4-Making Friends

My fellow AYAD companion in Bacolod, Aruna, and I had decided we would search for an apartment to share, as we are going to be in Bacolod for roughly the same amount of time and we get on really well. After a couple of weeks of house hunting, we found what we were looking for and have now moved in. The location was the clincher – close to restaurants and cafes in the uptown area and opposite Jo’s place, the other Aussie AYAD in Bacolod. The other big plus is that it is furnished. While it is a little more than we were budgeting on, it just so happened that the owner is a cousin of my supervisor and we got a discount! It is a 3 bedroom apartment so … our spare room is ready and waiting for visitors! (Photos next time after we’ve cleaned the place!)

Aruna and I have started formal evening classes in the local dialect, Hiligainon. Our teacher also works for GK – as a teacher in the primary school of one of the GK villages. We were keen to learn the local dialect, because the national language known as Tagalog (or Filipino) is rarely spoken in this area. School is taught in English and most business dealings are done in English but the everyday verbal communication is in Hiligainon, randomly interspersed with English words. While our teacher is used to teaching from Hiligainon to English, it is an unusual concept for him to be teaching it in reverse!

I have now been privileged enough to have met the founder of GK, Mr Tony Meloto, when he came to visit some of the sites in our province on the weekend. He is a very charismatic and humble leader, highly passionate and committed to nation building. It was both fascinating and inspirational to hear him speak with the rich and the poor, the priests and the politicians about the vision of GK. While he now lives and works from Manila, Tony originates from this province. The other reason for his visit was to attend the 95th Birthday celebration of his mother, which I was also fortunate to attend. A function room of a restaurant was booked out for the occasion and about 60 guests were invited. And what an amazing lady for 95 years old!

During our tour of sites with Tony on the weekend, we happened upon the annual Fiesta of Manapla, a town in the north. The mayor had invited us for lunch in the town hall (complete with a whole spit roast pig!). And afterwards, I had just enough time to watch the street parade before we had to leave for our next engagement. The street parade was made up of dance troupes – one from each suburb of the town, lead by their suburbs Fiesta Princess, sitting pretty on the back of a float. The costumes of each troupe represented local produce or delicacies. I don’t know how they were able to dance down the street under the sweltering midday sun wearing such costumes without passing out, but it certainly was a colourful and entertaining cultural experience!

I am also happy to say that I’m starting to make some local friends. At work I sit next to Marj who is my age and coordinator of the “Singles for Christ” for the Province. She invited me to her place on Sunday to meet her group of friends – a lovely bunch of fun loving young Philippinos. They took me to see the ruins of a former Hacienda (cane farm mansion built by the Spanish) which looked beautiful against the setting sun.

Workwise, I have been given my first project to concentrate on – a completely new village consisting of 50 houses, a hall, a school, an office, a basketball court and an area for agriculture on a 10,000sqm site in Handumanan, south of Bacolod. It is being funded by the alumni of the St Johns School in Bacolod to commemorate their 50 year anniversary.