Not Your Typical Chinese Laundry

I am grateful for the Dry Season here, which lasts all of 2 months, but still….my laundry dries.

Tonight is the second night of moderate rain and the beginning of the Rainy Season, wherein my laundry takes 2-4 days to dry a damp-dry, hung inside on the rafters in the kitchen….when the kitchen is dry.

When I lived with my host family, the Ustares family in Tiniguiban, I usually did my laundry on Sundays when they were at church.  I finally gave up on trying to photograph myself doing my laundry, and just before I moved, snapped some shots of Brenda doing the family laundry, which she did usually two days a week.   On a heavy laundry day, during the dry season, Mario would move the multicab from the driveway and set up a pipe assembly – the clothesline – which held seemingly hundreds of articles of damit – clothing.   That was the extent of Mario’s involvement with the laundry.

Typically Brenda washed on Thursday and Friday, starting as early as 6am in order to finish everything by 4pm.   She wore shorts and a tank top, and was lucky that she is under 5 feet tall, so she could squat on the stool easily to scrub the clothes.  She usually soaked the clothes the night before in tubs of soapy water – the whites with bleach as well, so that they were ready to be scrubbed.  This shot is looking from the kitchen to the outdoor area – Brenda is standing where the water pipes are and is filling the rinse tubs.  

The blue tub in front is the washing tub and that is just a piece of wood for her scrubbing board, and the stool to the right is where she sits.  The brown tub in the back holds the rinsed and wrung clothes.  The laundry basket holds to be washed items.  The other two tubs are usually the rinse tubs; often Brenda double-rinses;  however, two rinses here is not like at home – most of the time things are still soapy, but that’s not too big a deal…I make sure that my undies are rinsed well and then theorize that leaving some soap in helps me in some way – I’m making up my own superstitions here.

Brenda is lucky in that she has both a washing machine and a spinner (no dryers here).

The bar on the board is a whitening agent to get out the stains, and the plastic scrub brush is for more delicate items – a harsh bristled scrub brush is used for things like jeans and towels.  The small bottle to the right is bleach – many things here come in tiny quantities, probably because people don’t have the money for more than one laundering at a time.

 

My feet;  Brenda’s washed and expertly wrung, clothes.

Brenda, whom I call pandak (short) due to our greatly disparate heights.  My knees kill me if I sit like that, so I prefer the counter, which only hurts my back!

The hose is attached to a spigot and the rinse basin filled. 

This is how you rinse, so you can see the problem with getting all the soap out – especially when you use the same rinse water for several items.  I try to wring the soapy things as tight as I can, but there’s always a lot of soap left in them that goes into the rinse basin.  Maybe I’ll perfect my tactics, but I doubt it.

 

 The indoor hanging of more delicate items (at least during the dry season; during the wet season, everything will be packed in here).  The windows are into Jessa Mae’s room, where the electrical outlet is to work the machines.

 

 And this is Jane…posing for a picture…she has no idea how to do any of the laundry…but will in about 5 years when she turns 12.   

After Brenda washes, rinses and hangs the laundry…she is finished.  When Jessa Mae and Genesis come home from high school, they will take down all the laundry and take it to the kitchen where they will fold every last piece.  Then, they will take each stack of laundry into the proper person’s room and put it all away.   Both Brenda and Jessa Mae iron for the family, although even the men do this – ironing a work shirt for instance can be a man’s job, although Brenda does iron shirts on Fridays.

Brenda needs at least all day Thursday, and most weeks, two days, to complete her laundry.I try to do mine   twice a week, and it takes me about 2 hours to wash, rinse and hang.  I don’t have the knack that Brenda does, and I’m working on it; but this ain’t your normal Chinese Laundry.

"She's Leaving on a Multicab. Don't Know When She'll Be Back Again..."

So sang Jun as he hoisted my luggage into the multicab that Mario and he would transport me to my 2BR duplex in Santa Monica – about 5 minutes from my host family in Tiniguiban.

I was excited and ready to be out on my own.  My family was still slightly upset, but resigned that I was leaving (3,000 pesos each month is nice to receive, and I’m pretty easy to live with).  Brenda and I both shed a few tears, and she said, “Tita – thank you”…which I’ve rarely heard here.  I hugged her and told her how thankful I was for everything they had done for me and that I’d only be a few minutes away.  And then we were off.

About 20 minutes later I was alone – when Mario drove away I felt tears on my cheeks!  Wow, was it quiet.  And it was only 9am on a Saturday morning.

I had a list of things to purchase, so walked to the multicab stop (a lot farther than I thought) and hopped on.  Transferred about $150 from the US and purchased my refrigerator, blender, 2 electric fans and rice cooker (and they delivered it all!!).  However, realized I didn’t have enough money to buy a pad to put on the bamboo beds (which are pretty darned hard without a pad), cushions for the bamboo couch, curtains for the windows or mats for the floor.  And, found that there is no electric plug in the kitchen for the fridge, so found an extension cord that would reach from the bedroom through the window (although saw rat poop there and left the fridge inside).  Did buy a set of melamine plates, a protective dish-drainer for the dishes, cups and utensils from the yucky insects, etc, and laundry pails for the laundry which was long overdue.

I knew I couldn’t get it all on a multicab and needed a trike – the fare to Santa Monica he said was 100 pesos (wait – that was almost the fare to Aborlan!!!)  But, I was sooo tired that I said, fine, and we puttered out of the Unitop parking area onto Rizal Avenue, heading north to Santa Monica….

Oops – in San Pedro we were stopped for many minutes because the Hike for Life was starting – a 4 day walk from Puerto to Sabang (75 km), whereby young people speak about God and seeks converts.  Supposedly, every year Life Church (the born-again sponsor church) converts 200 or so out-of-school-youth to the church through this effort – funded entirely by the church.  The older girl (ate – “ah-tay”) and boy (kuya – “koo-ya”) in my family participated for the past 3 years.   But we finally moved through the crowd.

Oops - Only to be stopped again in San Jose at the Memorial Gardens for a funeral procession of a female barangay councilor.  That was something to behold – a white open air hearse carrying a white coffin beflowered with white lilies, and  50 people walking behind the hearse… followed by another 50 vehicles filled with people flooding the cemetery.  After perhaps 8 minutes, we proceeded.  I think he earned the 100 peso fare

…to my new home, where I fell exhausted into a hard bed.

….and awoke at 5:30am to the roosters, and perhaps 150 bug bites on my arms, legs and back.  Not mosquito bites – these were raised with clear liquid and painful as well as itchy.  Back to the store for bug spray.   I’ve asked several people what they are and have decided that they are either fleas – or, more likely, termites, which are really flying ants here!!!   Very upsetting to be seen as a piece of wood…I guess the Pilipino brand of termite likes blood as well as wood.  And, although I wear insect repellent, it hasn’t worked.

I’m not sure which is more upsetting – the bites and termites that leave mounds of wood shavings on my countertops, or the rats which poop in my shower.   As Scarlett said, “I’ll think about that tomorrow.”

To Petra’s in Aborlan and Onward to Narra and Will’s

 There is one navigable north-south road on Palawan – The National Highway.  Actually, it is not completely navigable the entire year…the dirt from El Nido to Taytay often washes out or is an impassable sludge during the heavy rains from June-December, when travelers have to boat from El Nido around to Taytay and resume the macadam there.  From Puerto Princesa, ginto sa Palawan (in the middle of Palawan), it is a 7-9 hour journey to El Nido - and I’ve heard more than one story about passengers getting out and pushing the bus to surmount some obstacle, adding another 2 hours to the journey.  From the Southern tip of the island (bawal, or forbidden to us in Peace Corps because of possible activity to protect highly controversial mining - google Gerry Ortega, Palawan to see just how controversial), it is another 8 hour drive to Puerto.  This is one large island.

Although we are “volunteers” in the Peace Corps, we have strict rules – one of which is that we have to phone our regional manager if we leave the city limits for an overnight during the week.  The wonderful thing about being in Puerto Princesa is that it is one of the largest geographical areas of any city in the world and you can drive 2 hours north and still be within the city limits.

This past weekend, though, I traveled to visit two of my ‘batch mates’ (graduating classes here in the Philippines are called “batches” and the Peace Corps adopted that terminology – we are Batch 269 of Peace Corps volunteers) – Petra lives about 1.5 hours south in a tiny town named Aborlan, where she teaches high school and another teacher, Will, lives another 45 minutes south of that in the rice bowl of Palawan - Narra.

This is Holy Week in the Philippines and, as for Christmas (although for only a week; not the whole month) – most of businesses are closed…certainly for the last few days:  Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Black Saturday and Easter Sunday.  I was told that even most of the transport, multicabs as well as tricycles, halt.  However, the weekend prior to Easter was fair game, and I was thrilled to be finally striking out on my own to see some of the island.

I caught a trike from my new place (I’d moved in the day before) at 6:30am to the San Jose terminal and headed for the bus….but everyone told me that it didn’t go to Aborlan today.  So, I headed back to Lexus, who said they would leave within an hour – we packed in and launched.  Notorious for their lead footed drivers, Lexus must have quite a maintenance bill – we zoomed along between 60-70 miles per hour – exhilarating from the back seat, and unimaginable from the front!

It took us quite a while to pass the enormous expanse of land where the Iwahig prison is situated….  “prisoners” were in the fields working – some with goats, others with cows and some plowing.  Begun during the American era, this prison has a gate, but no cells – many prisoners live on the land with their families.  They claim a better recidivism rate than most jails.  Strangely, the elder brother of the Pastor/Executive Director at my site was a guard at Iwahig for years….and became the only casualty to date.  Two years ago the inmates attacked him and stabbed him repeatedly with forks and whatever they had until they killed him.  He remains the only death at the prison.

Petra met me at her “terminal” (her terminology – it just looked like a street corner to me) and we crossed the street to the Aborlan market.  Lots of fun – bought a walis (broom), some bawang and sibuyas (garlic and onions),  kalamansi (yummy little limes),  pakwan (watermelon), and clams.  Returned to Petra’s nice, clean, tiled apartment and CR and made banana shakes – yummy – before getting into another Lexus van for the 45 minute rollercoaster ride to Will’s in Narra.  Petra says I had a broad grin on my face as we carromed down the road…there are 9 bridges between Aborlan and Narra and the rivers – especially the Irawan River - are gorgeous.  Palawan surprised me with its high mountains, and the 2^nd highest peak is in Narra.  As on other roads, the added benefit of a road trip is a rigorous massage which can actually leave bruises. 

Will met us on his bike at the Narra market where we proceeded to the bakery for banana bread (passing up a custard cake, sigh) and we triked to his place – 100 meters from the ocean.  This is the Palawan of my dreams – like Matthew said, we hardly feel like we are on an island where we live.  Will, on the other hand, has a view of tall palms and water from his 2^nd floor bedroom. 

The enviable view from Will's 2nd floor bedroom

 



In Will's Kitchen



We cooked the clams and made guacamole from fresh avocados,  met his counterpart, who lives next door, and set off for the beach – Petra and I headed out for a swim…sandy bottom and really warm water. And then, Wham!  - nearly decapitated by a flying fish – man those things pack a velocity!   Red Horse all around and I searched for shells….weaving badly (Red Horse beer has one of the highest alcohol contents and gets me every time).  Returned to find Petra napping and Will gone for fish for dinner.  Yummy grilled fish stuffed with garlic and tomatoes, and a walk on the beach at night. 

Found out that we could stay in a room at the beach for 300 pesos (150/each) – so, for $3 each, Petra and I shared a beach bungalow.  After a morning swim and more shelling (when Petra shot this amazing 2” long bug)



The amazing bug

A plethora of shells

We flagged another Lexus van returning to Puerto.

The fare from Puerto to Narra is 160 pesos, or $4, and I’ll be back.

Melodies and Dust

April 23^rd – tomorrow is Easter Sunday, and it is HOT.  We are in the tainit (ta-een-it) months – the dry season, which has been Anglicized to “Summer.”    The rains stopped mid March here, and became progressively hotter; today I am sitting in front of my electric fan, sweating.  My fan is on from the time I wake up until…well, the next day, when I wake up – if I am home, the fan is on…but I am usually still sweating.   Needless to say, showers and laundry have increased – I usually shower 2-3 times a day now.

I long anticipated the summer, which they tell me will recede by my birthday, and torrential rains will resume in late May, with the real rainy season hitting in June and July.  Theoretically, these taper off in December – but 2011 is a La Nina year, and the rains continued into March.  In the past, scientists thought that the El Nino/La Nina cycle occurred about every 10-20 years…now they are saying 2-4 years.  Another rainy season like the last one and I will be fungal.  And, while I grapple with the concept of a 2 month ‘summer,’ I will welcome a little rain to force the dust from the air.

Palawan is a paradise compared to Manila – the air is usually sweet and light here and breathing is wonderful – something most of us never notice….here on Palawan, I’ve noticed just breathing!  However, we do have traffic that uses leaded gasoline with no ‘smog check’ or filter at all on vehicles – being stuck in traffic here probably takes days off one’s life with fumes from the open-air vehicles visible and the black exhaust pungent.  Most everyone holds handkerchiefs to their noses and eyes.

Couple that with the heavy dust of the summer months, or the practice of raking up trash and leaves into a pile and burning it all…and it is easy to see why so many people here have rather severe asthma.  Pretty ironic that the Peace Corps touts the fact that the Philippines is one of few countries that will accommodate several medical issues – asthma being one….the reason seems to be that asthma is so prevalent here….so, actually, they are sending you to a place you really shouldn’t be subjected to if you are predisposed to asthma!!    Although I’m rather dreading the rains, it will be a respiratory relief (until too much mold grows and then asthma will resurface – crazy).

And, as you sit in front of your electric fan in the evening, as the light fades, you can hear melodies…the overbearing roosters (contrary to stories, they doodle at any hour of the day they choose), the higher scaled birdsong of the tuwit tuwit, the tuko chirping in the ceiling, and my newlywed neighbor humming a song I don’t recognize as she works quietly, sweeping the dust off her front porch…as I cough briefly, and smile. 

Togas and Mortarboards - It's Pagkatapos (Graduation)

Here in the Philippines, it's the dry season - some call it summer.  On Palawan it lasts for 2-3 months; this year summer began in mid-March and I'm hoping that the rains won't start in earnest until the end of June...but they laugh and say that rain will return in mid May - wow.  I'm enjoying the dry while I can!

And, as in many countries, School's Out for Summer!

In my extended Ustares family here (or Ustaris - their father misspelled two of the eight siblings' surnames on their birth certificates), there were several graduations because here in the Philippines, there are graduations from preschool, from kindergarten, from grade school, from high school and from college. Often both parents take the day off in order to prepare their children for the ceremony, while colleges practice entrances and exits for weeks prior to the ceremony.

I was lucky to attend three separate graduations and see four people graduate from preschool, kindergarten, high school and college.

JoAnn wore a beautiful formal dress

On March 29th, the two little girls, JoAnn and Jane both graduated - JoAnn, now 5 years old, entered 2nd year preschool and Jane graduated into 1st grade...oh, she corrected me  "Grade 1."     

Jane wore a white cap and gown!

 The ceremony began at 2pm on a Sunday (although it started "Filipino time" about an hour late) and there were only about 30 children - but it lasted until 6pm!!  Read on for an understanding of why.

On April 2nd, I was allowed to watch our kuya, Genesis, graduate from high school - the Puerto Princesa City National Science High School (where you have to maintain a grade average of 85% or better - if you don't, you are required to leave the school).  I think I get invited to things because of my camera - and I'm so glad that I have a nice camera here so that people prefer to take me along for the photography!!! 

And on April 3rd, I was given one of only two tickets to attend the college graduation of Glenda, the 32 year old mother of four who graduated from Fullbright College with a degree in Elementary Education, with a specialty in Filipino.  I got teary-eyed when she asked me to attend with her husband, but when I arrived at the college, I was amazed and so honored to find that I was actually escorting her in along with her husband!  There were 200 graduates, and we lined up 3 abreast in a long line - Jun on one end, me on the other and the lovely Glenda in between. 

Our entourage of three

Although the ceremonies were named differently (Graduation, Commencement Exercises, Graduation Rites), the programs and physical set ups were virtually the same. There is always a central stage set up with a colorful backdrop - either a printed tarp in the school colors, or colored letters on a huge plywood.  And, always potted flowers in abundance.   For both the high school and college, the ROTC brought in the colors - at the college, they joined swords over our heads as we entered. 

The bulk of people arrive before the scheduled time ... and then wait until Filipino time - usually an hour after the scheduled time.  For both the little girls and the college, this was true (actually, I arrived at 5:45pm at the college and they didn't start until 7:30pm!!).  The National Science High School prided itself on timeliness - and actually started 6 minutes early!  I also heard today that Western Philippines University's graduation was processing at 2:02pm...so, it must be according to the culture of each school.

Graduates are accompanied by a parent or significant adult in their lives - Mario escorted JoAnn and Brenda escorted Jane; Mario escorted Genesis; and June and I both escorted Glenda.  All the graduates line up single file (although with their escort-s) and are announced over the loudspeaker - individually as they enter the venue. They drop their escorts at the stage and the escorts sit in a special seating area (hence the ticket limitation) because they participate in the graduation ceremony.  Usually, the graduating class sings the doxology and then the National Anthem of the Philippines - "Lupang Hinirang" is sung.

 Most of the time, people have their gowns on for the processional - but at the college, they entered holding their gowns - and then when they got onstage, they turned their backs to the audience and donned their caps and gowns.

Then come the valedictorian (or summa cum laude) and commencement speeches, after which the degrees are awarded individually - by at least  two officials.  (The valedictorian at the high school was quite taken with himself and the emcee had to yank him off the stage after 45 minutes of a rather obnoxious judgment of several of his peers, along with his suggestions about how they could improve themselves).

 
The graduates walk from their seats up the steps and across the stage - again individually, with complete titles of the person, their degree and their accompanying escort announced by microphone...remember, 200 graduates at the college....



The commencement speaker is heralded with fanfare - even if they have little to say, or say it badly!



After this, all collegians sit down and listen to another brief speech by the President of the college....then, their escorts are called back up, and their hoods are affixed - in the colors of the different majors - by a faculty member and their escort.  Only one escort was allowed on stage for this portion, and I tried to get pictures as Jun put on Glenda's hood.  However, one of the main tasks is for the school to sell photographs - and the blasted photographers kept getting in my way - so I never got a shot!!  At least for this there were 5 graduates on stage at a time, but the hoods were difficult to pin on, and this took a while....actually, I was starving at this point - it was nearly 10pm...and I'd already heard their 200 names and titles twice already - so I walked across the street to a cantina and for Php 20 (less than 50 cents), I got some great pancit and an iced tea, gobbled it down and went back....and still had to wait 15 minutes until they got to Glenda's name. 

Medals are a huge thing here - and they are truly heavy medals, handed out individually - in Genesis's case for MVP of the championship football team - and the parent comes to stage with the student and hangs the medal around his neck.  The obnoxious valedictorian had a sore neck to be sure - probably 15 medals and scholarships.  And, yes, these are announced individually, in detail by the emcee.

You know the end is near when the entire graduating class stands to sing the song they selected as their "Graduation Song."

"Jesus Loves the Little Children"

"Thanks to You"

"Here I Am Lord"

 And, if the attendees are still functional and not asleep like these poor kids - at midnight ......or need to eat or use a bathroom........    for those, there are more pictures to take!

       

  The Stats:

March 29th - Preschool - 30 children - 2pm-6pm

April 2nd - High School - 70 students-  6pm-9pm

April 3rd -    College  -   200 students - 6pm-1am

"But that is not all.  Oh, no.  That is not all...."

Because it was now 1:00am on Monday morning, I asked if they could drive me home from the college and we left in the tricycle ... for about 5 minutes....until the gas ran out.  No matter how he tried -even tipping the tricycle on it's side and using all his tricks, Jun couldn't get it started.  So, Glenda took off her cap and gown, slid over and mounted the motorcycle to steer, as Jun and I got out and pushed.  Through the back roads - over the stones and mud - through the dark and quiet streets we jogged, pushing the motorcycle and side car in our finery.  And, my oh my did the dogs bark - a cacophony of sound followed us - dogs howling along with our howls of laughter.  Until we arrived at Mario and Brenda's - fast asleep it would appear from their befuddled  and disapproving looks answering the door.  

Laughingly, we said good night...and, as the Cat in the Hat said, "That is that."

The Philippine "Brown Out"

It goes like this....

You are finishing the graphics for your PowerPoint presentation about 10 am on a Tuesday morning and all of a sudden, you are not online any more.  You double check by turning on the electric fan (which does not turn on), and yes, it is a brown out - something I'd never heard of before arriving here in the Philippines.  All of the electricity just suddenly dies, but it is not a black out, because only some neighborhoods have lost power.   It, as many things, are just accepted here as a fact of life and accommodated.

Whilst training in Olongapo, power blinked out early on a Saturday, after one of the old power poles basically split in half during high winds, and again when Typhoon Juan blew through - then, it seemed off more than it was on (typhoons are really scary at night when you can't see anything but can only hear the wind ripping trees apart and things crashing onto a tin roof - a cacophony of torrential auditory stimulation that wears you out so that you awaken exhausted).  But those were the freaky brown outs - the typical brown out averages once a week - and lasts from 30 minutes to 6 hours.  The first week here on Palawan, I attended a training for "Teaching Character in the School" which was attended by perhaps 100 people (and given all in Tagalog...but that's another story).  It was a slick, 6 hour presentation....rather, it would have been, but at 8:30am, the brown out hit...and lasted until 3pm.   The presenter didn't flinch too much - just changed his presentation a bit to be hands-on - and he was a born-again pastor and used to evangelism.

   So, everyone here expects such erratic behavior (from electricity as well as most everything else) - teachers and business people have a backup plan for all presentations requiring electricity...which is really difficult if you want to show videos on Autism and autistic behaviors.  Practicing my first presentation the day before I gave it - yep, the electricity went off for 3 hours.   Everyone assured me that the brown out occurred then so that I would not experience it on the following day - and they all assured me that they would also pray for no brownout - something worked!

The worst is when it is hot - sometimes in the middle of the night - when the fan just stops and you start sweating under your mosquito net.  I remember one night in Olongapo that Tess and I just got up and talked for a long time in front of the door...although I had so many mosquito bites that I'm not sure which was worse - sweating it out at 1am, or having a little breeze along with Anopheles.

The first week of the New Year here, we had 5 brown outs on 5 consecutive days and I wondered if the electric company was giving us a taste of what was to come.  But, things didn't escalate - except for one day when we had three separate brown outs for a few hours each.  On March 26th, Mario told me to hurry up and finish my dinner - I was baffled....until at 8:30pm, Puerto Princesa City made sure that all of its citizens celebrated Earth Hour together - they just flipped the switch and at precisely 8:30pm, all electricity ceased.  It was my favorite brown out by far.  The night sky was incredible with no lights to hinder viewing.  Sounds of televisions, radios and karaoke vanished and it was quiet - the quiet you could imagine that our ancestors of long ago knew well. A sense of primeval times...especially when the cockroaches skittered across the road - obviously confused by the instant darkness.  I ventured not too far from the house because it was just too dark to see without stumbling...but the memory of those skies will remain with me.