not think too much about it, but boy was my heart beating fast! The scary thing is that the back if my hut is not fenced in and leads out to where there are a bunch of squatters who live on the beach. I am pretty sure that this midnight visitor was just a curious kiddo, but I was still spooked. About an hour later someone is throwing rocks at my wall, definielt kids, and I yell in Cebuano to go away or I will call the police and that got them out of here. I was hesitant to even tell my family because I have such a good set-up here (of course Daniel was furious at this when he told me to wake them up at that very moment when I called him after it happened), but my principal is already worried it is too dangerous. I told the fam the next day and my host dad installed more lights in the back (of course useless now that the electricity has been out all week, haha). Now people just yell “Hi Ate Allie” while they are walking down the street outside my hut. Ughhh, I really hate the lack of privacy, but not much I can do about it.

I had the best weekend with Daniel in Manila. Nutella and bread for breakfast, lazy movies, burritos, more tasty mangosteens and lansones, and even found new season of GLEE on the TV, sadly not impressed by it...I miss the innocent children. We also had a really cute skype date the week before where we fell asleep. GAG, I know, but it was so cute. In Manila, we ventured out to the GIANT Chinese market “Divisoria.” Major sensory overload in a good way, we only got lost in the labyrinth of it all a couple of times. The next night while just strolling about outside, we stumbled upon a surprise giant colored/music fountain bonanza. It was so random and fun, with lots of people and the fountain lights shot up, danced, and colors went along with the different songs played. The whole weekend went so well and much such a much needed escape for both of us. It felt so cool navigating all around Manila using Tagalog and taking jeepenys instead of taxis just like the locals! Saying goodbye is always hard, but we have another adventure coming up so coon for Christmas in Bohol with the Yoda-like tarsiers!

Entrance of Fancy ChinaTown Area

The Lovely and Magical Fountain

After all of that was the big typhoon that you all have heard about. Typhoon Pablo had a major temper tantrum and took out a bunch of our power posts, damaged classrooms and the beach/corals. No fun at all. So, we have been without power and water here for a week. Luckily, my host dad filled up our big water tank before the storm, so we are still using water from that. The first few days were fun with dinners by candlelight, playing cards, and having to be creative for fun…but now it is getting a little old. I feel very secluded and really don’t like having to do everything in the dark now, not to mention how sweltering hot the classrooms are with fans not working. School is back in session, but it is really hard to teach and learn in these circumstances.  I was very grateful that Daniel emailed my family to keep them in the loop, and that my host family here did so much to make me feel safe (even trying to get me to sleep on the floor in their house with the 20 other neighbors.) So as of today, December 9th, the Philippines President, Benigno Aquino III, has declared the Philippines being in a "State of Calamity" Yes, this actually exists, and what it means is that now local governments will be able to access funds for rescue, relief, and rehabilitation. The death toll is now at 540, with 1,100 injured, and 827 missing. The far worse affected areas have of course been the poorest regains, with flimsy houses that easily blew over and were completely destroyed, leaving the residents to fend for themselves in the flood waters. Most Filipinos, who I have met, do not know how to swim... A quarter of a million people are now homeless for Christmas and millions overall have been affected. It is a very sad situation, but people are now doing the best that they can to move on and recover. Enough of the sad facts now...

I had a pretty cool experience this weekend that really shows how much my family here feels like I am really a member of their family. They kind of kidnapped me to go to their other family members house up in the mountains for a fiesta that they were hosting. It was so beautiful and my host mom’s two brothers live there and live completely off of their own land, rarely going into the city, unless to use their roosters for cockfighting. Everyone kept telling me that day that I would be the one to kill the pig for the next day fiesta. They were serious, and I was seriously freaking out. Thank goodness once we got there, it had already been done and the blood made into tasty dinuguan and all the parts separated. However, I did have the pleasure to machete the pig skull open to scoop out the brains. There is a first for everything! We fired it all up the next day, and it was the best pork I have ever tasted! It was also pretty cute sleeping on the bamboo floor with my host mom and sisters. The next day, we went on a hike so they could show me where they fetch water everyday. It is so interesting in a time like today that people chose to live this old fashioned life, where they could easily move down to where the rest of the family live with cell signal, electricity (most of the time) and running water. It was all really cool, and besides the many Cebuano “Marry Me” jokes, I felt like part of the family. I was also surprised at the Cebuano that I can actually speak, and I love it that I can play the card game, Tung-Its, with the men and win. It was also so nice to have a mini adventure even with no electricity and the only thing to do was hand-wash all of my super smelly laundry, which I inevitably had to do the next day, but host mom and sissies all helped, they really are the sweetest. So, now it is on with the next 2 weeks of school before Christmas Break, likely being without power the whole time. It will be a stressful and sweaty time, but well worth it for the love I feel from my host family here and from Daniel across the seas. The big reward for all of this hard work will be Christmas party at school, then Bohol with Daniel for tarsiers and pristine white sand beaches, then New Years Even with all of my favorite Peace Corps friends in my very own city next door of Dumaguete. Definitely still taking the bad with the good, but still trying to make a small difference each day, since I am being so changed for the better by my students and really everyone I care about here in the Philippines. Typhoons, blackouts, earthquakes, phone text/calling mishaps, mysteries, and all, I couldn’t think of having it any other way.

Fainting at a Wedding

I had a moment the other day when I saw my school working as a pretty well oiled machine…but then I thought of a few gears that need some oil. First of all, more teachers! There are not nearly enough, only 3 English teachers for over 1000 students, which means certain classes are just left alone without a teacher (of course the lowest performing students). Also cheating is a huge problem, they don’t see anything wrong with copying their neighbors paper. The students actually say, “Cheating is an art.” Then there are tons of errors in the lesson plan book issued by DepEd, so I have to re-create almost every lesson to actually make sense to my students and be correct information and grammar. No wonder the students struggle when they are getting information that contradicts itself, and the teachers do not know any better, so they just ready straight from this overcomplicated and wrong book. Depressing… Anyways, I am working on a solution, if everything was functional I wouldn't be here! I am beginning to really enjoy teaching and seeing my students perform well and try so hard. A few other cool things like the “your trash is your problem” motto and how environmentally friendly Dauin is. The school is extremely clean because students are all assigned to do certain things at the end of the day like sweep, water plants, wax floors, the whole 9 yards. Last week my town launched our Dauin Anti-smoking ordinance, so the whole school was required to make hats with unique slogans for each advisory class and a poster competition. There was also a jingle competition, a student-made MASCOT competition, and a 2-hour parade in the sweltering heat. People who know how much I adore mascots and any oversized costumed silly creature, even more so on little kids, would understand how that was my favorite part. They were so good too! Once they were all judged, the announcer said alright thanks and moved on, but the mascot kids all just stood there confused in their costumes for about 10 more minutes until some woman went and tugged them along. Very funny to me. I am still trying to figure out Filipino humor, but the story of my life here is me cracking up constantly at things and my co teachers or students smiling awkwardly confused. Actually, who am I kidding, that has kind of always been the story of my life…I am weird. Anyhow, It would have been all roses and pansies if the parade were not sooo long in suchhhhh sweaty weather. It was slimy gross and luckily no one collapsed. There must have been thousands of students and teachers in the parade because all of the schools around were a part of it. We had cool matching t-shirts and hats to make us feel better, and the students seemed to never lose too much energy while singing gangnum style and chanting my name for a good minute. I have never had hundreds of kids chanting my name before…I admit I felt pretty cool and had to laugh out loud at the ridiculousness of it. I also spotted a private residence near my town named “Casa Alexandra” with a pretty sign…how curious…I would like to meet the inhabitants…

THE MASCOTS!

There was a music festival going on in Dumaguete city a few nights ago, I went with my host parents (who are really only in their mid 30s, they are definitely more of my friends than parents). It was a good time. Most of the bands just played covered American songs with a few lyrics changed to Tagalog. I ran into a few of the Australians who have been staying at Harold’s. It is funny how I know almost every white person around Dumaguete at this point. I have also become quite good friends with Golda, a Filipina who is a girlfriend of a Peace Corps volunteer. This is an all too common phenomenon, but these two are so cute together, and it is quite sad that he is going back to the states in 6 months (they have been together the whole 2 years he has been here and he extended his service). We usual make fun of dating locals, but I approve of this pair. It was also fiesta time in Dumaguete, so my family dragged me around to 4 houses of their family members to eat more whole roasted pig lechon and rice rice pork fat rice rice rice! I also got thrown up on by lots of flies all day…is it true they throw up every time they land? Jeff Goldblum doesn’t lie…but Sci-Fi?

So, GLEE CLUB! I made a bunch of cool flyers with the logo I had designed, for glee club try-outs! It was an exciting time, and so many students kept coming up to me asking questions. I was nervous that there would be way too may students to be able to control, so I decided for try-outs, each student would have to sing or dance for 1 minute without any accompanying music, this scarred away a fair number. So, the day came when I was in front and ready to start try-outs, my partner teach, Cathy, also is all about it, so she came to help out. A GIANT crowd of students is standing right around the room from all angles, trying to peek in…we get about 40 something brave souls. Some are really great and others not so much! A 17 year-old boys rendition of Tom Petty’s “learning to fly” while playing the guitar almost brought me to tears. Students were literally attacking the windowpanes and crawling on top of one another trying to peak in. I guess they are not used to exciting activities because their reaction was truly insane. Also, there were a small number of students who just wanted to dance, and since I said no music, they had their own knock off iPods in their ears and went all out dancing just from that. It was veryyy amusing for us just watching with no music. I was also impressed by their fearlessness. I decided to let all of the kiddos brave enough to try out into the club, even though everyone will not perform, but I posted the results alphabetically without numbers, so as I posted the sheet of new members the next day, another giant crowd formed, and students screamed with excitement when they saw their names on the list. Insanity again kicked in. It was the cutest thing ever though how happy they got when they saw their names. We now meet once a week on Thursdays after school, and next week they will perform songs of their choosing in groups of 5. Should be interesting/ awesome! I am prepared for constant insanity to ensue each meeting. Cathy and I are also planning a remedial reading program for a number of students who are very much behind, we will have it every Friday afternoon, and I am supposed to start coaching basketball too. I already founder into bed each night at 8 exhausted, I don’t know if I can handle more, but we will see! Bring it on… I also am wearing the teacher uniform now, different color and style for each day of the week, I feel like I look pretty intimidating, but the pink Thursday is definitely the most cutesy and innocent looking.

Advertisement at my favorite Dumaguete coffee shop...you can see why!

Thursday Uniform

On to the big event now…

I went to my first wedding in the Philippines on Friday…and guess what? It was between a male Peace Corps volunteer and a Filipina local. We PCVs joke a lot about this subject, and I could not help but edit video shots in my mind for “Four Weddings” on TLC, like when the mangy street dog scurried across the aisle (I added the token boing funny sound,) but it was a nice ceremony…besides when I passed out. Yes, I have never fainted in my life, and of course it has to happen in the middle of a wedding ceremony to keep my life exciting. Luckily, it was during a song and only a few people noticed, not the bride and groom. I awoke from being unconscious for about a minute to Chris holding me and 4 Filipinas pushing water, smelling salts, and pinches all over me. They seem to be always prepared for anything. I had been pretty sick for about a week and I guess the hot church was too much for me, or maybe I just got possessed by the Holy Sprit! Chris caught me as I was heading down, so I did not end up banging my head. He also carried me into the Peace Corps van with my Peace Corps Manager, who was at the wedding too and demanded I go to the emergency room. That was unpleasant, we saw a man have a stroke, then vomit and die there. Then we waited for a few hours with the doc telling me she wanted to admit me since I had a bad fever, but there were no available beds, so instead she prescribed me 4 different sets of meds and it was agreed that I would leave for manila with my manager the next day. Chris texted Daniel about the incident when I was incapacitated, and Daniel got on an overnight 12 hour bus to meet me in Manila…that was the silver lining. It was so cute, he packed all of his giant heavy dictionaries in case he had to talk to the doctors and translate. However, it was actually a joke, because Peace Corps left me to fend for myself in Manila until I was asked to have tests done on Monday when I got there on Saturday. So, I basically got a free weekend hangout with Daniel, which would have been lovely besides that I felt like death the whole time. We managed to feel like a normal couple for once though, went to eat at an amazing Korean restaurant, and strolled around the city (except that I almost passed out again from heat exhaustion and starvation) then we went on to watch some of a Filipino drag queen dress up competition…so actually I don’t think we will ever have a “normal” date in the Philippines… and I am totally okay with that! They ran all the blood tests on me at the Peace Corps Office in Manila, and turns out no dengue as suspected, just a respiratory infection…so I got 2 more bundles of meds. Pretty sure I just freaked out my manager since she saw me faint, and she just wanted to be sure everything was okay. Funny thing is, Daniel and I planned a meeting in Manila 2 weeks later, so we still get to have that too! I saw tons of other volunteers in the Peace Corps office and around manila since they have us all stay at the same hostel. I heard so many host family horror stories, and it really made me grateful again for all of the luck I have had here. This one poor guy, his first family got a hold of his journal and read all of his personal thoughts and complaints about him and the teenage daughter ransacked his room, then his second host father sexually harassed him every day, but he got past that all and finished his 2 years and is now heading back to the states before he extends for another year in the Philippines! He also gave me the best peanut butter I have ever eaten in my life, so that made him a good friend. I also think my taste buds have just lowered their standards since being here for a few months. Things that I used to find bland and unsatisfying…like plain white rice… now are delicious! So I will take it!

When I arrived home, my entire hut had been turned upside down cleaned of the millions of spider homes and decked out in Christmas decorations! There was also the adorable note below in a stocking on the door. I know I complain about these girls all of the time, but fact is It is going to tear me apart when I leave them, especially since I plan to stay in their compound for the whole 2 years. I really know now what it is like to have sisters, and they completely idolize me. I have fully accepted that I will be drenched in their sweat smeared into my own at all times since they are constantly hugging and climbing on me. It is still weird for them to be so fascinated by every little thing I do, but it is pretty cute, and more cute than annoying on most days. I have made it to the point where I really feel like part of the family, if only I was fluent in Cebuano! That is what I am working on now…

"Get Well Soon, We Decorate Ourself from Nicole, I Love You Allie Nunes"

Random funny: When I asked one of my classes to write down one of their main goals in life, this was a humorous answer I got…“when I sick a dengue the nurse always get a blood to my hand and I always crying. I said to the nurse if I will be a medic someday, I will get your hand and get a blood! Now I study hard to become a medic.”

This is such a fun filled time with all the Manila excursions, first GLEE performance in December, spending Christmas with Daniel and the tarsiers, all the coolest Peace Corps peeps coming to my hood for New Years, then visiting my old host family in Subic for the Anti-Atihan Festival celebrating baby Jesus and the Aeta tribe in January! I also feel like I am making such progress with each one of my classes. No matter how depressed I might have been on Thanksgiving (actually had the worst dinner here yet consisting of rice and only chicken bones?) I feel like I am here for a reason. The homemade family photo with my surprised skype face and foods made by bro helped a lot. I am definitely having way more good days than bad here now, and to be sentimental for a moment, I know this is where I am meant to be at this time in my life…

The One Where The Ants Attacked

WARNING, this is a long one! So, I will start off by reporting some more amusing blunders…so you can continue to find humor in my misfortune and struggle. The other night, the power conveniently decided to go out during my nightly tabo bathing. I was not the slightest bit prepared, when I should have been since it happens so often. I nakedly fumbled out of the bathroom to find my head lamp, sloshing my whole place in the scavenge, also squishing a number of bugs and probably drowning the rest, just to have the power come back on a few seconds later. What a world. Another, I was digging through my dirty clothes to find my skinny jeans for school one day since they are formal wear here (even though I hate skinny jeans), I shimmied into them and began to feel a crazy painful burning and stinging all over. It was 5 AM, I was still half asleep and had no idea what was going on. It was quite a fight getting the pants off my confused and sweaty legs. Guess what I found inside? Hundreds of red ants. I literally had ants in my pants. Not pleasant…very very painful actually, I felt quite violated. This phrase would never have become a common funny if people knew the true pain ants in your pants entails! Itchy butt for a week.

Speaking of ants though. They actually fascinate me. What other creature can hold up to 100 times its body weight? Did you know ants are the longest living insects, living up to 30 years? Also , all of the worker, soldier, and queen ants are female, some species of which are asexual and clone themselves without requiring any males! Girl power! As you can see, they have gained my respect, which is why I did not support the unsolicited attack on my butt and legs in my very own pants. Another strange ant story, the other night I was eating a standard meal of entire fried chicken, head, feet, and all, eaten with my hands of course. After dinner, I took my water glass back to my hut. I went off to do something unproductive, and when I came back to my water a few minutes later, ants were completely covering the outside of the glass in the perfect shape of my handprint. I don’t know what I was thinking in not getting a picture of this because it was soooo cool. I guess ants like chicken grease too…and yes I am gross and dirty and did not wash my hands. I have decided that the theme song for ants should be Destiny Child’s “Survivor.”

Nicole and I in our backyard

Teacher Dance Party

So, what could be worse than a burnt puppy from the last blog? Well, here we go. The other night, a giant rat attacked and killed one of the baby kittens by chewing off its face. How do more and more disturbing things keep happening here? Luckily for me, I did not see the aftermath. I woke up to Nicole pleasantly informing me one of the kittens was dead with chunks of it’s head gone. Then, her mom told me a giant rat was the culprit. I am also pretty sure I spotted this savage beast scurrying across the top wall of my nipa a few nights ago. I heard its hisses and clicks, waking me up in the middle of the night, then I spotted its outline creeping like a creeper on the wall right above my bed. Thank goodness for my mosquito net to be able bounce that freak off before touching me if he fell, but it would still surely still be a traumatizing event. Why are rats so disgusting and yucky!?! LEPTOSPIROSIS! That’s a reason why. I was also in bed for 2 whole days dead to the world with a fever of 103, a few days ago then woke up the 3^rd morning to be back to normal…must have been too much poison in my system from all of the spider bites or who knows what else. Before I was fully recovered, my co-teachers dragged my sick self in my pajamas to a beach party. It was actually really really fun, and I saw a different side of my principal, other principals, and the coolest teachers. 5 bottles of red wine were consumed and lots of singing and dancing, one of the male teachers plays the guitar and took requests, pretty fly for a Filipino guy. Some other pleasant things, I got to skype with my Subic family! It was their first skype session ever, and they were so cute and excited. My little shadow, Chloe was pretty shy and not her usual spunktacular self, but she still told me that she misses me so much and loves me. Made my tummy tickle, and I look forward to going back to Subic for their fiesta in January with Daniel and Hillary.

A few of my favorite kiddos

I had a minor freak out the other day. I had just gotten home from school and was changing and fiddling about while the girls were playing on my computer. Nicole runs over with the computer to show me something, and within seconds it crashes to the ground. The most painful sound my ears have ever heard. The screen went to being covered by bright green and red squiggles while the computer actually cried BEEP BEEP BEEP repeatedly until I shut it off. At that moment, I though all was lost, my only connection to the outside world, how superficial I know… I took a deep breath, shooed the girls out of my hut in not the most pleasant way, Nicole, who dropped the computer was balling with guilt. Serves her right. Brat. Just kidding. Kind of… I have been on spoiled little girl overload for a while now. It was probably for the best because now they are too scared to touch my computer, but this has actually enhanced their focus on grabbing at me and commanding me to entertain them like a monkey. Anyways, I was so so so worried I had lost all of my lesson plans, entertainment sources, and connection to family. I just stared at it for a while shut down on my bed…said a short prayer…then called Daniel to whine and for moral support as I tried to turn it back on. Turns out…it works perfectly. There is a green nick on the right bottom corner where first vertical contact with the floor was made, but no other harm done. I honestly do not understand how I get so lucky sometimes!

Fun fact. Everything is “ube” flavored here. Ube candy, ube filled bread, ube cookies, ube ice cream, ube, ube, ube! It is also bright purple! I have always been so amused and curious about this flavor’s true origin. I found out today that it is a root crop kinda like a sweet potato. AKA purple yam, native to the Philippines. Pretty cool. TEAM UBE!

Actual UBE!

The bathroom situation here never ceases to amaze me or gross me out. There is no toilet paper of course to be found anywhere. Most all bathrooms are toilets without seats and a bucket of water with tabo sitting next to it. I understand that hands are used, and tabo pours everything down after instead of a flush. But what still blows my mind is at my school, these immaculately put together women in their cute uniforms go into the tiny “comfort room” do their thang, and come out looking the same with no water spills or splashes anywhere even though the entire floor is a couple inches of standing water at all times! Oh, and no one washes their hands? There is no soap to be found anywhere...flabbergasting…and Icky? Will I ever understand?

Us 4^th year teachers planned a community clean up project, and we took all of the oldest 4 year students out to clean up the area all around the town cemetery since so many people will eat and sleep there the night before All Saint’s Day to spend time with their dead ancestors. It was covered with gross trash and weeds, but I think we did a pretty goof job at spiffying it up. My Dauin Filipino friends here had a Halloween party the day after Halloween, which is really not a big event at all in the Philippines. It was pretty cool though, giant speakers and strobe lights were set up in an uncle’s backyard. We all painted our faces for fun. A funny thing is that for Halloween, if people do dress up here, it is a vampire, zombie, or something else scary. Scary is the only option. We also walked for like an hour to a far away deserted cemetery at midnight, quite spooky, and the boys had a few good pranks. Families all go to the cemeteries to pay respect to the dead on Nov 1^st, All Saints Day. I went with my family to visit a few relatives and light some candles. I also had a long conversation there with my host mom about her deceased father and the whole tradition, it was a pretty cool cultural exchange.

 Some cool Negros kids came to visit me this weekend, including Hillary! We all cuddled and slept on the floor and went snorkeling and ate ate ate. We found some awesome restaurants and bars in dumaguete. My new favorite place is called Hayahay, it has tons of tiki lights and carved wood sculptures, they play a different style of live music every night and have the best fresh seafood, and it is where all the cool kids hang out. Saturday night was a volunteer’s going away party. The famous Harold hosted it at his actual house. Tons of drinks, food, and videoke of course. I had been going through videoke withdrawals, and I definitely got my fix this weekend. Hillary and I hit our all time low of getting a score of 22 on some Phil Collins song...I am telling myself it was because we were sharing the mic. Get this too, best part of the weekend, those of you who know me know how obsessed I am with Lando, one of my best friend’s bullmastiff doggie. Walking up to Harold’s house, I spot the spitting image of sir Lando. I might have cried a little bit…actually I definitely did, and was a loner for a good hour outside of the party playing with Lando doppelganger. No regrets. Harold has a bullmastiff and a Rottweiler, both are so so so cute. I still can’t believe how much Ms. Aubrey looks like Mr. Lando. Best part, Harold says I can come over anytime to walk them along the beach right in back, and he will feed me scrumptious food in return. Definitely made my night and helps a tad with homesickness. Harold’s house is so fancy and nice, seeing as he is loaded from the hostel and dive shop he owns. The night was pretty epic and turned into a dance party that moved to the one club in dumaguete and lasted into the wee hours of the morning. I mentioned he dated a few Peace Corps volunteers before, but after this wknd adventure it became even clearer of what a funny Filipino player Harold is. I give him props, I don’t find him attractive at all, he is in his 30s, but he has these young, hot foreign girls who stay at the hostel from all over the world fighting for his attention. It was actually pretty amusing, and one of his best friends, Christine (40 something year old sexy fake boobed Filipina with a 20 something German boyfriend) gave us so much entertaining chika chika, but these people basically live a telenovela soap opera life. I am still deciding how good of friends I want to become with these people, they might actually be insane….but sure are fun! Harold invited a few of us over to his other beach house the next day, which was great and relaxing and we said a final goodbye to Andrea, who went back to the states. If the weekend was not busy and crazy enough, I get asked to be a “candle” at my Filipino friend’s sister’s 18^th birthday party. All 18 of us girls wore dresses and said a little speech. The girl’s father sang her this beautiful song, and I started balling. I don’t think there was actually a pair of dry eyes anywhere in sight. From what I have seen, most Filipinos are very sensitive and sentimental, not afraid to show their feelings. It was so sweet, but it made me miss my own dad soooo much and this is the most homesick I have been yet…but thank goodness for our weekly skype dates, makes it a bit easier.

Hayahay

We watched a storm moving over Apo Island

THEN…I get a call from Peace Corps during my class on Monday telling me that we are having an emergency drill and since I am the warden, I have to consolidate my whole group at our meeting point in Dumaguete as soon as possible, even from the other island of Siquijor. It could not have come at worse timing, my students have been preparing for a month this special dance and song to encourage anti-smoking that there were going to present that afternoon…so I missed it. Quite bummed, and it was stressful telling my principal and teachers that I had to leave right away and texting/calling all my peeps to get them informed, but it worked out fine.... a little bit like amazing race. Funny enough, our consolidation point is Harold’s Mansion Hostel in Dumaguete, so we had more rooftop beers and chillaxed for the night once again. We also cut up some fresh pineapple and ate chooks to go chicken (the best fast-food whole chickens in the Philippines) while we filled out our form about how the consolidation process went. We only do this drill once a year, so it is good to have the surprise over with. Especially since later that night was the worse night here for me in the Philippines so far…It consisted of no AC in a dorm with 16 sweaty girls, phone fighting with Daniel, loud and drunk Australians coming in and out of the room at all hours of the night, someone throwing up in the doorway at 3 AM…stinky, and the shower I was so excited about not working…then having to make it back to school early the next day for my daily 6 exhausting classes. Depressing. That is today now and where I am at.

I went to the giant launching of “Ten Moves” last weekend. TEN for The Entire Nation, Moves. It is a campaign to raise enough resources to build 10,000 classrooms in public schools all over the Philippines. Its main strategy is to get 2 million people to donate P10 per day for 10 months. The schools with the greatest need will benefit, and a few of those schools are in my region of Negros Oriental. The Philippines public schools total recorded lack 66,800 classrooms. So, I realize I have not talked much about my actual work here at school. This is mostly because it is not exactly a positive situation at the moment. I have been extremely frustrated at school recently because there are a number of English teachers retiring. Nothing against them, but since they are just taking their “leave” now, not actually retiring until later, no other teachers can be hired. It has led to a very unpleasant and exhausting situation of only 3 English teachers left to teach over 1000 students. What is more infuriating is that I am technically not allowed to teach alone in the classroom for Peace Corps liability reasons, and I do not have Philippines teaching certification. To get around this, I have my own classes, but random teachers just sit in the back and all of the paperwork is under their name. For the past month, I have been thrown around everywhere to cover for teachers and this and that, so I am finally so happy to have a somewhat regular schedule. Turns out, I am only teaching 4^th year now, the oldest students. I co-teach three of the classes with a really amazing teacher, Cathy Credo, and have 3 classes of my own. It is a lot of work, stress with grades, and lesson planning since the classes are at different levels, but my students are so sweet and motivated to do well as far as I can see now. I also found out when us Negros kids consolidated, everyone else is still observing and most are not feeling useful at school, so at least I am feeling productive! Even if it is leaving me physically and mentally drained every night, it is what I came here to do. I have begun to implement a remedial reading program for certain students, grade 7, the youngest, who do not meet the expected level, the school actually calls them students at the “frustration level.” We will see if this will be successful or not, I just have to find a time when all of the students can meet. Glee Club is also pulling together nicely, I have the by laws all written up and objectives, we might even have our first meeting next week! My co-teacher, Cathy is so excited to help me with this, and it makes it so much easier having her enthusiasm and smarts be a part of it. There are almost too many students who are interested though, so we might need to hold try-outs. Who knows though, things move at a much slower pace here. Nothing much else to look forward to any time soon…a lonely Thanksgiving…but my students make me laugh every day and the beach cuddles and comforts me when I need it!