The Journey I Have Been (8)

20 Apr 2009. A full month after I arrived here in the Phils. from Kuala Lumpur. I look back, and I feel still uneasy about it all. But I have to accept the fact that my assignment has ended and now I have no choice but to move on.

It has taken me quite a while to get the courage to write down my thoughts as part of a cleansing process. During the past month, I distracted myself going to remote villages and renewing ties with project partners. It was also a blessing that there was the Holy Week. As part of centuries-old tradition, our family joined hundred others to visit at least 7 churches during Maundy
Thursday. Before this, there were church masses or services to attend. In-between these activities, I had time to reflect and put myself a little more at ease with how things were turning out which were not according to plan.

Some time during the period I had also to organize get-togethers for friends and colleagues to celebrate my birthday. I had to put up a happy front to hide the turmoil within me: what do I do at 67 when you are too old to be part of a strategic staff development plan? Or so I thought as I talked as though I was the happiest guy during the occasion. I had to fight self-pity and all that stuff, but this was all in the discipline. I tip my hat to this inner self which absorbs all the excuses and self-deceptions I fabricate to make the business of living a little more bearable.

I have recovered from this temporary setback. Now I am determined to try my hand in something innovative and new. I have decided that I will raise pigs the organic way for the remainder of my days on the planet. It will be a good idea for a book, this epic journey from being a development worker to an organic swine farmer.

This morning, I met with our three workers on the place we are developing here in Bohol and they were not surprised at all to listen to me expound on the merits of going into organic pig raising. We viewed a video together given by a recent guest, a colleague and friend, Raul Salceda. I have invited the brother-in-law of a friend to spend the first week of May with us to give us pointers on how to raise pigs the organic way.

Unless something turns up that will be more exciting than this prospect, I will embark on this journey soon. But I have to keep on reading more on the subject and listening to other people who have tried their hand in this business for quite some time.

For all we know, this can be a more effective way to save the planet and reduce poverty than all those fancy things I have done during the past 32 years of development work.

Let's see - and wish me luck!

The Journey I Have Been (7)

TRANSITION NOTES
12 March 2009; Kepong, Kuala Lumpur

For the past three weeks or so, this word transition has figured quite prominently in my vocabulary. I remember emailing everyone I had met in the course of a a 9-month assignment in Malaysia that I transitioned out of my role as Interim National Director of Habitat Malaysia last 03 Feb when a Malaysian was appointed, as planned, for the post.

I promptly applied for leave and left for the Philippines on 08 Feb to take a much-needed transition from this rather tough assignment. As usual, in an organization dedicated to the proposition that good intentions could triumph over evil, I found my time spent mostly in trying to decipher impure motives that pollute good intentions now and then. In this assignment, I believe I have been able to grow up or wizened up a little bit more to the obvious fact that character transformation is quite an uneven process.

But it is as though I had not known this fact about human nature before. It is just that when you enter an organization, the assumption somehow that you automatically make is that everyone there breathes the same air as to ideals and is walking the talk about noble mission and goals. I forgot what I learned ages ago that we are not perfect and it is through our imperfections that we can glimpse through the vast possibility of our own perfections.

This transition is devoutly to be wished, and worked for. That again is an old lesson that I have learned again and again during the past 9 months. No easy way out of it. We need to purify ourselves and others not in isolation, but in the company of fellow human beings equally caught in the trap of defining perfection in terms of some ideals, but remained hopelessly trapped in the contradictions of the flesh and the spirit.

I guess to be sane, one has to go back to the worn-out example of the glass: you either look at it as half full or half empty and that defines, according to psychologists or philosophers, whether you are pessimistic or optimistic.

Which brings us again to Habitat Malaysia: either you get dismayed that the average number of houses it is building per year is quite low compared to the average in nearby countries which are not so prosperous, or you get optimistic that knowing its constraints, it is able to build and repair houses in recent months more than the monthly average over the ten-year period.

The fact is that Habitat operations has been run largely through volunteers, from family selection to raising funds to the actual building of houses. There is a clear need to transition from this mode of operations to one that will blend professional work with volunteerism if we want to build more houses in such numbers that will impact on the local poverty housing situation.

Ah, transition, thy name is patience.

The Journey I Have Been (6)

10 Jan 2009. Back to Kepong, Kuala Lumpur. Arrived here three days ago. Still on leave, actually. But I have to follow up on a few urgent things for Habitat for Humanity Malaysia. There are deadlines to meet: appointment of a new National Director to replace me (I have been serving in an interim capacity since April last year); consultation with the National Board on the recommendations I have submitted; creation of the Executive Committee, etc.

Most of all, I want to reflect on my life as a new year beckons and, hopefully, make a fresh start. Sounds like a weird thing to say that I am about to turn 67 this April. At this age, I should know better what to do. This matter of starting a new year should really be a simple thing since I have been doing it for the best part of 60 years on the planet. Well, it should, but it is not, as always with life. You never can really be sure that you are making the right tactical decisions to help reach your strategic goal.

There are always distractions to manage, two or more roads vying for attention and each day is a torture to decide which one to take. As everyone knows, the least travelled one appeals to the adventurer in us, but we are actually less and less a risk taker as we grow older as we prefer the easy path. We are predisposed to choose the latter since as we grow older, we are more determined not to squander dwindling resources such as time, money and physical energy.

As I look back through the years, these self-focused reflections almost always include concerns related to the following:

How to manage my ego. This has preoccupied me since I began conscious existence in this life. Some of the outrageous things, as well as a few marvellous things, I have done are conditioned by a powerful need to feed the voracious appetite of a hungry ego. Some of these deeds may have resulted in some worthy achievements that benefit others, but am just amazed at some of the things I say and do sometimes. They seem to arise almost purely from the need to be recognized, to win attention, to score points that boost pride, vanity and self-aggrandizement.

I know, deep down in me, I need to tame this beast if I have to relate more effectively with others.

How to manage other people's ego. Those in my generation most likely know about Dale Carnegie's bestseller, How Win Friends and Influence People. Basically, it's about managing other people's ego. The only problem is that you suspect the other guy must have read the book also and is applying the techniques on you. Which creates skepticism and distrust!

This egocentric type you find everywhere, even in the most unlikely places. Yes, even in groups that are supposed to be selfless in their pursuit of spiritual wealth. Even in people-centered development organizations, I have seen these Lords of Poverty strut about waiting to be pleased, flattered and their enormous ego fed. Sane conversation is impossible at times. Even during consultations, where we are supposed to listen more from those we are consulting with, I have seen types who talk more about themselves, always hammering the point how good they are, how self-sacrificing the are, how they mentored practically everyone in the organization, etc.

Perfect fluent talk, but like the proverbial perfect surgery, the patient or the listener gets perpetually numbed or plain brain dead!

How to be less emotional. I have been trying to overcome this since I was four years old when I used to sneak into our relatives' homes to collect kitchen left-overs so our family of four could have something to eat for the day. My father was dying of TB, and it was my Mother and Grandma who tried to eke out a living by taking odd jobs, just to make us live, my sister and I. It must be during these times that I developed this habit of being misty-eyed each time I see someone in pain like us, emotionally or physically.

Now I am talking again about myself. Falling into that ego trap again!

Well, in the end of all this musing, let's pray for a kinder 2009. We have seen during the past year and early this year, images in newspapers and other media on how the human race could be so cruel to each other. I just hope such cruelty will diminish this year. Almost each year, we pray for this. Thinking more of the other and less of self may be the solution. But, then, nobody listens!

The Journey I Have Been (5)

16 Dec 2008. Still here in Kepong, KL. Last Saturday, I went with Tony Tan, Julia Tan and Patrick Guna to Kampung Lumut at the Lenggeng-Broga area near Mantin, less than two hours from KL. We were joined by Raymond and his wife from EDF & Man, a prospective donor corporation for Habitat Malaysia.

We went to the house of Pa Aru, who belongs to the Orang Asli tribe. He has been trying to repair his 29-year old house, which belongs to his mother-in-law, and he needs help from us in Habitat. His mother-in-law passed away a few years back, but his father-in-law is still alive. He occupies a shack at the back of the house. More than 10 members of three families live in the crowded two-bedroom house.

Pa Aru has three sons, aged from 8 to 16, all of them studying. This is quite unusual. Usually Orang Asli families do not send their children to school on account of distance from their settlements. Most Orang Asli settlements have been pushed to the interior villages because developers have encroached on their land for which they have no legal titles.

Pa Aru must be around 40 years old. You can see around his house evidence that he is not as laid back as the other families of his tribe. He has practically cleared the land near his place and planted bananas. He says this is for "testing." He speaks little English, which is also unusual. He must have completed his primary schooling somewhere.

He brought us to a slope in the nearby hill where water flows incessantly. This spring is the source of water for the village. He wants to divert water to a fishpond where he can grow fish and sell this in the town. In that way, he says, he can pay Habitat the monthly repayments for the planned renovation of his house.

On the way back from the hill, we took another path. He showed us an unoccupied, dilapidated house. He also wants the house repaired so his son and his family can move out from the crowded house to this place. He says he needs help in putting a proper kitchen and toilet and in fixing the wooden floor and walls. Pa Aru says he can work on it, too, being a skilled carpenter. But he will pay back Habitat for the construction materials.

It rained while we were in this second house, a Malay house, by the way, with the posts and the wooden materials used, the wide windows and the porch. We did not see his neighbors although there were similar houses around his place. Must be because of the rain.

Tony and I left Julia and Patrick in the village where they were interviewing Pa Aru's family for the required household profiles. We were in a rush for another meeting in another township, with a Malaysian lady named Helen Lee, who is based in London and lives only for three months in a year in a big house.

She is in her early forties and speaks with a British accent, having lived in London for more than 20 years. It was the first time we were meeting her. She had called the office once or twice asking for an appointment. We came instead to her place. She had prepared lunch for us. It was past 2 pm and over lunch, she took about her vision.

She wants to convert the house into a showcase for bamboo handicraft but the house has to be renovated first so it can show how bamboo could be used in an existing house such as this to combat climate change, a cause she is passionate about.

Two worlds, this one and Pa Aru's, on a Saturday that we had to live through. The Orang Asli family wanting to be part of the modern world with a house made of bricks and that of a lonely ecological warrior who wants to put on reality TV how her house could be transformed into a showcase for bamboo technology, which the Orang Asli tribe has been building houses with for centuries.

Two worlds on a Saturday gently interrupted with a little rain which we have to link somehow in this program to help provide decent, safe and secure houses for the multitude. Talk of a day providing another reason to be alive and well and active through a week-end.

The Journey I Have Been (4)

28 November 2008. Here in Kepong. Almost the end of the year. Have been trying to collect my wits lately. Too many things to do, too little time to do them. I seem to be always lacking time to get rid of all these action items. For this blog, I have been trying to compose in my head what I want to say for the past week or so.

First, thought I would talk about boards of non-profit organizations. It occurred to me that in my rather long career in development work, something like 32 years of professional work, I have yet to see a board that is genuinely functioning according to its mandate. Most of the time, the leadership in these boards is captured by a few who come from some other civic groups and they need to be identified with another organization presumably with more prestige and influence in the community.

Most boards I have worked with is controlled by a strong leader, who tells you to write the minutes even if there has been no meeting held! Members of these boards are almost always busy to meet and if you happen to be in the technical secretariat being paid to support the board, you are in for a rough time. You will be mostly thinking for the board and carry out what you have thought of - with the blessings of the Board. All they do is stir coffee, a friend says. Well, that's for stirring committees, a favorite creation of most boards if they do not want to do the work themselves. These committees will surely get the blame if things do not work out as planned.

Anyway, things get done somehow and everyone is happy. But I really want to see a real Board.

The other matter I thought I would like to write about are those longhouses I saw in Sarawak in two field missions I had with Habitat colleagues and volunteers in such places called Serian, Kapit, Kalapa in Sarekei. It's one house right, but you find inside individual units with families inside. You can count the doors to know how many families live inside those longhouses (one word!). The number can range from 8 to 32 or even more. Actually, a long house is a village named usually after the Kampung chief.

Families in a longhouse share a common area where they can have social functions under one roof. This makes sense. You do not have to take cover in case of rain. Also, it is easier this way to mobilize all the families for a community meeting. But there is also another reason for the common area as told to me by an old woman in a long house. She says she is often requested to look after the children when all the adults go to work during daytime. It's easier for her to do so if the children are all in the common area; she can see all of them from her end of the long room. Makes sense!

The longhouse, as everything else in this dynamic world, has been undergoing changes. In the old days, they were made of bamboos, wood and palm leaves. I have seen longhouses made of cement; the common area has tiles, and the windows have jalousies. There are TV sets, radio, fridge, sofa and other modern amenities inside. I did not see modern beds. The old traditional mats are there on the floor of the one-room family unit. I tell you these are among the best mats I have seen in traditional places - such as those in the Pacific and a few Asian countries.

In some areas in Sarawak, the longhouses have become tourist attractions. Well, you never know how a traditional thing like a longhouse will be in a global village where we all live. They get transformed into something else - such as being a tourist attraction rather than just a traditional abode for a village of families.

The Journey I Have Been (3)

11 Nov 2008. 6.24 a.m. Here in Johor Bahru, 5 hours from Kepong, Kuala Lumpur. I arrived here with the Habitat team two days ago. I am here with Tony and Patrick. Our mission: to look for partner organizations that could identify where we could start our program here to either repair or build houses with relatively disadvantaged households.

Our first contact was with Timothy Li, senior pastor of the Awe Charisma Tabernacle. We met him by the road and he promptly led us to an eatery and bought us lunch consisting of fish, fried chicken and some veggies. It was actually lunch at 3 pm. Then he brought us to his church on a hill.

His story reminded me of what Fr. Acong did in Apad, in my home province, Quezon, in the Philippines. He raised funds over a 5-year period mainly through his family and contributions from his flock. The two-story building could house 250 people during church service conducted in English, Bahasa, and Nepalese. Apparently, some workers from Nepal have become converts.

When the good Pastor, in his late Fifties judging from his youthful looks, brought us to the upper floor where his office is located, we saw in another room several members of the choir or band apparently in a practice session. Lucy, a Filipino, and her daughter and son, were there and greeted us enthusiastically.

In the meeting with the Pastor, he told us in detail how he was able to raise almost RM400,000 to build the church from the savings of the church-goers who were mostly of Indian origin. He himself is Indo-Malaysian. His next big plan is to build an orphanage at the back of the two-acre property that his church had bought out of their savings.

Yesterday, we travelled by car for two hours to a township outside Johor. The place is called Pontian. We went into one of the interior villages and met with Ken Kwan, his wife Tan Suan Chen, and their 9 children. I could not see any neighbor in this Malay village. They are the only Chinese family in this Malay village. It was quite courageous of them to move from KL to a remote place like this. With the help of some friends from KL, the couple built a house from second hand construction materials of two houses which were torn down.

Their house looks spacious enough for a big family like theirs. To survive, the family grow vegetables on their two-acre lot. Their children range in age from 16 to 6 months. Ken and his wife remembered Tony as their pastor more than 12 years ago in another place in Malaysia. They even remembered one his sermons.

It turned out Ken is himself a Pastor but without a congregation yet. How he will raise and grow his flock is still a dream. Meanwhile, he agreed to be our contact person in this remote place. He brought us to his Malay friend, who prefers to be called Boy. Boy showed us the foundations of the house he has been building for the last eight years to replace the crumbling wooden structure they inherited from their great great grandfather.

He said he would save enough and partner with Habitat in getting the house done. Tony estimates the house will cost around RM18,000. We told Boy we would exert efforts to help him and demonstrate to other Malay families how we all could work together to address their housing needs.

Then we rushed back to Johor where we met with Michael Yeo, senior pastor of the Church of Praise, and Steven, their accountant. They showed us a 10,000 sq. m. lot which belongs to their church. The piece of land is overlooking squatter communities along the Sungai Danga river. Michael says we can collaborate on building a community center here in which both Habitat and their church can manage to provide services to the families across the road, along the river. It is an ideal site for a Habitat Resource Center which can train unemployed youth from nearby communities on house construction skills so they themselves can repair or build houses for target households.

We went back to the hotel with gratitude in our hearts. Those Pastors had made our day.

Cheers!

The Journey I Have Been (2)

25 October 2008. 6.47 pm. Here in Kepong, a rapidly urbanizing suburb of Kuala Lumpur. From Petaling Jaya, I moved to this apartment last 20 July, a day before we opened the new national office of Habitat for Humanity Malaysia here.
Did not have lunch. Had late breakfast and decided I would just spend most of the day holed up here in my unit at the 7th floor. Trying to finish the first of two reports I have to submit soonest so I can concentrate on preparing for other urgent things before the National Board meets again.
Actually I just arrived back to KL last Thursday after a few days’ break in the Philippines. Was able to make it to the launch of a book in memory of Monsignor Acong Sevilla who died a year ago. The book was a compilation of articles written by people who knew him. It includes some articles written by him, too. Mil Sevilla-Reyes, his sister and my high school classmate, put in so much energy, time and emotions seeing through the collection, editing and printing of articles to produce the book. “A labor of love,” she says. A tribute to someone whose work she was not so familiar with, having spent most her time abroad with commitments of her own.

She appeared spent during the program to launch the book. The event was attended by more than a hundred people from all sectors: the church people and representatives of lay organizations; Mil’s class 58 classmates; the people of Apad, Calauag who were organized by Msgr. Acong into MSK (Munting Sambayanang Kristiyano); unfamiliar faces from everywhere. Sometime in their lives they must have known him.

Mil asked me to speak and I obliged, basically answering two questions she asked me to reply to in public: a) why did I suggest to her to document Msgr.Acong’s life, and b) why did I come three times when when he was in the hospital and during his wake. It was meant to be only for three minutes but I blabbered on and on until Mil motioned me to stop.

I felt good hours after the program. I was able to say what I had wanted to say all along: that Msgr. Acong does not belong to the Sevilla family anymore, but to the growing community of development workers out there who continue to sacrifice their lives reaching poor people in remote villages with assistance and a profound message of hope about trying to help each other out during times of need and distress.

I felt good for the initial hours, but wondered as the night wore on what was I really trying to say. Did I say what I said intending to inspire awe among the audience who came their in the first place because they had been part of Msgr. Acong’s almost impossible mission to build churches physically and erect temples of peace and joy and forgiveness in the hearts of those of are most deprived of life’s goods and benefits. Or was I only trying to portray an image of myself as a committed idealist and only use the occasion to feed my own ego? Why speak at all about the friends who perished in a futile struggle against what we thought as social injustice? Why talk at all about those years I chose not remember at all?

I had the eerie feeling nobody was really listening except my friends Rem and Kits. Mil and her family were too tired preparing for the book and its launch that they seemed not to hear anything at all. The six former classmates of ours from our high school Class 58 were more interested in getting our group picture taken. Or so I thought. I could be wrong.
Again, as always, my mistake was in taking too seriously occasions such as this. I could just simply thank the Sevilla family for giving me an opportunity to contribute an article to the book. Probably say a thing or two about how I have come to admire Msgr. Acong’s dedication which has resulted to hundreds of neighborhood associations to bloom. He succeeded where the underground left failed miserably. But, again, this would be opening up a well of memories I was determined to ignore.

And so I cried as I struggled to end what was meant to be a simple gesture of thanking the Sevilla family for allowing me to say what I failed to say to Msgr. Acong when he was still alive.
Again, the ego stood in the way of communicating what I needed to be saying in memory of someone who preached Christ’s teachings with his own life.

Goodbye good Fr. Acong. May the people of the Bondoc Peninsular continue your crusade for a better life in those places too remote for politicians and government workers to reach. In those places, a fierce battle is raging for the hearts and minds of the people and the Church seems to be winning largely because of Fr. Acong’s passion and commitment.

The Journey I Have Been (1)

Here in Petaling Jaya, Malaysia, at the border with KL. Have stayed here since 04 April this year. Krishnamoorthy, chief reporter of The Star, offered me the annex of his house to serve temporarily as office of Habitat Malaysia National Office and also as my residence.

Last night, Krishna and I went to the launching of the book "Malays" by Syed Hussin Ali, noted Malaysian intellectual, who now serves as vice president of the opposition political party that won here in Selangor State. He actually wrote this book thirty years ago while under detention. The book that was launched last night was the revised version.

Anwar Ibrahim, the opposition leader, was there to formally launch the book. In his speech, he stressed the message that the country is now on the road to creating opportunities not only for Malays, but also for non-Malay people. He said this is the only way to move forward.

Tan Sri Dato Ramon Navaratnam, trustee of Habitat Malaysia, was also in that jampacked hall of Armada Hotel. Krishna and I greeted him and after the event, we met a restaurant near our place. After partaking of thosae and talking about the need for Habitat to be more visible by repairing houses, he asked about our temporary office and we brought him here.

He even went to the main house and to the kitchen adjoining our office. He suggested that perhaps there should be a separate kitchen for the Annex, not really for me but for future tenants.

During the past two weeks, the 73-year old author of nine books and corporate adviser of Sunway Conglomerate has been chasing me to go after our contacts among the MPs, members of State Assemblies, NGOs, community groups to find out where the makeshift houses are and do something about these houses. Unfortunately, in the villages in Bandar Sunway and neighbouring areas, the squatter communities had been cleared. There are makeshift houses in the city, but these are scheduled to be torn down in a year or two as the KL government implements a new plan for low-cost housing.

We promised him we would continue to look for makeshift houses to repair in and around KL, but our volunteers say most of the makeshift houses are outside metropolitan KL.

Today, I will spend Father's Day in Sungai Buloh, a township less than an hour by road from Petaling Jaya. Ambrose Saminathan, president of an Indian Association, invited us to see some families living in makeshift houses. Tony Tan will pick me up here at 9.30 a.m.

The search goes on.

Countdown to 66

27 Mar 2008: Singapore. 6.20 a.m. Here at the lobby of YWCA. I am actually waiting for breakfast. Luc, my room-mate, is still asleep. We have different sleep habits. He sleeps late and wakes up late. I do the opposite.

I guess this is part of getting past 60. Luc is a much younger man. He jogs early evening. I can only manage to take a brisk walk down to Orchard Road, the best part of it I missed last night because I took the wrong turn. I ended up near Bercoolen road. I promptly turned back.

We are here for a workshop on individual giving and mass marketing. We have had interesting discussions since Monday. The participants, around 30, are enthusiastic about the topics. I am particularly impressed with the presentation of Jack Sim, president of the World Toilet Organization. He has done quite a job promoting globally the cause for better sanitation.

His slides on include one showing him as a boy doing the improper sanitation thing on the road. I was followed by a slide showing a very modern Singapore. He was able to put awareness about the need for proper sanitation to all significant global fora, including Davos. Impressive!

My co-participant, James Lo, of Kuching Habitat, was also quite impressed with the intensity that Jack put for his cause. He put his marketing savvy to this worthwhile cause.

I think that's at the back of everyone's mind: how to put poverty housing in the consciousness of those who have the political and economic power to make a difference. I have sensed renewed intensity on the part of my colleagues to pursue this advocacy this time armed with more marketing knowledge and insights from Usha Menon, Joseph Scaria and other resource development specialists from Habitat for Humanity.

While the sessions were going on, I was thinking about Malaysia where I am recently assigned to be Interim National Coordinator. Now I have a better idea on how to formulate a resource development plan for the National Organization and the affiliates. I am aware this assignment in Malaysia has come when I am about to turn 66.

Hope I will a few more vital things on the way to 66.

Updates

Mar Patalinghug, BLDF member and loyal contributor to the poverty cafe website, has reminded us our website needs updating. We have explained to him we do not have a full-time webmaster. The site is maintained by the Seloterio brothers, Arnold and Ryan, on a part-time basis. They have other tasks to do and they are not paid market rates due to our current financial difficulties.

I have noticed that my last entry was on 31 Jan yet. Quite a long time ago. What I will do is just to convert this blog into a journal of sort so that we can dispense with the news section later. Looks like it's hard to supply the section with fresh materials regularly.

I will just have the updates here in my blog. Later, I will request Arnold or Ryan to put my blog where there is this news about Loon. It has been there for months, and Mar is justified in complaining about it.

Here go some updates:

INTERN FROM BOSTON COLLEGE:

Erin Hoffman, a social work graduate student from Boston College, has been on internship with BLDF since 11 January. She will work with the BLDF field support team for 8 weeks, which means her internship will be until April.

She has done quite a bit of work since her arrival. Erin has visited several municipalities and villages where the Foundation has some projects. She has been involved developing the survey methodology and questionnaire for ABCD or Assets Based Community Development, which we hope to put on wide-scale replication after the pilot phase in several villages.

Based on the initial piloting in San Isidro and Anda, she has drafted an Operations Handbook which we hope to use in a cluster of barangays or villages to demonstrate the methodology and, hopefully, develop in the process a software that will facilitate the use of assets in local-level development planning.

Tony Irving, our British IT consultant, and Rodrigo Ocarol, field operations chief, have been busy negotiating with municipalities on the replication of ABCD methodology. It is hoped that eventually we can link up the ABCD software to the PDMS (Poverty Database Monitoring Software), which was developed by BLDF based on basic needs approach.

Linking ABCD to PDMS will be quite a milestone in our quest for an effective approach to finding a tool for pro-poor targeting, as well as assets mapping, to ensure that local communities and householdds need not wait for external donors to be able to start something that will help them improve their development status.

Erin will make a profound contribution to the achievement of this milestone with her hard work on the ABCD methodology.

Habitat for Humanity Malaysia in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia is interested to use the ABCD methodology in partnership with University of Malaysia Sabah. Negotiations are underway to make the partnership possible.

SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE PROJECT GETS NOD FROM EVALUATORS

The Sustainable Agriculture Project that BLDF implements with AusAID funding in San Isidro and Sagbayan has been cited for outstanding work with Local Government Units (LGUs). The evaluation was done by the PACAP (Philippine Australia Community Assistance Program) Secretariat.

The project team is composed of Yollie Albuladora, project coordinator, and two community organizers, Dodong Formentera and Moises Alfuerto.

BLDF PROJECT SEMI-FINALIST WORLD BANK'S PANIBAGONG PARAAN CONTEST

The Sagbayan Social Enterprise Development Project (SSEDP) has been selected as one of the semi-finalist in its Panibagong Paraan Contest.

The project seeks to match idle youth in the municipality of Sagbayan with idle land. BLDF will serve as broker to bring together the LGU and its development partners so that unemployed can be trained on sustainable agriculture and be allocated the use of idle land to implement organic agriculture projects.

Arnold Seloterio, BLDF Database Administrator, says the project will have as partners the following: the Central Visayas College of Agricultures, Forestry and Trade (CVSCAFT), the Bohol Association of Hotels and Resorts (BAHR), the Bohol Initiators for Sustainable Agricultural Develolpment (BISAD), and the Association of Concerned Landlords (ACL).

Final selection of winners will be done this April.

PDMS NEW SURVEY IN DEMAND

Updated surveys for the Poverty Database Monitoring System (PDMS) using the revised questionnaire and the latest version of the software (Version 2.1) is on the increase.

Rodrigo Ocarol, field operations chief, says that after Loon and Maribojoc, BLDF has been invited to discuss how to proceed with PDMS resurveys in Pilar, Duero and Tagbilaran. Other municipalities may soon follow.

All 47 municipalities and 1 city in Bohol province has completed PDMS surveys using earlier versions of the questionnaire and software covering more than 150,000 households.

Finally, thanks to Mar for the reminder.

FR. ACONG ON MY MIND

26 December 1974: I will always associate Fr. Acong Sevilla to that night 34 years ago when I knocked at the Sevilla residence at the “Short Cut” in Lucena City and requested him to help me escape from two armed men who were pursuing me. He was seated on what looked like a rocking chair and he swiftly got up after hearing my reason for coming to his place.

Both of us rushed to his jeep parked by the road. He started the engine and promptly asked me where I would like to go.

For a moment, I could not speak. Then I managed to squeak out the name of the place where I would like to pick up a friend and our clothes and other personal stuff. I guess his calmness sought my frayed nerves and I managed to tell him bits and pieces of the story; how two young men blocked my path while I was walking on the road beside the Lucena Elementary School in Iyam district, in front of our high school; how the two walked with myself in the middle; and how I felt the nozzle of a gun on the left side of my body; my swift decision to parry the gun and free myself from their hold.

The two young men ran after me, but I managed to elude them or, probably, they would not want to risk getting notice by the neighborhood. I was able to reach my relative’s home and told the family what had happened. I decided to leave so as not to involve the family and a young boy volunteered to accompany me in the dark until I reached the main road.

Still no sign of the two young men, but I had the feeling they were just observing from a distance. I rode in a passenger jeepney and to ensure I would not be followed, I got off after the Iyam bridge and followed the familiar unlit and stony path leading to the Sevilla home. In fact, I remember I ran unmindful of the barking dogs.

Looking back to this incident, which I did many, many times during the last three decades, I had the same feeling of relief that Fr. Acong, at that moment of extreme anguish, did not hesitate to help me and a friend find ourselves out of a difficult situation.
We were being pursued like rats on account of what we stood for at that time against what we perceived as injustice committed against our people and the more than thirty of our friends who had been persecuted and just disappeared without a trace.

By extending help at a time when we needed it most, Fr. Acong demonstrated what it meant to be a shepherd to his flock, including those who had strayed off the path. When my friend and I finally decided to leave the underground, two weeks after Fr. Acong brought us to a safe haven, you can doubtless say his singular act of kindness had influenced for the most part that crucial decision. ####

Nestor M. Pestelos
Kuching, Malaysia
28 January 2008

A Week to Remember

Now it's Monday, 14 Jan 2008. What a relief! I have just gone through a nerve-wracking, energy-sapping, emotion-draining week!

Gardy Labad and I met with Director Ted Romo of the Department of Social Welfare and Department, Region 7, last Monday. We went through the basic concepts of creative industries and what is known as ABCD or Asset-Based Community Development.

The following day we had the consultation meeting with Mayors and/or the representatives of the six municipalities of Bohol where the Kalahi Creative Industries Development Project (KCIDP) would be implemented on a pilot basis. The Mayor of Pilar would like the project implemented immediately in his municipality. The others preferred to be assisted first in explaining the project to key sectors in the municipality, most especially the barangays.

KCIDP is not the type of projects municipalities are used to. This will be focused on creative industries considered as assets at both community and household levels. What everyone is used to are projects on basic needs: water supply and santitation; roads, clinics and other infrastructure; assistance for malnutrition or households with school dropouts, etc. Teatro Bolanon will present a cultural showcase to help communities be aware of their cultural and arts assets. Hence, the planning for creative industries will start not with the usual identification of needs and problems.

Local planning will start with a process of identifying assets. BLDF has taken the challenge of producing the survey methodology and the software for this revolutionary approach and link these tools to Poverty Databased Monitoring System (PDMS) developed as pro-poor targeting tool based on basic needs approach.

On Wednesday, I had to fly to Manila to meet friends from UNICEF and CIDA in efforts to get some support for developing the ABCD tools. There's some hope we could get CIDA to co-share with BLDF the support for the IT programmer and specialist. In exchange, BLDF will make available data that could be used by CIDA for writing up case studies.

Habitat Malaysia waits eagerly for the outputs which can be used for a community survey in cooperation with University of Malaysia Sabah.

Thursday I had to spend almost half a day with Habitat Philippines so we could finalize my work plan for the first quarter of the year. We had to agree on the case studies to be undertaken and on the role I have to play in implementing the ADB urban project.

Friday I had to pick up the CD on a friend's funeral from Guadi. We had to meet for this at the Greenbelt chapel. By late afternoon, I was back to Bohol to meet Erin Hoffman and the BLDF team. Erin had arrived earlier from Boston College to start a four-month internship with BLDF.

Saturday I had to meet them again at our place in the village. Then the news was broken to me gently by Jojie about the passing away of my close friend, Atty. Nitz Cambangay, who just retired as Provincial Planning and Development Coordinator. All of us were shocked by the news. We met with him 04 January to finalize plans for the registration of a new entity, the Institute of Poverty Studies and Governance.

Afternoon of that Saturday I had to rush back to Baclayon Church to serve as sponsor in the wedding of Toby Martin and Dagni Aya-ay. Prior to that I had to attend a wake for the mother of the former Mayor's mother. Shortly before midnight, when the wedding reception ended, I went with the family to visit Nitz at Funeraria Gomez. The place was full of people. We emphatize with Helen's situation, who now must confront a future without Nitz.

Early Sunday, after attending morning Mass, we went back to Nitz where he seemed only sleeping there and for the first time during the week, I had moments to recall how we conspired to make poverty not only a "showbiz" issue, but the overarching theme of all development plans here in Bohol.

We will go on with this journey and this is probably the best way to remember our friend and colleague, Nitz Cambangay.

Back to Blogging

Now let me see: almost 18 months I have not had any entry to this blog site. Long time, yes. Long time to prove if somebody will care if I don't blog. Hahahahah! It's really missed.

So why return to it? The answer is probably more of a wish to get things documented and hope somebody else will read it and spark a thought or two that everybody will profit from in terms of new insight or for just the share pleasure of knowing somebody somewhere shares the same thought.

For the long absence, I do not have to cite the same excuse about being busy. It may be true, but if you really want to do something, you will always find the time to do it. Or it could be poor planning, being unmindful of how to allocate time based on priorities. Or it could be plain and simple fatigue, a certain tiredness of the spirit, a physical inability to do things which are not directly related to one's work.

Whatever it is, those 18 months are gone, as far as my blog is concerned.

Among my friends, only Vanni Villafuerte of the Philippine Business for Social Progress, commented about the blog during the long period of its absence. In a visit to Bohol a few months back, he said he read my blogs because it deals with a common interest we share: poverty. Of course, it's not all about poverty; sometimes I renege and deal with with some topics remotely related to poverty. I must admit it's tiring to think and talk poverty all the time, especially if your friends want to talk about something else - which is often!

Let's try again going into this blog with the regret that some incidents or experiences I have had during the last 18 months are gone forever - except perhaps in images I have stored in my digital camera or captured in scribblings on my notebooks, faithful companiorns since I am 11 years old.

Thanks to Arnold Seloterio for facilitating my access to the blog spot. Now let's see how long I can sustaing blogging this time.

Search for Meaning

Sounds like a 1960's syndrome, but when I look back during the past five years when I am supposed to be on retirement, I am meeting more and more people in search for meaning in their lives, or more specifically, something meaningful or significant to do. I am simply amazed to what length and sacrifices they will go just to do something they believe can make a difference in other people's lives. Their efforts seem to balance so much greed and selfishness around us.

During the first few months after retirement, I met people from a group that goes by the acronym FRIENDS. I forgot already what the acronym stands for, but I met some of their members who turned out to be retired professors from the University of the Philippines inLos Banos (UPLB). I learned they would go to remote areas in the country, e.g. Bondoc Peninsula in Quezon Province, and give free advice to farmers groups on the latest technologies to increase farm yield in ways that do not harm the environment. They could have earned millions from this consultancy services, but they chose to dispense them free. Simply amazing in a world where you are charged for practically everything!

Two years ago, I went to Dumaguete City to find out more about an institution run by an NGO which is into making bamboos a profitable source of materials for housing, furniture and handicraft. We went to the Buglas Bamboo Institute which is doing pioneering efforts in this side of the country in advance techniques to grow bamboos and in exploiting commercially the many uses of this wonderful crop. The staff brought us to their facilities and briefed us on how they plant bamboos which they learned from the People's Republic of China, which is promoting organizations of bamboo users around the world.

My wife and I were able to see the vat with chemicals mixed with water where bamboo poles are kept for days so they would not be attacked by bukbok, that perennial insect or whatever that makes bamboos rot. We saw the plantations and the buildings made of bamboos. There was even a resort with structures all made of bamboos. Then we were brought to a workshop where young people, trained by the Institute, were rushing the varnishing of newly-finished furniture bound for Lebanon. Surprise of all surprises, we found a former classmate here, also from UP Los Banos and also retired, working as business adviser to the Institute "for lack of anything to do at home," he said. He is married to Ruth Ruiz, an old friend and former colleague at the national planning agency.

I have met such people, young and old, both in the Philippines and abroad, who are involved in cause "bigger than themselves," as we used to say during those idealistic college days. They inspire me no end. Yes, at this very ripe age of 64, we still need to be inspired. The examples they set show that the pursuit of noble causes is still alive during this time and age.

Cheers!

A Celebration Called Nyepi

31 March, 7.00 a.m. Here in Bali. I rushed here from Bangkok thinking I could get into a 30 March flight via Merpati to Dili. Right at the airport, an airport staff told me there would be no flight out by any airline on that day.

At the hotel, the staff repeated the same information to me. On the way to my room, the hotel boy who helped carry my two pieces of luggage said Bali would be celebrating the New Year. I thought I heard him say it was a Buddhist ceremony. Later, I found out from a copy of the Jakarta Post I bought in a convenience shop that it was actually a Hindu ceremony. It’s their New Year according to the Hindus.

Nyepi is to them a Day of Silence. Lights are put off. Machines are turned off. Shops are closed. Locals stay indoors. Tourists are advised not to leave the hotel compound. At the Melasti Beach Bungalows where I stay, the guests eat in a tent inside the inner compound; the restaurant by the road was closed yesterday. The Jakarta Post says in an editorial: “Let the sounds of the wind and the birds be the hallmark of Bali for one.”

This year’s celebration of what Hindus called Caka 1928 fell on a Friday, a day when Muslims would gather at mosques. On this day, however, Muslims did not use the loudspeakers for their Friday sermons. They also did not use their motorized vehicles to go to the mosques. As the Jakarta Post noted: “It was an admirable show of tolerance without sacrificing the practice of one’s respective religion.”

I agree. It has caused us inconveniences during the day, e.g. not being able to shop; going to the toilet in total darkness; groping the keyboard to be able to type; giving up TV for one day and a night, etc., but these are small things to pay for giving us the chance to see a glimmer of hope that the world will rediscover tolerance.

The Hindu who came later in the day to make my bed said, “It’s for reflection, sir. Thinking about self and family and others.” For me, the word introspection, which I loved to quote from my existentialist idols when I was younger, would never be the same again after this brief interlude of observing Nyepi in Bali.

Cheers!

Waiting for Emma

We are still here in Timor Leste waiting for Emma, the cyclone that was supposed to hit us two days ago. For the past two days, the government has been tracking this cyclone, reportedly with a 150 km per hour velocity. Fortunately, nothing has happened yet except for occasional heavy downpour. Surviving the heavy rain is quite manageable.

There’s much stress over news about Emma. If it comes here, it will be the first time in living memory that a typhoon, storm or cyclone of such magnitude will hit the country. It will be a real disaster on top of several disasters that have hit the country.

A coincidence, but during the week, we have had two guests from the Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (APDC) based in Bangkok. They are Earl Kessler, deputy executive director, and James Bennett, training coordinator. The two were accompanied by Charlie Ayco, the Director for Regional Programs, of Habitat for Humanity International, also based in Bangkok.

The three are preparing a case study to be presented to the World Urban Forum scheduled in June this year. The study is about the shelter kits distribution project implemented by UNHCR and NGOs as a response to a man-made disaster, the destruction of 70% of the country’s infrastructure in late 1999 in the aftermath of a referendum when majority of the people chose to establish a new nation.

The approach consisted of the UNHCR making available shelter kits consisting of basic house building parts to partner NGOs, which in turn took care of selecting beneficiary families and conducting orientation and community preparation activities. The approach makes sure that the assistance will not entail relocating families and communities; the same basic core house materials will be provided each beneficiary; the shelter kits can be further augmented by family resources; and the donors and NGOs need not compete for coverage, house design, and other matters.

In preparation for this mission, Habitat Timor Leste, headed by Butch C. Batilong, National Director, worked in partnership with the Bohol Local Development Foundation to prepare a database on beneficiaries of the shelter kits projects using the Poverty Database and Monitoring System (PDMS) software. Tony Irving and Arnold Seloterio, IT Consultant and Database Manager, respectively, of BLDF have been brought here to Timor Leste for this important assignment.

Aside from the cycle, there is another disaster that many people anticipate to hit the country. Some economists are saying that with the phase-out of the UN peacekeeping mission by May this year, there will be quite an impact on the local economy. Hotels and restaurants, which provide for most of the employment and share in the economy, will bear the brunt of this expected impact. Business will be adversely affected particularly those big shops which sell basic commodities. There will just be less customers to spread cash benefits all around.

Probably in anticipation of this economic slump, most foreign-funded projects now focus on enterprise development and building the skills base for local employment and entrepreneurship. It is simply that no amount of economic growth in the coming years will be able to create jobs for those who are unemployed now. The labor force has 20,000 new entrants each year and there is no industry large enough to absorb that many people and those unemployed before in gainful employment.

Both the government and the international donor community in Timor Leste are engaged in efforts to prevent a possible disaster that may arise from this explosive situation. Hence, while waiting for Emma the cyclone, we are reflecting on other disasters that may likely hit the country and join efforts to find ways as creative as the shelter kits distribution to contend with them.

Forward Timor-Leste!

Notes before 6

At 6 p.m., this Habitat office in Timor-Leste closes. Now I am rushing to jot down some notes. I have noticed my last entry was on 03 Jan yet; and it's most excerpts from Isa's letter.

What can I tell you now? It has been raining here all week. I arrived here 09 Jan. Arnold Seloterio and Tony Irving were with me. Butch Batilong, the Habitat Director here, met us at the airport. He whisked us from the airport to the hotel, then to the office. We spent the whole afternoon planning for the poverty database project here which would be implemented in three out of thirteen districts.

In two days, the survey tools were translated into Bahasa and reproduced. Then for three days, all thirty volunteers were trained on the use of the survey tools. The field supervisors had been trained prior to this and they helped in providing inputs. Then the survey began almost simulataneously in all areas. As of today, barely a week after the start of the survey, a total of 190 questionnaires have been returned with complete data; the encoder has started the task of putting the data in the software called the Poverty Database and Monitoring System Software (PDMSS), developed in Bohol, Philippines by the Bohol Local Development Foundation, in cooperation with the Provincial Planning and Development Office.

Tony Irving modified the software based on revisions done on the survey tools. He left last Saturday, 21 January, for the Philippines with his job accomplished. He is now in negotiations with World Vision Timor Leste for his return sometime in March on a consultancy arrangement.
Arnold has accepted Habitat's offer of an extended three-month consultancy on database management.

We are proud of what these two guys are doing for Timor-Leste, one of the world's top 20 poorest countries. Their efforts will contribute to reducing poverty incidence here, no doubt.
Let's move on ...

Isabel's Letter

Here is a letter from Isabel Losloso-Rivera, a close friend and former classmate from Class 58 of the old Quezon Provincial High School in Lucena City. It was emailed last 26 Dec 06 to another classmate and close friend, Milwida Sevilla-Reyes, and forwarded to me the same day. As I read it, I was struck by Isa’s honesty, genuine concern for family, most especially her apo, Jayden, her account of how it was to live in America, and on the whole, her reflection about her role in the family. These are the stuff that make great literature – they focus on the particular and relatively small events, and yet they succeed in another level of consciousness to address universal themes. Isa has given me pemission to publish her email in our website to share it to a broader audience; yes, even in one’s family, you can be a change agent, a development worker.

The letter is printed here unedited, straight from Isa’s heart. The only thing we contributed was the paragraphing:

drinking coffee is something i did not embrace here in america. in the phil., i was drinking cocoa. i remember when all the brothers/sisters/parents came one by one -- they were disappointed not to find coffee in our household. i stayed pretty much the same here in america. and that's one of my wisdoms that i find myself repeating to my mom, brothers & sisters & when i do i find them yawning, leaving the room. adding to that statement that america has so much to offer, that if you are not engrained w/ good values/virtues you will end up embracing the wrong ones left astray.

i am witness how my own families fall from them. just like my mother,irene, elmer they became addicted to gambling then --- going to reno behind my back but all these really never escaped me 'cause i have friends/acquaintances who repeated seeing them.. my mom would even tell me when i told her about it," nanay, why do you have to go to reno -- para kang may santong sinasamba duon hindi mo naman ginagawa ito sa pilipinas,why do you have to start?." and my mom will retaliate saying: "why worry, hindi naman pera mo ang ginagastos ko."

now, whenever my nanay got greeted by her grandkids, they usually jokingly, say, "how's reno." i said to myself, thanks goodness that's something i do not want my kids/grandkids to remember me by. sometimes,in exasperation i would say" why, i am just the daughter, why do i have to be the parent to you."

come to think of it, that's the role i played all my life to my family,agonizing at their falls,rejoicing at their victories even rejoicing at insignificant ones. or should it be rejoicing too, at their falls because from them their inner self will get better & in the end,good is victorious over evil.

it's already monday, i am still feeling the effect of that coffee -- we went home past 11 pm from our family's x'mas party at jennie. my mom, nana pacita & myself were playing w/ jayden after my son, cesar&phoenix left earlier for antioch & joel for home. we seldom are together w/ my mom, so we made sure that there that's group picture taken. it was raining since 12 noon of christmas,even as we came home.

i always relay to my mom everything that jayden does/did, so my mom has enough time to witness all of them last nite. in the side of my eyes, i also witnessed how cesar took care of phoenix -- bringing him to the johns -- phoenix was well dress(matching pa) & carried it well too,changing his clothes to sleeping pajamas complete w/ one of a kind disneyland slipper before boarding his van back to antioch (my plan to go w/ him got axed as he said he already have plans for that day),protective of jayden (his baby cousin,his word) -- if he goes by the door, he runs toward the door w/ his hands stretched as a barrier. he was so suplado earlier in the evening as he awoke from his slumber but warmed up later on.

it was not hard for us to get his hug at nagmano pa kay nanay (learned fr. maternal grandparents/g.g.(?). gg stands for great grandma. that's how nanay is addressed here too. from downstairs, i can hear them laughing/making funs of poses in jennie's family album,etc., phoenix/jayden racing to the stairs,door,x/mas lites,w/ the latter touching anything his hands can lay on,passing/scurrying from one room to another, downstairs,uptairs -- never still parang "kiti-kiti."

phoenix was showing us all the punches, jumps of a karate kid from all the videos/tvs he watched & what struck me was his words that his dad was the best (because of my senior moment, i forgot what we were talking about).

for their take home, i packed several plates of pansit, tamales, turkey meat,mashed potatoe & stuffing. if anything else i will be remembered for my famous good/delicious turkey cooking (see jennie invitation). w/ almost 20 years cooking it, i have perfected it having read /watch in tv all the secrets thereat to produce one. allan, a man who like the rest of his family, knows a good/fine food when he tastes one, commented that he wants to know all of my secrets, and jennie had always rated mine on top of allan's mom and all the turkey that she had eaten in her life.

jayden is well loved. any baby is not hard to love. there's not enough of jayden for jennie&allan & i already dread the time in 2 more years when "boyhood" will pretty soon engulf :"babyhood."

nestor, just like when senior moments takes over our junior moments.mil read nestor's latest entry in his blog. i got disappointed, because i already added my private message & got erased & i cannot retreive it. i was trying to rewrite it again but senior moments took over, i cannot rewrite it. goodbye junior moments, hello, senior moments.

Laarni's Letter; April's Letter

For the past 20 Christmases or so, Mil Sevilla-Reyes, a close friend and former high school classmate from way,way back in Lucena City, has been carrying on the tradition of writing and distributing letters that tell friends about milestones in her family's life during the year about to end. Those letters have been a fascinating read; our classmates and other friends look forward to receiving this letter each year. It chronicles key family events which no Christmas cards can do. Mil used to write these letters until recently when she encouraged her daughters (April, Laarni and Carmel) to do so. This year, Laarni and April actually prepared a letter each. To give the wide readership they deserve, we will print them here in this section. I must thank Mil and Ces for keeping us in the loop after all these years.

Laarni's Letter:

Merry Christmas and Season’s Greetings to all! Hope everybody’s had an enjoyable year and doing well. Life over this way has been pretty good - another year swiftly gone though productively filled nonetheless.

My year began with another month long trip to the Philippines to see relatives and friends, as well as make the most of my three-month uni holidays. Some family friends from Sydney were also over at the same time so it was good to enjoy our holiday together. I stayed mainly in Manila and Lucena, but was able to spend time in Batangas and visit Villa Escudero with the Sydney folks. The month went by quicker than I expected and soon enough, I was back at uni beginning the first semester of my final year. I’ve actually just recently finished my course and am now awaiting the results to gain my degree in Bachelor of Arts in Organisational Learning.

Having majored in Human Resource Development, my plan is to find a job in the field sometime next year. For now, I’m still working as a casual in my retail job and I’d rather leave it that way so I can take a break, relax and have fun over the summer. Although there are no plans to go overseas this time, a few trips out of Sydney with mates won’t go astray.

April’s out of the country. She’s travelled to countless destinations since leaving in July for a yearlong venture. She and a friend are now based in London and by the sounds of all her adventures I’d say she’s having a great time. She’s started working with O2, a telco similar to Telstra, though not before she attended World Youth Day in Cologne and toured Europe. Definitely, a well deserved break from working life. She also flew to New York at the beginning of November to celebrate Lola’s birthday with the Reyeses. She had fun hanging out with all the cousins. Speaking to her on the phone the other night, she’s already filled me in on her next plan: to travel to South Africa sometime in 2006. Wouldn’t we all love to spend a year like that?

She and Carmel both moved back home at the beginning of the year, with April renting out her apartment to save money for her trip and Carmel focusing on completing her studies. Carmel has been working on her degree in Interior Architecture, while also teaching music (keyboard) to students in various primary schools. I think she’s gotten used to being called “Miss Carmel”. She always has funny stories to tell us about her kids. Approached by one kid’s dad, she began playing the piano for his local R&B cover band. She enjoyed performing different gigs around Sydney for a while. Heaps more active than I, she’s also taken up Capouera – a form of Brazilian street fighting/dancing. I guess it’s a really good workout and also a lot of fun because I always see it being performed in the City and attracting great crowds! Maybe I can take it up with Carmel as part of my New Year’s resolutions.

Now to Mum and Dad: they have yet another year of Bass High and ResMed under their belts, with Mum immensely enjoying her role as Librarian and Dad fully settling into his new work location and innovative facility. Mum’s still very happy at her school and I often wonder when she’ll ever get enough of it. Somehow I don’t think that will be for a while yet. Dad’s well and truly gotten used to travelling the distance to work everyday and is even keen to get me into a role related to my course with the company. We’ll see what happens.

The year saw a visit from Dad’s youngest sister, Tita Ludy, who flew in from Connecticut for a two-week stay here in Sydney. As well as doing all the sightseeing and touristy things around here, she was able to visit Cairns in Australia’s north when Mum and Dad and their friends flew there to celebrate my Ninang Salve’s birthday. Even though Tita Ludy fit in with all the ‘oldies,’ my cousins, sisters and I would often refer to her as our ‘big sis’! It’s always good fun having our relos from overseas visit so I wonder what (or who) is in store for next year.

Well, that’s about it from the Reyes camp for this year. As for the New Year, April’s still not definite about when she’ll be coming back, Carmel will be finishing her degree and I’ll probably be on a quest to find a new job. All the while having a good time no doubt! I hear there are plans for both Mum and Dad and the other parents to holiday in Las Vegas (?)

‘Til next Christmas letter everyone. I’m sure you’ll be filled in on the 2006 details then! Have great holidays and Happy Christmas!!!

Love, Laarni

Merry Christmas from London town!

Wherever you are in the world, I hope that this letter finds you well.

I have been very fortunate this year to meet and experience the people and places that I have. Laarni has summarised my year well and yes, my adventures have been brilliant! Before heading for London, I visited the Philippines in May staying most of the time in Lucena and spending some time in Bohol with the Pestelos family.

I’ve been in London nearly four months now and over this period have been able to settle in to this big and vibrant city. I’ve settled in my parish of Our Lady Queen of Heaven here in Bayswater, and joined a local hockey team. But there are things that I miss about Sydney – my family most especially, my friends and the good weather.

If I had to pick my favourite places so far, they would be Rome, Krakow and Prague. I’ve recently been able to visit Prague for the second time. My visit coincided with the opening of the Christmas markets in the old town square which had choirs from all parts of Europe performing, good traditional Czech food and it was snowing! It is a very pretty town.

Through my travelling adventures, I have also met some really great people from different parts of the world. And thanks to technology, we’ve been able to keep the friendships alive and meet up again on the road. Living in London has also meant that I have met many Australians, Kiwis and South Africans. It is true when they say that London is full of antipodeans.

The beauty of meeting so many fellow Aussies, is that we are travelling similar journeys and can share in each other’s experiences. The down side is that I’ve come all this way yet I struggle to meet English people!

On my agenda for 2006, is New Year’s Eve in Edinburgh, then Paris, South Africa (to visit my good friend Riefqah), Copenhagen and hopefully back to Spain and Italy. There is a lot to fit in before I head home to Sydney!

Happy Christmas and may 2006 bring us all blessings of health and happiness.

Love, April

P. S. Our thoughts are with Tito Pari as he and his colleagues celebrate their 40th year of ordination in his parish of Apad, Calauag on 18 December.

We’re also reaching out to Tita Laura Jardin and her children in San Diego. They are facing Christmas for the first time without Tito Johnny. He passed away on 2nd July

Senior Moments, Junior Moments

I just read an exchange of emails between my two close friends from high school, Mil and Isa. (Yes, we copy each other's emails). This last one was particularly interesting. Mil says she cannot remember something from way back and that it must be one of those "senior moments." Lapses of memory belong to the old, this phrase implies. But, then, it set me to thinking: perhaps we, as elderly, do have junior moments, too.

For instance, we are 63 going 64 and still we:

- dance the night away in a disco while surrounded by under-20s;
- remember the dress that our first date wore to the prom thirty years ago;
- memorize some cell phone numbers because for some reasons we do not want to store them in our phone's memory;
- eat roast pork as though there is no tomorrow;
- race up the stair and beat the elevator to the top floor;
- chat with our neighbors about the secret lives of singers and actresses we know;
-find our way to the john even during brown-outs;
-recite more than ten lines from a t.s. eliot's poem;
-use email rather than write letters or send postcards;
-drive a car even on rainy nights and not lose our way, or just park and call home for help;
-go to mass at 4.30 a.m. and still make it to the computer at 7.00 a.m.

More junior moments? I can't remember anymore what I jotted down over coffee. Well, Mil and Isa, this must be my senior moment creeping in.

Proposals

Whenever I meet old friends, and even a few new ones, I am always asked the question, "How did you end up with Habitat?" or something to that effect. Of course, the next query is almost always if I have met Former US President Jimmy Carter! In the popular consciousness, the name Carter and Habitat are closely associated due to several high-profile house builds that the former US President fund-raised for and personally led.

Yes, it's true, I have retired from UNDP after working in several projects mostly in South Pacific countries. I went home for good starting 14 Dec 2001. Home was and still is and, hopefully, will always be a village named Laya in Baclayon, Bohol. After three months of trying my hand in contour farming and mostly looking at our house helps raise native chickens, I felt if I had to live longer, I must go back to the chores I am used to for more than 60% of the lifetime I had lived. I need to do development work, identify problems, build a case for interventions, prepare proposals and other documents and basically move heaven and earth to get things on the ground, interest people to do their share, look back after all the confusions and resolutions and affirmations and endless reaffirmations of goals and shortcomings and new resolves and then move on to ... well, writing new proposals!

The need for writing project proposals was quite evident when I joined the provincial planning office on 01 April 2002. I looked at some office documents and felt the same way as before; this is another proposals factory. I felt the same way when I was with a public relations company that raised funds for civic causes; several NGOs in the past that were forever struggling; briefly with the National Economic Development Authority in a social mobilization project for children; and UNDP for twelve years trying to mobilize resources for atolls and other remote places that seemed invisible to planners.

Looks like the first skill to learn is how to write project proposals that will get government and external donors to fund. It is like you are thrown into the water and if you do not know how to swim, you will surely drown. Same way with development work; if you do not know how to prepare project proposals, you will not survive. Whether you are with an NGO, a government agency, a planning authority, an international UN agency or an international Christian ministry such as Habitat for Humanity International, you need to know how to put together a project proposals using formats prescribed by the donors or funders.

No way to escape this and my advice to romantics who have somehow ended up with development agencies these days; leave your literary biases behind or the illusion that you can just plunge into doing your chores based on your technical expertise. In most cases, the modality for the exercise of such skills is through projects, and you will first help produce the resources to enable you to practise such skills. Hence, it pays to know how projects get prepared, submitted, appraised and approved. Otherwise, you will have no project to hire to pay for the exercise of your skills.

Now I have not really answered how I came to join Habitat. You see, I have yet to finish this proposal I will submit to ... well, there is no end to this; I just had a break.

Bibo Bohol

For almost a week, prior to my trip here to Bangkok, I was preoccupied with Bibo Bohol. It was quite an intense experience from 25 November, when I had the trip to Bilar, to 03 December when I participated in a planning workshop at the Governor's Mansion in Tagbilaran City. I reflected on this experience 05 December on my trip to Bangkok on this Cathay Pacific flight via Hongkong.

Gardy Labad invited me to present the LPRAP (Local Poverty Reduction Action Plan) software being developed for the past two years by our Foundation, in collaboration with the Provincial Planning and Development Office. I had to present the context first before showing how the software works. After all, the software is just a tool to process the data from the household poverty surveys. We talked about the program framework on poverty reduction; the overview of the program based on the framework; the linkage of the poverty reduction program to peace and development efforts; the restructuring of the provincial government based on this new thrust; and the reallignment of the annual and medium-term development plans consistent with the poverty focus at policy level.

As always, Bea Zobel quickly responded to this development. I think she saw quite clearly that Bibo Bohol is part of the provincial development agenda. It is not something cooked up as a stand-alone initiative by the Metropolitan Museum of Manila and the local cultural and arts council. Its emphasis on what it calls the sunrise creative industries can be a potent intervention against poverty in Bohol. Heritage-based social enterprises and marketable eco-tourism sites can benefit directly Bohol households, 47.3% of whom are still below the poverty line.

I had to fly to Manila on from Bohol to work with Gardy Labad, Ino Manalo and Bea on a slide presentation on Bibo Bohol. The slides were critiqued by marketing experts from Ayala Foundation.

(Note: I am doing this on the run. I have to attend a presentation by the SGS group here at the Habitat regional office. Will get back to this as soon as possible).

3.00 p.m. It was a very interesting presentation by Robert Jourdain, assistant vice president of SGS about Habitat Thailand. SGS has been hired by Habitat for Humanity International Asia Pacific to assess selected affiliates in several countries (Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines and India) in terms of global best practices of NGOs. It is an NGO benchmarking exercise. His findings can shed light on current problems and, hopefully, the national organization and the affiliates can move on from there to implement measures to improve performance.

Now back to Bibo Bohol. The slide presentation was seen and commented on and the following day, I joined Gardy and Ino and Bea to work on the revisions. It was a nerve-wracking exercise. Finally, thirty five minutes before the scheduled presenation at 10, we moved on to the Globe building in Mandaluyong.

It was like presenting a research study before a panel. Ino presented the revised slide presentation. Bea and Gardy provided inputs and answered questions. The Globe panel was cautious about making making cash commitments, but on the whole they saw the merits of participating in the Bibo Bohol program.

All of us were happy about the result. Bea treated us at the Shang Restaurant at the Shangrila, where Monette Flores joined us. Monette has had a remarkable track record developing eco-tourism sites and her expertise will be valuable for Bibo Bohol. She practically walked us through the process of developing such sites. Bea suggested we go to Calatagan, Batangas the following and continue our meeting there so we could take pictures of her bahay kubo (native house) that I could show to the architect who would design local houses for us in our place in Laya.

That trip is a story in itself. It is apparent that as we tackled issues related to Bibo Bohol and some possible projects, we were also learning details about our personal lives. In brief, we were actually engaged in team building efforts.

In the end, I can say, Bea's vision for Bohol hasbecome ours too.

Trip to Bilar

Gardy Labad first invited us to be at Sitio Ubos in Tagbilaran City at 1.00 p.m. We arrived at the Rocha-Suarez ancestral home at exactly the appointed time. To our surprise, lunch was being served. The people were expecting Luli, the President's daughter, but she did not arrive. Bea Zobel was there with her team and a local group identified with heritage and cultural preservation. We had eaten lunch, and so we spent the time instead to go about the house. It was my first time there. The house underwent renovation and what interested us were the artifacts and mementos of past centuries. This house stood there for ages, and five generations had lived there.

By around two o'clock, we were on our way to Bilar. We tagged along with the group. Bill Granert and several members from his NGO, the Soil and Water Conservation Foundation were there. There were also people from the barangay. We were shown the renovation taking place there, in this place that was once a Boy Scout's Campsite 30 years back. It also became known as the Magsaysay center in the past. Then the place deteriorated under the care of Department of Environment and Natural Resources and the LGU. Hopefully, with assistance from Bea Zobel's group, this place would hum again with activities.

In May, 2006, the place will host hundreds of young people from all over the country to camp together and undertake activities that will deepen their understanding of ecology and culture. Let's wait for May. Better still, let's contribute to make Bibbo Bohol a celebration of what we can do together to preserve the environment and our culture.

Gray November

Since I arrived home from Jakarta, it has rained here everyday, mostly in the afternoon. On my first day, 29 Oct., I could not resist the impulse of getting out in my shorts and t-shirt and had almost an hour under the pouring rain. Actually, my 12-year old son Odon had been there on the front yard, enjoying the rain. If you are 63, anything that brings you back to the delights of childhood will always be a welcomed event.

The following day, it rained again, also in the afternoon. It rained all the time, mostly in the afternoons until today, the 4th of November. When I look back, I can recall it always rains when it's around All Saints Day or All Souls Day. I cannot recall a rain-less first of November. The rains must be the reason why we always think of November as gray. Remember that expression, "When its gray November in your Soul." In my bohemian days, it refers to a pub in Manila where writers and artists and campus intellectuals would like to congregate and massage their egos, in addition to discussing topics about art and literature ... No such place now to spend your gray November days. Well, not in this place anyway. There's probably no need for one.

We can discuss about poverty anytime of day, in any month, and always we resolve to do something about it the following day. We have our own Poverty Cafe, a moveable feast of ideas meant for sharing and, hopefully, for doing something about this scourge that affects us all. Ah, November is gray indeed.

Action Items

Since I arrived home from Jakarta, it has rained here everyday, mostly in the afternoon. On my first day, 29 Oct., I could not resist the impulse of getting out in my shorts and t-shirt and had almost an hour under the pouring rain. Actually, my 12-year old son Odon had been there on the front yard, enjoying the rain. If you are 63, anything that brings you back to the delights of childhood will always be a welcomed event.

The following day, it rained again, also in the afternoon. It rained all the time, mostly in the afternoons until today, the 4th of November. When I look back, I can recall it always rains when it's around All Saints Day or All Souls Day. I cannot recall a rain-less first of November. The rains must be the reason why we always think of November as gray. Remember that expression, "When its gray November in your Soul." In my bohemian days, it refers to a pub in Manila where writers and artists and campus intellectuals would like to congregate and massage their egos, in addition to discussing topics about art and literature ... No such place now to spend your gray November days. Well, not in this place anyway. There's probably no need for one.

We can discuss about poverty anytime of day, in any month, and always we resolve to do something about it the following day. We have our own Poverty Cafe, a moveable feast of ideas meant for sharing and, hopefully, for doing something about this scourge that affects us all. Ah, November is gray indeed.

Holiday Mood

Both cities were in holiday mood when I left Jakarta and arrived in Manila. Jakarta was about to celebrate Idil Fitri or the end of Ramadan, while Manila was preparating for 1 Nov for All Souls Day when Filipinos go to cemeteries to remember the dead. The airports and hotels and the streets were filled with people all rushing to the provinces. The police forces in both cities have announced they are ready with full security during the holidays, 4-5 Nov for Indonesia and 31 Oct to 1 Nov for the Philippines.

Both countries announced they were in full alert against terrorism. The bomb blasts in India added to the paranoia. How could you enjoy the holidays with this threat in the air?

But the domestic flight I took last Saturday from Manila to Tagbilaran was quite full. I could not find any familiar face. It seemed all the other passengers were domestic or foreign tourists. Bohol is still the country's top tourist destination. If they are scared of terrorist attacks, nobody shows it. The beaches and the cemeteries and the malls are all full of people here in Tagbilaran City. Looks like everybody is determined to enjoy the holidays with or without this warning against terrorist attacks.

Back2Manila

10.00 a.m. Jakarta time, which is one hour ahead of RP time. I have checked the Blog section and found out my entry yesterday is missing. Where can it be?

Perhaps it goes to be saved somehow. So, for the moment, Jakarta Blues2 is on deck.

I arrived late this morning, almost 9. I usually come half past 8. The taxi I took from the hotel had a different route. What normally takes 15 minutes took us 30 minutes. Different drivers, I found out during the past 6 days, have different ways to go to the office from the Hotel Mega Anggrek. It's good in a way. I get to see different parts of the city.

But this morning is quite different. I was charged Rp 33,000, which is Rp 10,000 more than my usual fare. I could not argue with the taxi driver because he had this table that clearly showed what I would pay given the route we took. But, of course, he assumed I did not know some other routes which could be shorter.

It's like I am in Manila. Taxi drivers always prove to passengers they are smarter. How about putting them in one city or region, for that matter, and let them run things? Probably things will run better because taxi drivers anywhere in the world are smarter than the rest of us. They will always get you to the place you want to go - and they are so creative about the possible routes to take to bring you there.

Now I go back to this EU proposal I am preparing for Habitat Indonesia. Will Jakarta Blues3 disappear, too, in cyberspace? Let's see what happens.

Jakarta Blues

Still here at the Habitat office in Jakarta. Martha, the secretary, has phoned in to say if I need a taxi. I said yes, at 5.30 p.m., as usual. I have been here since Tuesday last week. The mission is simple enough; produce a proposal for EU funding. It will be similar to the Mindanao Peace Build project that Habitat Philippines submitted to EU last August.

Handoko, the Habitat National Director, assigned four staff to the project proposal team. We all thought at first that Manado would be the project area. When I checked the EU website last Wednesday, after a full day of taking down notes, I found out Manado was not among the five preferred sites for the donor assistance. Thursday we finally decided, after another day of reading, comparing notes and discussions, that we would zero in on Nusa Tenggara Timur or West Timor as the proposed project area.

More discussions last Friday enough grist for my mill during the weekend. I was not able to go the nearby Anggrek Mall. I just stayed in my room churning out around 30 pages of text. Today, most of the team members are gone. Vinon got married last Saturday. Pauline went back to Bandung. Handoko is on a mission to Manado. Glenn left for West Timor yesterday.

Fortunately, I was able to discuss things with Ricky and Lanny. They gave me fresh ideas. Now I have to revise substantial portion of my draft.

Jakarta is getting to be a ghost town. I was told when it's about the end of Ramadan, people go back to their hometowns for celebration, or in anticipation of the celebration of the fasting season. I read in the papers sales are slow in the shops because of low purchasing power due to the 126% increase in fuel prices here.

Now my taxi is here.

Old Friends

Old friends have kept turning up during the last two years or so. I am trying to figure out if there is some kind of logic behind it all. Or, is this just coincidence?

Richard Prado and Ces Adorna, friends from those UNICEF days 20 years ago, managed to visit us here two years ago. Mil Sevilla, my close friend in high school, visited us here during the same period that the two were here. Of course, I see Rem Torres, my closest friend in college, now and then. Last Oct. 2, we were with him and his wife, Kits, in Manila to celebrate his birthday, which was on the day before.

Bituin Gonzales, my kumare, was here in Laya, Bohol a couple of times this year. I had not met her for almost 20 years, I think. I met Ruth and Sammy Ruiz in Dumaguete City in early 2004 after years of not seeing them. I know Ruth from those NEDA days and Sammy from our UP Los Banos days. Talking about UPLB, I met Dr. Willy Padolina after decades of not seeing him on a plane from Jakarta to Manila. That was early August this year.

I just came back from Dili, Timor Leste. There I met Offie Valdecanas, our Mother General during those country programming days with UNICEF in the late 80s. She was with Dr. Arnold Calooy, my inaanak sa kasal.
There must be a reason why I have kept bumping with old friends in recent years. I feel happy seeing them again.

Still at BLDF

It's 6.25 p.m. Still here at the the BLDF office. BLDF is Bohol Local Development Foundation, the NGO which has pioneered the household poverty database system here in Bohol. It was quite a busy day here.

Arnold, our database management specialist, had to finish putting into the poverty database the Habitat home partners from two villages, Bool in Tagbilaran City, and Tabalong in Dauis municipality. We were quite excited when we finally was able to link the poverty status of each home partner to their home repayment status. This is a breakthrough. Now we at Habitat can be guided by the database on what strategy to take to improve the repayment rates of home partners. It is easy to see what to do with home partners who are no deprivation but still refuse to pay. This is clearly a case of wrong values and will have to be dealt as such. It can justify using the full force of the law to evict such home partner from the house for which he or she refuses to pay despite having the means to do so.

The others burdened by high deprivation levels need a different strategy. Perhaps our youth volunteers can help them identify a project to lessen their other burdens so that in the near future they can realize some savings and pay for the house.

We were also able to compare the poverty status of home partners with the rest of the households in the village where they live. The database can also compare the poverty status of home partners based on 12 core indicators.

Let's see the other home partners in other places, how they will rate based on this database. More next time.

Thanks, Rence!

Rence Sore, a friend from the Solomons, turned up in cyberspace and asked that I sent him a copy of the reply made by Miss International from the Philippines when asked what would she say to the rest of the world who think RP is a country of nannies. I gave him a copy of the email sent to me.

I am happy that on the second day of blogging again for Poverty Cafe I got a query from someone whom I have not not met for years. At least, someone read my entry. Rence is now with Commonwealth International based in London. Rence is making it big, quite a leap from those days going through the bureaucratic maze in the Solomons where you could easily get lost untangling web after web of conspiracies and counter-conspiracies. It was easy in those days to lose one's footing. The rules themselves would complicate things.

I am happy for Rence. Now he can focused his enormous talent and people's skills on development concerns. We hope we can work with him again someday. Perhaps not in the Solomons, but in more remote areas where they may be just starting create a state. Timor-Leste, perhaps?

A good thought to close the day and wish everybody good night.

Emotions, Emotions

There's this email sent us by a colleague from Habitat. It's about the answer made by the Filipina winner of Miss International. She was asked about what she thought the Philippines being known as a country of nannies. The answer brought tears to my eyes. I sent the email to all my close friends and associates.

Sounds corny but until early evening that answer still played strong in my mind, and I cried now and then. If you guys want to know her answer, email me at pestelos2003@yahoo.com. I'm too emotional now to even try to put it again to words.

Good night, guys. It's my second day of blogging.

Back Home

Well, back home. This is after dinner. I'm here in front of the laptop. This is a challenge. It's still early but I feel drowsy. Another tiring day at BLDF. Arnold and I are working out the database for the Habitat home partners here in Bohol. He has tinkered with the existing poverty database for two villages here where there are Habitat communities. Now it is easier for me to find out how each home partner ranks in terms of each of the 12 poverty core indicators.

Tomorrow, we will continue this tedious work. I have requested him to reflect the repayment status of each of the home partners. If we can link these to the poverty status, then we can systematically assist the households cope with problems that impact on their capacity to repay the house loan.

Let's see what happens tomorrow. Good night. I need to sleep.

We are back!

Looks like it is a good day to resume blogging. What can I say? My last entry was more than a year ago, in May last year! And to think that I was saying at that time that it had taken me a month to resume writing.

So many things to say. Where to start ... Here I am, at the BLDF office. I am actually waiting for Arnold to program something in my computer. It's almost 11 a.m. here in Tagbilaran City. We're in this new BLDF office.
Ok, Arnold, is finished. Must go back to work.

Will resume later.

Almost a month after my last entry? Sorry, sorry, sorry. I have noted that the journal has been visited 15 times this May. There's really no excuse.I must find time to make entries to this journal. I must. I must. I must.

I have a sore neck. It must be from this TV set which is placed too high in my room. Like many Filipinos these days, I depend on TV to keep track on what's happening in Congress these days. They are supposed to canvass the votes for the President and the Vice President. Instead, our honorable representatives of the people spent the past two days debating on the procedures. Last night, a woman spectator from the gallery sent a note to the filibustering Congressman who, incidentally, lost his bid for Senator to just shut up and start the counting. The honorable wants the whole Senate and Congress to act as committee of one to do the counting instead of having a 14-member committee to do the canvass as it was done before. The honorable congressmen and senators could not agree on which option to take.

Anyway, let us hope, the people will not be too impatient to take matters in their own hands. They may just barge through the barricades of policemen and the Marines to just scream their frustrations about the delay.

Meanwhile, here in Baclayon, more than 200 residents have signed a petition addressed to their political leaders that they support their proposed amendment to the road expansion plan to be implemented soon by the Department of Public Works and Highways and Korea's Hanjin Corporation.

Copies of the petition were also sent to the Office of the Governor, the Sangguniang Panlalawigan, the Office of the Vice Governor, the Office of the Representative for District 1, Hon. Edgar Chatto. After a week, complete silence.

In a microcosm, you see here the indifference of public officials to the simple request of residents that the expanded highway should not destroy pre-World War II houses and other structures along a two-km. stretch of the town.

I still hope the bureaucracy can act a little faster to respond to this petition.

Meanwhile, life goes on. That means, I have now to go to the showers, dress up, eat breakfast, and rush to the office. Here's another day to live through despite all these distractions or, if you prefer, burning issues...