You Have to Learn to Crawl Before you can Learn to Climb.

Birthday climb up the Sawtooth

2011-11-28T08:51:00.010+08:00

For my big 2-9, I browsed a couple of maps of the Indian Peaks and found a very aesthetic peak in a seldom-traveled drainage. Sawtooth Mountain is modest by CO standards, topping out at a mere 12,304ft. After reading the Summitpost Route Description I decided that, given the weather conditions and my lack of experience with technical routes in the winter, I would scramble the East Ridge to the summit. I convinced Ian to join me on this adventure. We are both very close in levels of fitness and technical skill so I felt that anything that would be a stretch for one of us would be a stretch for both.

As it turns out, this peak is the namesake of the delicious Sawtooth Ale by Lefthand Brewing Company in Longmont.

Look closely at the bottom of the bottle design and you'll see the distinct shape of the summit ridge and peak.

We left Boulder around 4:45 AM and arrived at Beaver Reservoir around 6:15AM. There was light snow on the roads and it was cold but the skies were clear, and there was not a breath of wind. As is the standard for long approaches we both were very quiet; we put our heads down and trudged on until the snow on the 4wd road became deep enough for snowshoes.

For the entire approach hike, we saw only occasional rabbit tracks but no hints of any other human presence. Nothing beats cutting fresh tracks.

Ian breaking trail just after sunrise

We came within view of the objective as the sun was touching the summit and got a breathtaking perspective on the ridge and summit. Any pain I was feeling in my feet from the long approach was immediately forgotten.

A blurry picture of Sawtooth Mountain on the approach

The route description tells you to hike along the Buchanan Pass trail until the ridge is visible across a clearing and then head up the ridgeline. When we reached a clearing that seemed to match that description, we got a taste of the conditions to come. Shifting, fast-moving clouds were now menacing the summit and it felt like a wind tunnel had been turned on us.

We added layers, balaclavas and goggles and began slogging upwind looking for a way to gain the ridgeline without crossing any snowfields that posed a potential avalanche hazard. It was 10:30AM when we started the climb. After being out in some very harsh conditions last weekend, I felt much more comfortable with how my face was covered and protected from the wind.

The summit guarded by scary-looking winter clouds

Lacking crampons, we snowshoed our way through slopes of loose rock intermixed with patches of snow. Strong winds had loaded portions of the slope with inconsistent patches of snow. One minute we would post-hole up to our thighs, the next we would be walking on top of a crust of near-ice.

Finally gaining the ridge, the wind picked up again and conditions became that much more serious. Ian's goggles had iced over by this point and we stopped to talk about our options like when or if we might make the decision to turn back. I really didn't want to leave without summitting, but I also wanted to make sure that we were safe; I left the decision up to him. Ian said he would try without the goggles, but if the wind and blowing ice were too much, we would have to bail.

Having adjusted our gear systems, we moved on. We had to climb down to the south side to pass around of the three rock towers on the ridge. "Tower" is a bit of a misnomer for these giant piles of chossy crap; they looked like they only had a few winters left before breaking into pieces and falling down the slope.

Looking back at the ridgeline from the beginning of the final summit push. You can see the rock "towers" in the lower left corner.

Once we reached the end of the ridgeline, we climbed straight up the final face, staying clear of snowfields to the North and a large cliff to the South. This last push up the face was the steepest portion of the climb so far and the most hazardous. At any given stance it was hard to find a rock to grab onto that didn't come loose in your hand.

On the way up this final slope, I started swearing at the stupid mountain and yelling about the stupid crappy rock, the stupid wind and the stupid effing snow until I stopped and realized how idiotic I sounded. I whipped my head around to make sure that there wasn't anyone around who might hear me...on a mountain...in a windstorm...yeah...Fatigue and psychological stress had made me pissed off at a pile of rocks instead of seeing that all this was in my head. I took a deep breath, laughed at how ridiculous I probably looked and kept climbing. In my opinion, any mountaineering trip that gives you some perspective is a successful one.

We pushed on and, after what seemed like an hour, we made it to the summit! From the base of the ridge to the summit, we had gained about 1,700ft of elevation, though the weather made it seem that much harder.

My summit shot; I had to take it from inside my coat since I can't operate my cameraphone with gloves on and taking my hand out of my coat would have meant I may have come back with one less hand.

Ian's summit shot; he is wearing almost all the gear he brought with him.

We didn't linger long; checking our watches, we had summitted at 1:30PM and had a very long hike back. I had told people I would be back in Boulder and getting ready to go out at around 6:00PM and I didn't want to disappoint. We took one last look around, breathed in the thin air and started back down the slope.

There were some patches of snow large enough to butt-slide down, so the descent was made that much quicker. When we did have to walk, the movement was treacherous. The snow was shallow and anytime I would plunge my heel into the snow, my toes would catch on covered rocks. More than once, I was forced to sit down or kneel to keep my ankle from being caught or twisted. It was a very frustrating descent.

We got to the bottom of the ridge in 30 mins flat. The thought of burgers and beer was inspiring enough that we put on our snowshoes and double-timed it back the way we had come. Over the course of the day, the wind had blown away our tracks, leaving us routefinding once again. Luckily, the approach hike had followed a creek drainage nearly all the way to the base of the climb, so there was almost no risk of taking a wrong turn. When we finally found our tracks and entered the woods, we looked back to get one last view of the peak as the sun was beginning to go down behind the peak.

Sawtooth Mountain with the sun beginning to set.

It wasn't until we were within two miles of the trailhead at Beaver Reservoir that we began to see ski tracks from others who had been out that day. It was nice to have the solitude of the peak, but every sign of civilization we saw meant beer and burgers were that much closer. We double-timed it back towards the car.

We made it to the car at 4:45, as it was beginning to get dark. After a quick stretch, a high five and some gear shedding, we were headed back to Boulder. Total distance: ~14 miles; total elevation gain: ~3000ft. This was a good birthday present.

Sunset behind Sawtooth

Full Webshots Album

Extorted by the NPA

2011-04-08T04:08:00.002+08:00

I guess the statute of limitations on getting in hot water with Peace Corps staff has expired so I can finally tell this story:

Every place has its gangs; LA has the crips and the bloods, El Salvador has MS13, West Side NYC had the Sharks and the Jets, and the Philippines has the New People’s Army. They are a fun-size communist insurgency that was founded as a group opposing the oppression of the country by Ferdinand Marcos (his wife Imelda had the 4000 pairs of shoes) and the US bases around the country. During my Peace Corps service, all my local friends would call them the NPA or the Nice People Around. Bikol, where I was stationed, is a particularly “nice” part of the Philippines. Since everything I said was in the local language, I will do my best to translate from my broken dialect into English.

One of the pipelines I designed and built was for an INCREDIBLY rural upland barangay or “hood”. To get pipes and sacks of cement to the main work site took a 40 minute drive from the city and then a 20 minute hike over steep, sharp limestone terrain. Cellphone signal in this area was spotty normally, on more than once occasion I had to climb small trees to send text messages.

All of my local friends and counterparts had told me that the project area was within about a kilometer of the regional base for a platoon of these nice people. While I was a little nervous at first about working on this project, I decided that since I didn’t have any money and my organization was internationally neutral, no one would bother me, or I would just woo them with my totally amazing language skills. I managed construction on this project for more than a month with no interruptions and without even seeing so much as a single nice person. In fact, since if anyone from my agency knew what I was doing, I would probably be sent home, I had only told one or two close American friends where I would be working. The only safety precaution I had was a pre-written text message with the location of the project and the fact that I had been kidnapped by the NPA. I practiced sending it with one hand with the phone in my pocket and got good enough that I could send it out in 2 seconds using only 5 clicks. This was my safety plan.

One day, right after lunch, my buddy councilman Jimmy, this short, nervous guy, took me aside, and said, Page, there’s some PEOPLE who want to TALK to you.” At that point, I could have run, I could have hidden in the woods and snuck back to the main road after dark, but I decided that I had morality on my side and I had no reason to be scared of a group of clearly idealistic “communist” rebels. I was totally ready for this and had my morals all puffed up to defend myself and the work I had been overseeing.

Jimmy led me another kilometer into the jungle, down a steep series of cliffs, along a creek and behind a giant boulder. If there was had been any chance of using my texting skills to save my ass that ship had long since sailed. As it happened, earlier that week, the nice people had blown up a nearby cellphone tower when the tower company refused to pay their “revolutionary tax.”

Waiting behind this boulder were 6 guys in camo t-shirts and shorts, flip flops, baseball caps, ammo clips and AR-15 assault rifles; if these aren’t the NPA, they are at least giving them some serious competition. So what do I do, having gone into this thinking I could talk my way out of this situation? I introduce myself to the wrong guy. I walk up to the first nice guy, shake his hand and start talking to him like we have known each other for years. After a few sentences, he starts to get a little bit nervous and is looking over my shoulder. I follow his eyeline and find myself staring at someone who is clearly the leader; he has dark, deep-set eyes, is pretty built for being 5’ tall and has way more full clips of ammo than anyone else.

“do you know who we are?”

“you are the NPA”

“you are building a project near us, do you know what we want?”

“no”

“we want respect”

Now this would have been easier to handle if he had said something concrete like money or food or gas or something but how do you give someone respect? Does he want me to follow him and his platoon around and compliment his leadership style?

“ummm”

Again: “We want respect" then “How much is the total amount of your project budget?”

“500,000 pesos” (about $10,000)

“we want 10%” or 50,000 pesos worth of respect

This is where I should have said “yes sir no problem sir I’ll get it for you as soon as I can sir.” But I have a big mouth and I thought my morals were in the right. The workers on this project had all taken a cut in their daily pay since they were the ones getting the new pipeline.

I said “no, I can’t do that; these people are working hard and if I give you that money, we won’t be able to finish the pipeline and all this work will all be for nothing.”

Not to mention all the paperwork I would have to do and receipts I would have to forge to hide 50,000 pesos in the project budget….

And then I said “What class of communists are you, trying to stop a project that is for helping the people?”

I know he must have been a little miffed because he said a bunch of words very quickly that I didn’t understand to some of his buddies and spit a little bit when he said them.

“golly gee these negotiations are unexpected”

After a couple more minutes of going back and forth, he realized I didn’t have a briefcase full of bills with me in the jungle so I had two days to go back and send him a text message when I had the money available; he wouldn’t interrupt construction but after two days all bets were off, including the health of my buddy councilman Jimmy. As I was getting ready to leave, I asked for his phone number so I could get in contact with him. He had one of those phones that shows multiple contacts at a time so I tried to get all James Bond on his ass and write down all the numbers I could see like someone was going to send them to some central database with all their DNA and give me a run-down on their criminal history and any medical conditions they are predisposed to…

I let the workers off early from trenching for the day, got back in a bus back to the city. When I got back to the office, my coworkers already knew everything that had happened. Someone’s brother’s wife’s mother’s friend knew someone in the platoon of NPA and had made the necessary text messages and calls to let everyone know how they just shook down a big white guy. Of course, they all thought it was funny as hell that I had gotten to meet some nice people and had already been planning for how to pay them off since day one of the project (without telling me about it of course). We eventually settled on paying them 10,000 pesos, a goat, a sack of rice and a big box of instant coffee. My counterpart took the goods to them and once we paid I never saw them again. The pipeline and pumps were installed without a hitch and the village still has easier access to water.

Besides learning to keep my mouth shut, what I took away from this whole experience was that even principled revolutionaries turn to extortion if they can’t get their morning rice and coffee.

The Spearhead, RMNP

2011-03-16T07:11:00.005+08:00

Full Album of Pictures Here

Climbing the Spearhead in Rocky Mountain National Park was the first winter ascent I have made or attempted steep enough to need crampons and a mountaineering axe. I have heard read hundreds if not thousands of pages of stories about the trials and treachery of alpine climbing and I needed to experience it for myself. The Spearhead is a granite prominence in Rocky Mountain National Park; the summit is at 12,560’. The summit is best accessed via the Glacier Gorge trailhead (9,300’) near Loch Vale.

It never ceases to amaze me how the most wild and fun adventures seem to come from the most simple kernels of thought, origin unknown. All it takes is an offhand comment or even a whisper of a word to set ablaze the neural pathways connecting the yearning for adventure with THE OBJECTIVE. The Spearhead was no exception to this; almost as soon as the name was mentioned, I jumped on the idea and planning mode took over.

It was Sunday, March 13^th at 1:55 AM; daylight savings time would start in 5 minutes. My alarm clock went off for the second time and jolted me out of sleep. I had guessed, correctly, that there would be some kind of clock malfunction if I set my alarm for between 2 and 3AM so Adam, Ian and I had decided to use this excuse to wake up that much earlier and have more of a cushion on our day. Ian swung by in his small car that has been the start and end to more good adventures than bad. We drove to Adam’s apartment, grabbed him and his gear pile and were on our way.

The drive to the park was slow since there is a high risk of elk on the roads between Lyons and Estes Park. At least once, Ian slammed on the brakes to avoid turning yet another deer into road kill or car into scrap metal.

As we approached Estes Park, rain and sleet were splashing down on the windshield and the mood in the car was apprehensive and quiet; as though if anyone drew attention to the fact that rain could mean a cancelled climb, the rain would hear them and fall harder. As we crested the last hill before the descent into Estes the rain abruptly turned to snow and though Ian’s driving became more cautious, playful chatter about the climb started up again.

I had decided to carry ~2.5 liters of water and quite a bit of food. We carried a working stove in case we needed more water, but Adam was insistent that we take every precaution to manage our heat so as not to sweat or become overly dehydrated.

We arrived at Glacier Gorge trailhead at 4:45AM and after 10 minutes of clipping, strapping, tightening and chugging water, we put on our snowshoes and headed off into the night. Fresh snow and an early start meant that even on a trail as popular as Glacier Gorge we were cutting fresh tracks.

Thick, fresh snow can turn any trail from a something resembling a tourist highway into a more natural type of exploration. With no well-defined path to follow, we paralleled a deep gully, scrambling over snow-covered rock when necessary until we found the turnoff for Glacier Gorge trail.

There was plenty of snow on the trail

Glacier Gorge is about 4 miles long and slowly sloping uphill. We all settled into a walking rhythm and slowly moved up the valley as the sun began to touch the summits of the towering peaks above. On the way we passed the start of several other impressive alpine climbs including All Mixed Up. Our objective was the easiest thing in the valley, but I made a few mental notes to return once my skills have improved.

At 9AM we finished arrived at the base of the bench on which The Spearhead sits at the very end of the gorge. We had seen a single other car parked at the Glacier Gorge trailhead and it looked like it had been there for some time. We found the car’s owner camped at the base of a snowy slope within 1 mile of the Spearhead; he climbed out of his half-buried tent to say hello. He was on skis and, from all the snow pillows on the rocks we had passed it looked like he was going to have a more fun hike out than us.

We climbed up onto the bench (passing a beautiful, blue, multi-pitch ice climb on the way) and then hunted around for a giant boulder that had served as Adam’s bivy. Although we found the boulder, unfortunately the entrance was blocked with several feet of windblown and consolidated snow and ice. With a shovel, perhaps we would have gained access to the cave, but chopping at the snow with ice axes was futile. We had a brief rest on the lee of a rock, had a little lunch and strapped in again.

Mental Note: Come back and climb this ice

We snowshoed up to the base of the North Ridge of the Spearhead and traversed around to the right to find our route, the more manageable Northwest Slopes scramble. We hiked up until the snow was steep enough to need crampons and put on our harnesses.

Our first view of the objective

We started up the climb at 11AM after 6 hours of approach hiking. This would be my first pitch of climbing with crampons and a mountaineering axe. Ian and I both roped in to Adam’s harness and Adam soloed the first 60 degree snow pitch and built an anchor. Once the first anchor was set, we simulclimbed as a team of 3; Adam leading and Ian and I following but close to one another. The snow was deep with a consolidated layer about 2 feet under the surface so moving up the slope went something like kick, place axe, stand up, wallow in 2 feet of snow, kick, step, repeat. Once I got the rhythm down, my movements got faster and I sped up, at once point outpacing Adam and inadvertently putting a bit too much slack in my rope. When I noticed the excess rope, I stopped and matched his pace.

Looking up at the snow climb
\

While standing in place, I watched the steps I had kicked fill in with spindrift in a few seconds. The wind would pick up every minute or so and we would all have to hunker down and protect our faces from being sandblasted by the fine, sharp ice particles whirling around us. Although a strong gusts of wind stopped us temporarily, the gale was never sustained for long enough to be a major impediment to our progress; the impression of difficulty was there without the danger, making the climb that much more satisfying.

Adam leading through the spindrift

After about 400’ of simulclimbing, the slope eased to about 40 degrees and was mostly exposed rock or covered by less than a foot of snow. Almost all rock on these upper slopes was loose so we slowed down and remained roped up for another 4 pitches. Crampons had to be placed carefully and the axes really came in handy for stability on these upper slopes. Although we were on belay, a fall wearing crampons on this terrain could mean a 5-mile hike out on a broken leg.

A brief break in the weather at a belay station

Once we were within a pitch of the summit ridge, the sun was within 30 minutes of going behind the west ridge of the gorge and we needed to move quickly. Luckily, the scramble to the top was on much more stable rock than we had found below, so all 3 of us hurried to the ridge and took a much needed rest.

Adam leading towards to summit ridge

At 3PM we reached the base of the summit block but decided that the time and exposure required to rope up and climb onto the block was an unnecessary risk; we took pictures instead. To the north of the summit ridge was a sheer 1000’ face dropping nearly to the base of The Spearhead.

The team on the summit

The summit block

A break in the weather

We had been blasted by ice and wind for 4 hours ascending this chunk of snowy rock and finally, when we reached the summit, the clouds broke and the weather calmed. The North Face of Long’s Peak, Chief’s Head, McHenry’s Peak, Thatchtop and the entire length of Glacier Gorge were visible. We could see down the gorge, into the center of Rocky Mountain National Park and on to the horizon. It was a spectacular milestone on a particularly difficult day.

McHenry's Peak

Chief's Head

We snacked, drank water, had the obligatory victory swig of Jameson, removed our crampons and prepared for the descent. That morning Adam had suggested, for the sake of speed, that we bring some slings to leave behind, rappel 60 meter pitches on double ropes and then pull the ropes out. It only took 4 rappels apiece to get to the top of our initial snow climb; from there we plunge-stepped down through soft, pillowy snow until the terrain evened out and we were on solid ground again.

Rappelling the top pitches

Plunge-stepping the bottom of the snow climb

30 minutes before sunset we were gearing down at the base of the climb and releasing our stress now that we were out of technical terrain. When the harness comes off, then you can breathe a sigh of relief and start thinking about burgers and beer. If you allow yourself to relax before you are off a climb, you can put yourself in greater danger by not fully appreciating the risks of the terrain.

One last look back

Leaving The Spearhead behind

We still had 6 miles of hiking to go, but since it was all downhill and the objective had been completed, it was far less daunting than the hike in. We descended the bench back to the skier’s campsite to find a set of ski tracks that were almost completely filled in with drifting snow. As we walked, the trail became more and more defined from the many snowshoers that had followed our tracks up Glacier Gorge during the day. We were the first in and the last out.

The North Face of Long's Peak on the Hike Out

As we plodded down the gorge, the half-moon shone brightly enough on the bright snow that we could move easily without headlamps. I have been camping many times in or near Boulder County and am always able to see the pink glow of a nearby city no matter how far into the wilderness I am. This time, the black sky and the bright stars showed no hint of civilization.

The hike out

The hike seemed interminable. That morning we had cut our own direct trail for the first mile of trail, avoiding the meandering path shown on the map. Following the snowshoe tracks that evening we were led down almost an extra mile of what some people might consider scenic trail. After 4 miles of plodding we didn’t want any more beautiful views; we wanted the car, food and beer. More importantly, we wanted to let my girlfriend know that she shouldn’t call RMNP’s rescue team to come looking for us. If she had not heard from us by midnight, she was instructed to call 911 and get a SAR team organized to come searching for us. Given that she had read the Summitpost page for The Spearhead more than 10 times in the preceeding week, there was a good chance that she would call 911 no later than 12:01AM.

We made it back to the car at 10:00PM after 13 miles of hiking and 3200’ of total elevation gain over 19 hours.

We celebrated by driving home and being surprised by a batch of freshly made cupcakes and a hot meal. What an amazing day.

Long's Peak and Extreme Irony

2009-09-09T04:46:00.009+08:00

"“Extreme ironing - the latest danger sport that combines the thrills of an extreme outdoor activity with the satisfaction of a well-pressed shirt"

Summer in Colorado translates to fit, young people put themselves in harms way for reasons as simple as a story to tell while eating or drinking. 14,000+ foot peaks abound in Colorado, so anyone desensitized to the ups and downs of daily life in the city puts on their hiking boots and hits whatever trail they can find.

Long's Peak is one of the most famous non-technical perspective-providing climbs in Colorado. At 14,255 ft. it is tall enough that the peak is subject to year-round storms of unbelievable intensity. Epic adventure of this sprt serves to remind me of my own insignificance in the grand scheme; I am a speck at the mercy of nature; a fly to be swatted.

Life and limb are only fun to risk if you have someone to risk it with. My buddy Alex, his friend Abe and I decided that life was too safe and in need of risk.

We packed rain gear, warm clothes, 5-too-many-pounds of food, headlamps, water, a first aid kit, pocket knives, 4 liters of coffee and, on an impulse, an iron. My first thought as we pulled away from Alex's house in Boulder at 1 AM was how good a freshly ironed pair of socks at the summit would make the trip.

We set out on the trail at 2:30AM and used the waxing gibbous moon instead of flashlights for as long as tree cover let us. The first 2 hours of the hike saw us bearded Boulder boys passing more than 10 other hikers on the way to the front of the pack. During the high season, this trail is known as the Conga Line; a dance which is really only fun if you are at the front, with the basket of fruit on your head.

At 4:30 we reached what the guidebooks called the Boulder Field; an increasingly steep pile of house-sized rocks. Navigation from cairn to cairn by moon- and flash-light proved difficult but manageable. The Boulder Field ends at a gaping maw of chunky, angular rock called the Keyhole. The Keyhole is known to have some of the strongest wind on the mountain due to its exposure. From the Keyhole, we began to follow a series of markers called fried eggs (painted yellow circles in painted red circles that mark the trail).

The Keyhole, as seen from low in the Boulder Field; I took this on the way down

Once we moved passed the high winds of the Keyhole, we began a traverse along the west side of the mountain. On the traverse, we ran across a man lying in a sleeping bag. This man and his son had been climbing the mountain the day before us and he had fallen and dislocated his ankle at the bottom of the toughest part of the hike after reaching the summit. His son carried a sleeping bag up to him and he spent the night under a rock on an exposed ledge thousands of feet above the valley floor. He told us that a group of rescuers was en-route but that, due to rescue protocol, they would not arrive until dawn. Later in the day, we heard a helicopter carry him off to safety. The easiness with which he coped with his perilous predicament made us feel a bit safer and better taken care of.

We left the injured man and finished the traverse in an hour or so. At the end of the traverse is the Trough; a 2000 ft. near-vertical channel lined with giant contiguous slabs of granite. Hiking through the thinned air at the 11,000 ft. start of the Trough was a lot like being strangled while working out on a stairmaster. To cope with the lack of oxygen, I put a mental system of 10 steps, stop, 10 breaths, into effect; at this rate, I could climb steadily.

Alex, at the top of the Trough
(note the large group 2000 feet below)

After the Trough is a skinny ledge that wraps around the mountain briefly. We were feeling in need of some food, so we took a 20 minute break and I used that time to iron my pants before putting them on.

The tool of the trade

A brief break to remove wrinkles and make myself presentable

From the ledge, we advanced to what is called the Home Stretch. This 60 degree slope of nearly crack-free rock was the closest thing on the route to a technical ascent. A single slip or misplaced foot could lead to a vertical mile of tumbling to the rocky valley below.

Looking down the Home Stretch to the valley below and the mountains beyond

One final oxygen-deprived push left us both mentally and physically breathless as we looked out across the large, flat summit at 8AM. It had taken us 5.5 hours to reach the top (most guidebooks recommend 8 hours), so a break was in order.

Abe and Alex; enjoying a good sit at 14,255 feet

On the summit of most mountains in Colorado is a guestbook of sorts. You sign the book with your name and time of arrival as a way of feeling a sense of recorded accomplishment. At the top of Long's Peak was a standard logbook as well as a zip lock bag with a disposable camera and a note with instructions for us to take pictures of ourselves and leave an email address so we could get the pictures later. I decided that the owners of the camera should know how comfortable we really were on this hike, so I ironed my backup pair of socks and put them on; warm feet are hard to beat.

Freshly-ironed socks were a luxury I was unwilling to give up for this mountain adventure

The tool at the top

We sat for an hour at the summit and watched other hikers perform their various summit rituals; some shared stoves and soup, some brought beer, some smoked cigars, some simply smiled in the summer sun. We stayed for an hour, soaking up the day, then shouldered our packs and began the descent; known in some circles as the A-knee-ilator.

Returning down the steep-sided chasms in the morning light gave us new fears and shakes. When danger is more obvious, it is MUCH scarier.

The wide valley below the Trough, now visible in the daylight

We followed what we thought was the trail we had arrived by but came to a feature called the False Keyhole. Confused, we read a very large warning label that mentioned how dangerous and wrong this route was. It took 20 minutes or so, but eventually we found our way to the actual Keyhole.

The front side of the False Keyhole; a 1000 foot sheer rock face.

We passed the Keyhole and the Boulder Field with no issues, decided we were making amazing time and took a nap on a sunny rock.

After our nap, we hucked it and broke into a near-jog for the 6 miles back to the ranger station and Long's Peak trail head parking lot. We arrived at 2:30 PM, 11.5 hours after starting out. Being too tired to mentally function, we went back to Alex's house and enjoyed 3 men's shares of delicious microbrew.

A last look back at Long's Peak

Recommendations for potential climbers:
- You should ARRIVE at the Long's Peak trailhead parking lot no later than 2:30 AM. We took one of the last available spaces when we arrived.
- You should be off the summit before noon to avoid the daily storms (even in the summertime).
- There is no where to get water; bring at least 3 liters apiece.
- Esoteric items are totally worth the mountaintop photo op.
- Don't eat a 12oz. steak 6 hours before getting on the trail; your farts will kill even the hardiest of mountain men walking behind you.
- If you live in Colorado, MAKE TIME TO DO THIS EPIC HIKE.

Until next time

Your favorite Extreme Ironer

Page

One for the Road

2009-06-30T20:47:00.002+08:00

At the end of next week, when I end my service as a US Peace Corps volunteer, I will have been in the Philippines for 1204 days. Three years ago, I got off a plane in sweaty, gritty Manila carrying on my back everything I thought the Philippines was lacking (a backpack full of tools to save the world). Several active volunteers and some well-seasoned staff met my group at Ninoy Aquino International Airport and herded us like jetlagged, gawking cattle with no idea where they were or how they might leave into buses and off to the nicest hotel I would stay at for my entire time here.

For 2 months, I was trained in the Bikol language and cultural appropriateness of eating, drinking and pooping (always take a bite, take a shot if you are offered and NO ONE USES TOILET PAPER). I studied hard and, with the help of my unforgettable group of fellow trainees, managed to spend the better part of every day laughing until my sides hurt.

In June 2006, I was sworn-in to serve in the 265th batch of the more than 8000 Peace Corps volunteers to serve in the Philippines since 1961 (this picture is just of the people I trained with in Bikol, there were 75 of us in my batch of volunteers).

August 2006 brought a volcanic eruption

September 2006 brought the strongest typhoon seen in storm-smashed Bikol in 20 years.

November 2006 one-upped September with the strongest typhoon in the living memory of Bikol. More than a thousand people were killed in the ensuing landslides and another 40,000+ people were left homeless. I saw millions of dollars in relief money thrown around with little thought or accountability; ever wonder where your "help-the-poor" donations go?

In April 2007 my fellow volunteer, and friend, Julia Campbell, was murdered on a vacation in her last few months before leaving the country.

In May 2007 I decided that massive natural disasters weren't a good reason not to not do my job, so I helped set up a manufacturing center for household water filters. Since it started, the production center has made more than 350 filters and installed them in schools and homes around the region.

I spent the rest of my service designing and constructing multiple piped water supply pipelines to communities who previously had to walk more than a half mile to the nearest source of water (of questionable quality). I have greased political palms to do this.

I have used engineering equipment from world war II.

I have seen necessity be the mother of invention (this guy is using a hacksaw blade with his bare hands).

I have eaten rice for almost every meal

I have slaughtered, cleaned, cooked and eaten pigs, chickens, turkeys and goats.

I have crawled through caves, lept from waterfalls, slept on white sand beaches and swam through beautiful forests of coral.

I have survived lava flows, knee-deep mud, plants whose leaves will burn your skin, foot-long centipedes, hand-sized spiders and hot-dog-flavored-mayonnaise sandwiches on wonderbread.

THE BEST PART:
I was paid by the US Government to do this.

Careful: Peace Corps is not the protected bubble of happiness and fulfillment that its colorful pamphlets make it out to be. I went through a daily roller-coaster ride of emotions. Moment-to-moment things like being yelled and giggled at by every person I pass on the street were just as taxing as the bureaucracy and corruption that are ways of life in the Philippines. Almost nothing works the way it should and I expect all restaurants to have less than half of their menus available at any given time. These frustrations could bring laughter or anger depending on the hour of the day and the day of the week. On the other hand, the few (less than 10) moments of pure success I had made every other second worth it.

To anyone stuck in a rut/office without any kind of meaning in your life: JOIN. Peace Corps is a leap of faith, so I really can't tell you why except that I have not met a single volunteer who regretted the decision to join. You will gain so much more from the "sacrifice" of your two years helping those in need than the dollars you don't earn. Every hour of every day is different and exciting in ways you can't comprehend. You will be a celebrity. Any ideas you might have of "how the world works" will be smashed and reshaped into something incomprehensible to the current "you". You will see how families and communities of people can come together and collectively survive while under threat from global forces well beyond their mental grasp.

If you don't think you could join for whatever reason or you don't think they want you, at least take 5 minutes and Email a Peace Corps Recruiter and ask them what they are looking for. Or go to a Peace Corps Event near you. What you learn might surprise you.

If you have kept in touch over the last 3 years, thank you. The isolation of being one of 10 native english speakers in a city of 150,000 is powerful and it helps to have support from home.

Peace Corps has told me numerous times not to underestimate the mind-warp of coming home from the developing world the the USA. I want to give myself about 6 weeks before I am ready to start saving the people of America, but other than that my plans are no more detailed than eating a sandwich and maybe getting some sleep.

AND REMEMBER:

Water System Construction

2009-06-22T18:11:00.003+08:00

Water System Construction Through Partnership (As published in the Aquinas University Campus Newsletter).

PICTURES AT THE END.

Aquinas University Foundation’s community development program in Lamba, Legaspi City has numerous aspects; from agriculture to education, and now potable water supply. A Level II (communal faucet access) water supply system is currently under construction in the center of barangay Lamba to dramatically improve the resident’s access to water for domestic uses. This project is being funded by a number of different stakeholders. Once completed, the water system will be managed by the barangay council, and eventually, a people’s organization.

The residents of puroks 1 and 2 of Lamba have a number of difficulties in accessing clean water for drinking, cooking, washing and other domestic needs. The closest potable water source is approximately 500 meters away, over a hill; men, women and children can regularly be seen carrying single gallon jugs to and from this source for their families. The barangay’s sandy soil and proximity to the Albay Gulf make all open and drilled wells undrinkable due to salt water intrusion and contamination. The source to be tapped for this system is a large, constantly flowing spring with no variation in flow during the summer.

The water system is very simple, yet effective. Water will flow, by gravity, through 2” diameter PE pipe for 500 meters until it reaches a high point in the center of purok 1, Lamba. In centro, a 9000 liter ferrocement (thin-walled concrete) water storage tank will be built to store water collected during the evening for use during the day. From the storage tank, another 2” diameter PE pipe will carry the water 400 meters to 8 different communal faucets strategically placed throughout the barangay for maximum benefit. Each faucet is built of reinforced concrete to ensure its safety.

This project has been prepared and will be funded by a number of different local, national and international agencies. The total water system budget of PHP288,000.00 is funded jointly by Hiefer International, the US Peace Corps and an in-kind labor counterpart from the community members. Community organizing and pre-project awareness were done by Aquinas University’s Center for Community Extension Services and the US Peace Corps volunteer, Page Weil, assigned there. Topographic surveys and water system design were done by the US Peace Corps volunteer, enlisting the help of the beneficiaries whenever necessary. The ferrocement tank technology was developed and tested for Albay at Aquinas University’s Rawis Campus; prototypes can be seen by the water refilling station near the cocofed building. Sunwest Development Corp has generously allowed use of the water source and the land where the transmission pipes will be laid since it lies within their property.

The people and barangay council of barangay Lamba have greeted Aquinas University and the US Peace Corps with open arms and, as of this writing, are working hard to make this plan a reality. The project is scheduled for completion in May of this year.

And now...PICTURES!!!

The children in this picture carried those buckets of water from more than 500 meters away. They do this every day.

To build this water system, we used WWII-era surveying gear.

Water is transmitted over a kilometer through 2" plastic pipe

Here the masons are plastering the reusable form for a 9000 Liter Ferrocement Tank (this is not the first one I have built)

There are few feelings in the world better than watching someone's face as they turn on a water tap in their neighborhood for the first time ever.

Kids playing in the spray of a pipe under repair.

I'm speechless

2009-06-22T18:04:00.003+08:00

Ridiculous things that need very little explanation:

A meat-shop LITERALLY on the side of the road. Notice the fan with no blades for keeping flies away.

These are individually, and hand-wrapped, tomatoes and onions

A worker HAND-PAINTING the lane lines on the national highway. This was not just a touch-up job, he spent all day doing this.

Two girls are assigned to wrestle a single cow to the ground. It takes about 30 seconds.

A curious lizard on my kitchen counter

Cure-all drops from the Great Salt Lake (we all know how clean and full of healing energy it is).

I challenge you to figure out where to pee in this bathroom... (hint, it ISN'T the bucket).

Probably the most disturbing statue I have ever seen.

My workspace

An hour in the life

2009-03-04T16:04:00.000+08:00

Over the course of a 1-hour bus ride on the national highway near my home in Albay I saw:

A pig
Rice being dried spread out on the road while cars zoom past
Old men sitting in front of small convenience stores staring at nothing in particular
A giant concrete pencil
Terraced rice fields in all stages of growth and planting
Fighting cocks being tested against one another
Both broken and working wells
Boys and girls holding hands indiscriminately
Trees used as lampposts/power poles
A truck with a giant picture of Jesus on the hood and the silhouette of a naked lady on the door
Men and women chopping things with large machetes
Concrete being mixed in the middle of the roadway
Painted school buildings with no books, chairs, teachers or students
A sign advertising a newly completed road where the name of the senator who funded the road is larger and more visible than anything else
A motorcycle with 5 people on it, none wearing helmets
Smiles with no teeth
Small stores (“sari-sari”) advertising Coca Cola and local beer at prices lower than bottled water
A dump truck that was welded together in someone’s backyard
“Decorative” (read: not functional) concrete columns painted baby blue and hot pink
Cigarettes with names like “Champion” and “Hope”
A female yogurt cart vendor taking a shit in a drainage canal
45 pound children fetching 5 gallon water jugs
Teens in school uniform clearing weeds with their hands
Stacks of cinder blocks weak enough to break with my fingers
Government-subsidized rice (people can’t afford it if it is more than $1/lb)
A cell-phone tower than has been recently rebuilt after being blown up by rebels; any company that refuses to pay their so-called “revoluntionary tax” gets attacked.
New water supply pipelines funded by the World Bank
Road signs sponsored by a local Chinese restaurant
People showering on the roadside wearing shorts
Naked babies
A woman carrying a 10lb+ roll of vegetables on her head
Vehicles with no mirrors, turn-signals, headlights or brake lights
Burning piles of trash
People hand-making fans from Abaca fibers
A group of men without shirts on getting drunk at a wake on $1/liter brandy
Dogs “stuck together” after having sex
$1.25/liter gasoline
The entrance to the city dump, flanked by people with sacks waiting to pick through the next delivery of trash
Hand-painted movie posters
Rotisserie chickens
Nursing students dressed in white pants, shirts and shoes without so much as a SPECK of dirt on them
Banks and pawn shops offering 15% APR interest rates
A giant Church of Latter Day Saints (Mormons) with the nicest basketball court in the province (that’s how they get new converts)
A statue in the fenced-in courtyard of the local church “Iglesia ni Christo” of an aborted fetus with painted blood on it and a sign that says “in memory of the unborn”

Jungles: concrete, abstract, vegetated

2009-01-19T18:31:00.004+08:00

Conveniently, everyone I know has a calendar that starts in January and ends in December. This totally arbitrary system for keeping track of time has one distinct benefit: everyone I know is reflecting on the past and thinking about the future at about the same time. Since I like to know what people are doing with their lives, it is only fair that I share what I am doing with mine.

After 33 months of exclusively-Filipino experience in Southeast Asia, my girlfriend and I decided, through a complex process of pooling our pocket lint on a table to see if one of us would have to sleep with the pilot to get us on a plane, to go to Peninsular Malaysia.

Geographically, Malaysia is conveniently separated into two large pieces by the South China Sea. Malaysian Borneo is mostly Jungle and Elephants, Peninsular Malaysia, to the west, has these as well but is slightly better developed.

Culturally, Malaysia is a halo-halo (a Bikol word for mixture of completely random ingredients that don't necessarily share any traits whatsoever; conveniently, it is also a dessert) of Indians, Malays, Chinese, and both clean and smelly backpackers.

Mostly, the trip was a way to escape the food and noise of the Philippines for somewhere a bit cleaner, with deeper jungle and wilder animals.

Oil money sure can make some REALLY nice buildings

If aliens intend to contact rural Malaysia, at least we know they are prepared.

Jess vs. the Elephant

Monkeys!!!

Monkeys taking pictures of monkeys!!!

Even 5 ton elephants are no match for the MEGAFLICK

SQUISH!!!

That small child is having his hand eaten by a giant tentacle!!!

The largest Buddha in Malaysia

It could've been an Ent

Another very SINuous tree (no pun intended, even though it WAS in a church)

Hair for sale!

BEFORE YOU GO:

While Jessica and I were staying on Penang Island, the Pearl of the Orient so they say, we were located at a backpacker's hotel in the center of Georgetown. Jessica managed to get a fever and was bedridden for about 2 days. Over these days, I had to try hard to entertain myself; I didn't want to leave for fear of the paperwork involved in disposing of an American corpse in a Muslim country. I spent a good deal of time on one of two free internet terminals at the hotel looking for the appropriate forms and doing other things to pass the hours while the patient was sleeping. The last day we stayed there, I was getting ready to leave when a fat, round, ungroomed head throws itself at an awkward angle in between me and the computer monitor.

"Are you a YANK?" It belches

"Yes, I am. Why?" I respond with utter eloquence and humility

"That bloody explains it! I have been staying at this bloody hotel for 3 bloody days and every time I come out of my bloody room to use the bloody internet you are bloody on it bloody!!!!" It regurgitates after what was clearly several minutes of build-up before this encounter.

"Excuse me, I wasn't aware that you needed to make use of the efficient and currently-unavailable conveniences this marvelous establishment has to offer." I said with a touch of humility that could have changed the mind of a starving leopard looking to feast upon my angelic presence.

What followed was a pointless exchange where it was obvious that not only did he not actually want anything but didn't want me to apologize for having not done for him what I didn't know he wanted.

"Well, I'm sorry I couldn't help you out; can you please leave?" I say

"[ranting]... AND THIS IS WHY YOU YANKS ARE LOSING THE WAR IN IRAQ"

WTF?F?!?!?!?

Peace out and happy new year.

Updates

2009-01-13T12:29:00.002+08:00

I just spent christmas and new year's in peninsular Malaysia. 10 days of Indian food, jungle trekking, clean cities and ANONYMITY has made Page a happy Peace Corps volunteer. There is a full update to come later, but for now you will have to settle for some NEW PICS!!!

New Pictures: http://good-times.webshots.com/album/569621027sCqaMr

New Pics!

2008-10-24T15:31:00.003+08:00

Time flies when you are having fun or doing construction work. In the latter, it seems like a quick-burning fuse attached to a keg of dynamite sometimes...

I met the US Ambassador Kristie Kenney today for lunch. She was in town doing some business and her people called my people. Lunch was good. The fish was overcooked.

There is a new batch of pictures for your personal consumption ONLY on my webshots account. No sharing. If there is one thing I learned in kindergarten, it is that if you share your blocks with little Billy, you will not have blocks anymore. Screw Billy. Just kidding, we all need blocks; but if Billy doesn't give the cool arched one back I am going to call his mom a poo-head.

http://community.webshots.com/album/568247064mFJTVq

Clif notes:

Animal Slaughter
Construction
Beaches
Recycled Handbags (Garbags)
Friends
Funny Signs
A Giant Warthog
Candid shots of the US Ambassador

Penafrancia Festival, 2008

2008-09-30T18:44:00.002+08:00

Some of you may remember my post on Penafrancia last year, but religious fervor comes but once a year. This year's theme is fanaticism!

The local "out-there" sect of Christianity; the Lolas. Everyone who is a member of their highly exclusive club gets a set of clothing printed with the Lola message. I once saw a married couple that had matching denim jackets printed with the good word. So cute.

One religious icon defended to the teeth by the Philippine Army. I don't actually understand what is going on here, mostly because of how unprotected the NEXT few icons were.

Our lady of Penafrancia being carried through the streets by true believers. Touching the icon brings good luck. We, the Peace Corps 265 and 266 Bikol Male Volunteers, are now imbued with local luck after our run on the icon.

The feet of the chosen

I swear, I didn't mean to elbow him in the face. I was just showing him the scar I had from last year's festival.

All these boats are tied together to tow the icon. Religion makes the best boat motor.

The barge carrying "our lady" at the height of the festival's intensity.

Faith still wont keep you from flipping your boat.

We are religious in our ridiculousness.

And, for no apparent reason, a crate of spraypainted baby chickens.

Full Circle

2008-07-01T14:33:00.002+08:00

The Julia Campbell murder case which was a national sensation in 2007 has finally come to a close.

From the ABS-CBN Article:
Juan Duntugan, the suspect in the murder of US Peace Corps volunteer Julia Campbell last year, was sentenced to life imprisonment Monday after being found guilty of murdering the American.

Life in prison with no chance for parole and millions of pesos in damages. Who knows if the money will ever come considering the murderer's family is rather poor. Regardless of the outcome, it is good to have some closure on something as horrible as this. Julia's family has received an incredible amount of support from Peace Corps, the Filipino Government, the US Embassy and many of Julia's friends and fans across the US.

Thank you all for your caring and support to her family, to myself and to any Peace Corps volunteer you may have worried about over this last year.

Construction Blog #1

2008-06-17T14:28:00.004+08:00

First a little background:

In the Philippines, I am a Water and Sanitation Technician with the US Peace Corps. Over the course of my (sofar) 2 years in country, I have networked with a number of donor agencies that specialize in funding water projects (specifically potable water supply for needy communities).

Over the last year or so, I have been working with a local NGO (Alternative Systems for Community Development, or ASCODE) to develop a design and proposal for a piped water system for barangays Quitinday and Rizal in Jovellar, Albay (on Luzon). These barangays are both EXTREMELY rural. Rizal is a 40 minute drive from my city of Legaspi; Quitinday is another 20 minute jungle trek beyond Rizal. There are about 80 households in Quitinday, but they are spread out throughout the surrounding jungle.

The people of Quitinday have to hike an average of a half-kilometer to get to the nearest source of drinking water. Imagine if there were no faucets in your house, no water pump outside; everyday you would put a stick over your shoulders and carry 6 1-gallon jugs to fill them with just enough water to cook and drink for the day. If you want to do laundry, you have to carry all your dirty clothes through the jungle to where the spring bubbles up from under a rock and do them there, then carry them back to your house, wet.

Barangay Rizal has a piped water system now, but it was installed in the 1960's and has fallen into disrepair. The pipeline is riddled with leaks and illegal taps that reduce the quality of service for everyone else downstream.

Our plan is to construct two separate pipelines to supply water to these two barangays. One pipeline will start at a spring in Quitinday and carry water through 4" diameter pipes to the center of barangay Rizal, where it will be stored in (2) 30,000 liter ferrocement tanks and then piped down to communal faucets in the population center through 2" pipe. The water system for barangay Quitinday is a bit more complex. Water coming out of a spring is captured, piped through a series of Hydraulic Rampumps to a 9000 Liter ferrocement storage tank, and finally piped down to communal faucets near the houses that need the water.

On May 26th, we broke ground on the pipeline for Quitinday and have made some serious headway.

Highly technical engineering drawing of the Quitinday water system

This picture was taken from the construction site. That cellphone tower is the closest bit of infrastructure.

Here is a kid fetching water for his family (cutest thing in the world with his tiny machete)

Taking a break

Daily snacks of rice wrapped in banana leaves

Moving big rocks to clear out one of the springs

Pouring concrete to make the base of one of the spring intake boxes

Tank formwork (Necessity is the mother of invention and we were all out of lumber)

Bending the reinforcement to the will of the people...

First round of plastering

First layer finished, looks good enough to eat

This will be a manhole cover when it grows up

Tank feels naked with her forms pulled off in public (she's still a bit ugly and needs some more plastering to fill in those holes, but the advantage of ferrocement is that it is really easy to repair and doesn't get self-conscious when you talk about it like this)

"Laying some pipe." Get it?

d
Steep section of worksite. OSHA, eat your heart out. (guys were carring 40kg sacks of cement down this on their heads; each step is only about 6" wide)

Did I mention it is BEAUTIFUL up here?

What's wrong with this picture?

That's right, he is holding a hacksaw BLADE in his hand because we didn't have enough handles for all the workers....

No blog is complete without a picture of a giant jungle spider.

More next time as construction continues...

2008-06-17T14:28:00.000+08:00

"The Clap"

2008-05-01T15:07:00.003+08:00

Sometimes there are moments in Peace Corps that make you sit back, smile and remember why you love this job.

The community of Jovellar, Albay is extremely rural and is one of the poorest in the province. Over the last 6-12 months (depending on how you look at it) I have been working with a number of local NGOs and government agencies to develop the plans to construct (2) piped water systems for barangays Rizal and Quitinday in Jovellar.

Just last week, my counterpart and I met with the barangay council of Quitinday to spell out the division of labor for pipeline and tank construction. We needed the council to offer, as the community's counterpart, local labor to haul all construction materials 2km into the jungle to the site where we will lay the pipe and build the water tanks. The total cost estimate, using local daily wages, came to about 25000 pesos. It is hard to understand how difficult it is to ask for donations from people who struggle to buy a kilogram of rice for their families everyday (even with the world rice crisis, 1kg of rice runs about $0.75 a kilogram).

They all speak a rural, upland dialect of Bikol that I can only partially understand, so I had only a vague idea of what they were debating. After an hour of raised-voice deliberation over how the materials would be moved into the woods, all 15 council members leaned back in their chairs at the same time, clapped once and said "iyan" (translates as "like that"). They had decided to have the council buy food for all the workers and families of the workers who will carry materials to the site.

Bikol is, for the most part, a contextual language; sentences are not too complicated and you can usually understand what someone is talking about just based on what they are doing at the time. To have a group of people who don't all necessarily agree with one another have one communal moment of clarity and come together with a clap and a "iyan" was an amazing sight to see.

From the volunteers I have spoken to, and my own personal experience, the best feeling a volunteer can get isn't building a pipeline or planting a tree but when someone UNDERSTANDS you. If a local takes what you tell them, interprets it and acts on it in the way that you intended the information to be used, there is this almost giddy sense of success that I can't really put into words (though clearly I am trying to).

Not too many people will admit to having "the clap" as their best memory of Peace Corps, but I know I will.

Donating my body to culinary science

2008-04-28T11:48:00.004+08:00

A few hypothetical questions for all the vegans out there:

Let's assume I get in a horrible car accident which results in both my legs being amputated. I would immediately have the legs put on ice and saved for my next memorial day party. This doesn't sound like much fun, but let's look at the silver lining: there would be a few pounds of morally neutral meat available for the eating.

Would YOU, as a fellow enjoyer-of-barbeque, ever eat human meat if it was presented to you in this way?

Do the tenets of veganism (no violence against another creature) imply that cannibalism like this is not allowed? If I consciously offer my own meat, does that remove any moral qualms about where the meat came from?

Can I invite my vegan friend to the party without him/her getting offended?

How would you want the meat prepared?

If this question is too strange for you, ask yourself what about cannibalism makes it wrong or at least undesirable?

It may be human meat, but we are just animals with very similar biochemistry to monkeys, whether you think Darwin was a douche or not. If you would eat monkey, why wouldn't you eat me.... if I offered?

The Twilight Zone - To Serve Man

Disaster season 2008

2008-04-08T11:26:00.004+08:00

I just made it through my third typhoon season in the Philippines and even though the damage caused was nothing compared to the season of 2006 (remember typhoons Reming and Milenyo), Bikol is still an uncertain and volatile place to live. This year, the typhoons were mild and the winds were weak but there have been heavy rains extending 2 months into what is now supposed to be the dry season. The Philippines can be brutally hot when the time is right, but honestly I have been looking forward to a break from the overcast sky and intermittent downpour.

The rains fall with such intensity that the water cannot runoff fast enough, the result of which is widespread flooding and landslides.

Aquinas University (called Aquarium behind its back) is adjacent to the largest river in the province, the Yawa, which is tempermental and likes to flood and cancel classes on a regular basis. After typhoon Reming's reaming of the province, the school planners wised up and built all classrooms at least a meter above the floodplain so the school would be more resillient to disasters, but that has only worked so well.

During a particularly torrential rainstorm, students and teachers (and Peace Corps Volunteers) flee the flooding.

To escape the rising floodwaters without getting your feet wet, improvise a bridge!

The canteen, underwater

When weak, clayey soil becomes saturated with water, it becomes more prone to fail. Due to the soil in Albay, as well as the steep hills, makes the danger of landslides a very real one. There is no local budget for any kind of preventative measures besides relocating families to some where flatter, so the earth reshapes itself on a regular basis.

They just never let up

A minor slope failure in an area where I work regularly. You can see the failure plane around the rim of this area

A landslide diverted a river from its natural course and through the yard of this house

More drowned vehicles

The shoulder of the road has been totally scoured by the new river

These were semi-trucks at one point...

Manmade Disasters

On a morning much like any other, I walked out of my house full of caffeine and oatmeal, headed for parts unknown. As I passed a jeep parked on my street, I noticed some Filipinos running around and yelling at each other. Things are generally quiet and calm in my neighborhood so I went to investigate and found that a jeep parked on my street had a trickle of flame coming from the gas tank.

People ran back and forth throwing wet towels and sand bags at the flames, to no avail. Within 30 seconds of my watching the car, the car was a fireball with a tower of black smoke covering the nearby houses.

The towering inferno

"Oh shit, I hope I didn't leave my wallet in there!!"

Thinking like an American, I turned to the man next to me:

"Do you have a phone? We should call the fire department or someone with some water!"

"Oye, sorry sir. Walang load." (He didn't have enough prepaid credits on his phone to call anyone who might be able to help.)

At this point, he turned away from me and went back to watching the fire begin to spread to other vehicles and nearby houses.

The crowd that has gathered to stare dumbly and not do anything about the flaming car

Instead of lecturing people on the need to help others around you and passing out cards with the local emergency number (117) on them, I picked up my phone and called the local fire department.

I'll be honest, I didn't have much faith in the fire department here at first, but that has changed. Using the stopwatch on my phone, I marked them at a 4 minute response time; better than most places in the states. Luckily for us, it is national fire prevention month in Albay, so the firemen were on top of their game.

If it is going to be an official awareness month of any kind, you HAVE to have a banner

Only in the Philippines would you see a fireman wearing shorts and tsinelas (flip-flops)

Local reporters arrived moments after the fire department

As the fire died down, the crowd moved in until everyone was huddled around the burnt hull of this poor guys jeep

Videoke: A true natural disaster

Hanging out on the fresh lava flow from Mt. Mayon

Soon-to-be-cooked pig

Oh the sun'll come out tomorrow. Bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow, there'll be sun

Conspicuous Foreigners

2008-02-24T12:35:00.003+08:00

It is now that magical time of year in the Philippines, as the rainy season comes to an intense, floow-prone conclusion, when the white people come out in force. All over Bikol there are sightings of Peace Corps volunteers participating in civic activities and generally helping out their fellow Bikolanos.

Three weeks ago, anyone wandering by the Shell station on Magsaysay avenue at 5:30 AM would have seen several Americans doing their duty by getting up before dawn to ride their bicycles 100km. Senator Pia Cayetano has put on what is called the Bike for Hope every year for the last 6. This year the ride was from Naga to Legaspi City.

Becky, Aaron, Francis (a local TV talk show host) and I joined in the fun and took our sweet-ass time getting all the way down to Legaspi. This trip was Francis' first bike ride over 1 or 2 km so a trip of ~50x that was a new thing for him. We all ended up with sore butts, but hanging out with a senator was worth every painful day for the next week or so.

Plus, for the Php300 entry fee we got a delicious lunch and free bike jerseys and a gift pack.

What is in a bike ride gift pack, you ask? Not what you would expect, but useful nonetheless.

(1) Package of high-calcium powdered milk (with pictures of ole people on the front)
(1) Can of generic energy drink
(3) Packs of shrimp-flavored cheetos knock-offs
(1) Blue plastic bracelet signifying something
(1) Package of ramen noodles
(1) Tube of pain-relief cream
(3) Cans of vienna sausages

Makes sense to me...

Getting pumped the night before

The senator making us dirty Americans look better

Ready to go

The Route!

Francis on his last legs

The heroes taking their victory lunch

Official website of the ride:
http://www.cayetanofoundation.com/bfh/newslist.php?cmd=reset

2008-02-24T12:35:00.000+08:00

2 Tales of Fun and Adventure

2008-01-09T21:07:00.000+08:00

Point A to point B

I find it is easiest to relate to people outside of Peace Corps in terms of things in their daily lives that they take for granted. Ease of travel is a BIG one.

Going to a restaurant with family can be a bit of an emotional ordeal sometimes but the actual transportation is relatively easy.

Insert ass into vehicle. Turn key. Depress gas pedal. Obey traffic laws. Enjoy food. If you are a bit cheaper you can take a cab or the bus; probably air conditioned; probably not filled with pigs or chickens.

In the Philippines there are many modes of transportation but all of them belch large quantities of noxious fumes and none of them have seatbelts or obey traffic "suggestions." To get to the same family-style restaurant from above requires a bit more bravery.

Cross road while dodging the multitude of high-speed transportation barreling at you. Flag down jeepney. Clamber inside after stepping over sack of piglets on the way to market. Squeeze your butt in between any two people with more than 6 inches of bench between them (not an exaggeration). Watch the road through the front window that has more area covered in decals than is actually translucent. Bang on the roof and yell for the driver to stop when you see your destination. Climb out over the 3 cockfighting roosters that were just brought onboard. Breathe. Eat food. Repeat.

What about much longer distances? If getting to a restaurant was hard, traveling cross-country to get to Boracay, the expensive beach resort that Cancun WISHES it was, seems daunting. Although there are 2 airlines in the Philippines, I decided that boats are much more entertaining and took nothing with me but a map and a machete as I headed off through the islands surrounding Legaspi.

A basic itinerary of my travels looks something like this:
1. Van to city - Php110
2. Jeep to port - Php7
3. Fastcraft boat to next island - Php360
4. Large 4x4 across island - Php90
5. Extra passenger fare on fishing boat - Php600
6. Bus to city - Php75
7. Jeep to van terminal - Php7
8. Van to Port - Php65
9. Boat to island - Php25
10. Tricycle from port to hotel - Php10
Total one-way travel budget - Php1349
Currently that is $33.64 for 250 miles of travel by the seat of my pants (and in only 10 easy steps!).

Unfortunately, this table of statistics can only do so much for a your understanding of how wonderfully uncertain this trip was. Let's look at the line item 5, "Extra passenger fare on fishing boat;" but first, a little preface.

While on the 4x4 (number 4 in the budge above), I met a family going home for the weekend from the big city. A father and his three teenage daughters (let's call them J-1, J-2 and J-3) were sitting next to me on a pile of cabbages and, almost immediately after departing, they asked me who I was, why I was there, what my cellphone number was, and where was I staying? (This line is bolded for effect, but when three teenage girls coo in unison, it is hard not to remember without the emphasis). I told them I was going to look around the port area for a pension of some kind and they said that simply wouldn't do.

2 hours of bouncing down a rainy road later, we arrive at their house where I was treated like some kind of low-level royalty. Food was placed in front of me; I was asked to sing some videoke songs for them; the ubiquitous Filipino drinking circle found us at the bottom of two large bottles of brandy. Considering I didn't know any of these people 2 hours prior, they proved most hospitable hosts.

The next morning I awake early with the intention of connecting with the passenger boat that supposedly leaves this port with regularity. No such luck. 30 minutes of hunting found no passenger boats of any kind. J-1, the eldest daughter seemed excited at the prospect and, seeing as the next ferry didn't leave for 2 days, DEMANDED that I come back and stay a second and third night at their house. I saw flashes of Indiana Jones-style outlaw romance in my head and ran for the nearest fishing boat. With a good deal of haggling in a language I only half-understood I managed to secure myself passage across the adjacent strait although, the captain said, I would have to wait while they traded some fish. Seeing no reason to stay in this bear-trap of a port any longer, I jumped on the boat with him and we headed out to sea.

The transportation I had managed to secure was a courier ship that received its load in the open ocean from two other boats (one filled with a fresh catch and one filled with ice to preserve said catch for the journey ahead). The exchange was an ordeal of sounds and smells as one boat was emptied of several cubic meters of hand-caught fish. After 2 hours of trading we headed seaward and were blessed with perfect blue skies, cottony clouds and calm seas. The first mate cooked a pot of the fresh catch and we ate delicious, hot fish cooked in garlic and onions with our hands as the boat treaded on. Once we ate I used the map in my guidebook to introduce the captain to the idea of triangulation and how, based on the position of the islands around us, we could tell approximately where we were and how far we had come. We came into port and I bid the crew farewell as I headed on to my next adventure.

I am still getting text messages from the eldest daughter "mis u alam mo parang na in LOVE ako sau"

Tale 2: New Year's Eve and Couchsurfing

New Year's Eve on Boracay Island. Crazy. It was a party with drinking, dancing, singing and many other forms of debauchery that need no mention here.

Couchsurfing, on the other hand, DOES deserve a round of applause for the good it does for the world.

(Begin shameless plug)

Couchsurfing is a website/social network that connects people who need someplace to crash but don't the dough with people who have a place and want to meet some crazy-cool travelers. "Social network" in this sense is much more accurate than the way it is used to describe Myspace and Facebook. In Couchsurfing you actually MEET people and have real interactions. Users are ranked based on how good they are as house guests/owners. When you "friend" someone on Facebook or Myspace, little or no judgement is passed and little social interaction beyond, "SWEET PARTY LAST NIGHT BRA!!!!11" is ever had.

I stayed with a Filipino family in Manila on my way back from Boracay and I have to say that living with someone, albeit briefly, from an area you are interested in visiting is a MUCH easier way to learn about the quirks of the city than simply getting on the big bus marked "Metro Manila Bus and Mall Tour, 100 Pesos Lang!"

(End shameless plug)

This second story is not really up to my usual standards, but click on one of the two following links to entertain yourself more:

Pictures from my travels TO Boracay

New Year's Eve Funtime Partypics ON Boracay

Ferrocement Tank and Rainwater Harvesting Training!

2007-11-19T10:02:00.000+08:00

Hey there! I just blew in from Pamplona and BOY is that rain harvestable!

Last week, I went to the next province north of me and had a grand old time building thin-walled concrete tanks with a bunch of other water and sanitation volunteers.

Ian, Lee, Alan, MAriah, MOria, honorary Wat/San Tom, myself, and all of our various Filipino counterparts, under the direction of the fearless Kiwi mixed and poured concrete in the almost-pouring rain. Fun times!

A ferrocement tank is basically a cheap way of making a large-volume concrete water reservoir. The tank is used, in this case, to catch rainwater so that the people near this school don't have to walk a half-kilometer to take a drink.

It is round because circles have all kinds of NEATO physical properties. It is made of concrete because, let's face it, concrete is about as awesome as a bucket full of ninjas. It reinforced only with tie wire because engineers like to show off how cool they can be by using minimal materials and still having a casual conversation on a 3" thick roof:

"But Paaage, I know all that and I want to be able to make one myseeeeelf."

"Slow down there, little lady, and let me walk you through the process."

First:
a) find or make a tank-shaped mold made of rebar
b) divide the mold into sections
c) wrap each piece in rice sacks
d) re-assemble into something resembling a giant beehive
e) fill mold with tallest volunteer in Philippines for the amusement of the Filipinos "Oh! He is very tall!"

a) find or make a tank-shaped mold made of rebar

b) divide the mold into sections

c) wrap each piece in rice sacks

d) re-assemble into something resembling a giant beehive

e) "Oh! He is very tall!"

Next comes the concrete:
a) Stand around while other people mix concrete
b) Pour a circular base with tie wire embedded
c) Watch with glee as your boss mixes concrete
d) Plaster the outside of your beehive (making sure to remove honey first)

a) Stand around while other people mix concrete

b) Pour a circular base with tie wire embedded

c) Watch with glee as your boss mixes concrete

d) Plaster the outside of your beehive (making sure to remove honey first)

And then you build some more:
e) Cover concrete with vertical tie wire
f) Place concrete like you mean it
g) Wrap horizontal tie wire (looks kinda like a giant bug-zapper)
h) One more layer of concrete!
i) Remove form from inside (I hope it's not too big...)

e) Cover concrete with vertical tie wire

f) Place concrete like you mean it

g) Wrap horizontal tie wire (looks kinda like a giant bug-zapper)

h) One more layer of concrete!

i) Remove form from inside (I hope it's not too big...)

And then you do a victory dance:

a) Get a pic with the army detachment sent to guard against any kind of full-frontal assault on your training.
b) Place small female volunteer inside concrete shell
c) Take a picture with counterpart for posterity
d) Take a CU/CSU rivalry pic for the heck of it
e) Go get loaded and celebrate

a) The guy next to me was known only as 'Nades

b) Place small female volunteer inside concrete shell

c) Take a picture with counterpart for posterity

d) Take a CU/CSU rivalry pic for the heck of it

e) FUN CENSORED BY THE FORCES OF CULTURAL SENSITIVITY

Ingat kamo!

Island Adventures from Far, Far Away

2007-11-09T12:05:00.000+08:00
Let me tell you a little story about a place I know.
I got back from there about a week ago.
It’s in a category by itself.
Just above the continental shelf.
With a machete and a sidekick too,
I went exploring on Rapu-Rapu.

I had a plan to go help some folks,

By cleaning water and telling bad jokes.

We swam in the falls and forded the streams,

And were consumed by our sweat in the dense jungle steam.

We trekked and we hiked and we saw water sources,

But broke every hour for the day’s many courses.

Some people drink water straight from the river,

While others use tubes of bamboo to deliver.

We ate many odd foods and had too many laughs

But honestly, I could’ve taken more baths...

Come rain or come shine we’d make our way

Each beach to each beach knowing not where we’d stay

This woman is rolling some betel-nut for me

And this banana-sized spider hung from a tree.

For Elmer, deceased, I write this short poem

For the hat that he got me, I guess that I owe him...

RIP Elmer Casillan (1958-2007)
Father; friend; co-worker; goofball.

PenaFrancia Festival, Naga City

2007-09-22T13:15:00.000+08:00
As usual, I have new pictures posted from my trips. Rapu-Rapu Island and PenaFrancia Festival are the recent additions.

Festivals are, in general, a good time. Religious festivals are, at least in my alternative-reality view, usually an awkward event. I don't believe what the christian masses and, as such, cannot appreciate the spiritual impact on the lives of so many people. In my more judgemental past, I thought it would be impossible to enjoy a religious festival simply for what it was because I did not share the values of anyone else attending.

Friday, fellow PCV Jarod and I biked 100km up to Naga city through the pouring rain to kick off the weekend with sore legs and the mental significance of having made our own pilgrimage. After 5 and a half hours of sitting on a seat and cranking our legs up and down, we finally made it to town and felt like, if the festival was a disappointment, at least we did something that weekend.

The party had been constant all week, but all events culminated on saturday with what is called the fluvial procession. Every year for the last 300 or so, Naga City has had a christian celebration where 2 large, metal icons are carried around the city by a rather pious mosh-pit. Once the icons reach a river at the other end of town they are then boated back to the church from wence they came on a barge towed by hundreds of canoes. It is quite the spectacle and, since I missed it last year, I was looking forward to seeing something as significant for a large percentage of my fellow Bikolanos.

We watched the first of two icons pass and be attacked by countless people who wanted the good luck that comes from touching this symbol of christianity and Bikolano-hood. I took pictures and watched people go crazy. When the second symbol passed, I ran down, charged through the crowd and touched the hulking metal burden.

Some may say that my difference in belief is enough to make my participation in this event a mild blasphemy, but I disagree. As with most traditions that have been handed down, generation to generation, their true meaning and intention becomes lost and they are more of a cultural phenomenon that unites a group. Although, in my mind, metal is metal and physical contact with a symbol has no reason to change me as a person, simply being involved in an event that the people with whom I live and work is enough to make me feel like a more culturally aware person. Everyone I talked to about attending the festival and touching the icon thought it was a good idea and encouraged me to experience this spectacle first-hand.

Enough pontificating.

Me in Naga. Icon passes by. I touch icon. Icon is placed on boat. Boat is brought, quite conveniently, below my hotel balcony. Pictures were taken. Connectiveness was felt between myself, other volunteers, and Bikolanos alike.

Good times.

The best part about Peace Corps

2007-08-26T12:15:00.000+08:00
There are many reasons people join the Peace Corps. Some join for resume building, some to save the world and some for good ole-fashioned escapism. We all have different motivations for being here, but there is a certain feeling of understanding that we are all looking for deep down.

I recently went to an island; you may giggle because the Philippines is known for 7,104 of those but this island is special. It is called Rapu-Rapu and is within an exceptionally poor municipality in a down-trodden and typhoon-prone province (Albay)in a neglected and forgotten region (Bikol) of the Philippines. We are installing water filters there. 50 BioSand water filters will be donated to this rural, poor area.

Instead of having the trained artisans of the BioSand filter production facility install them, I thought that people would care about the filter more (treat it better, and be more likely to use it correctly) if they installed it themselves.

So I had a training. Training of trainers is the crux of being a Peace Corps volunteer. You impart the ability to teach skills and information to locals who will teach it when you are gone (sustainability).

Normally, when you give a training in the Peace Corps, it is likely that the people who attend do so more to listen to a tall white guy (Halangkaw na puti!) speak and be funny in public than actually learn what you are trying to say. There are usually one or two people who think that what you are doing is a good idea and only one of them isn't too shy to let you know how they feel.

This event had been postponed a number of times: Weather, Protest Rallies, Absent Attendees, Fiesta. All of these factors finally worked in my favor on this particular weekend and I travelled to the island with a smile on my face. The venue was prepared and the people showed up (REALLY; A BIG DEAL!!!). The weather was BEAUTIFUL. My training materials were completed and fully prepared!

Begin.

A woman whom I work with "Ate [ah-tay, meaning 'older sister'] Flo" and I gave a presentation on water and sanitation and how, if you drink contaminated water, you are most likely eating someone/something else's poop. That went well, people asked questions.

I presented the BioSand filter. They liked that.

We installed 5 filters and taught people how to do it themselves.

And then the smile on my face got big: one woman from the people's organization I was working with stood up and started answering people's questions. She had just learned all these good and bad ways to live and be healthy and now she was relating these to her fellow citizens. She understood me. She not only understood me, but she believed me enough to take the initiative and explain it to those around her after less than an hour!

In case my punctuation does not make this clear enough, this is a very good thing.

Given the number of times that people don't listen to what you say or really appreciate that you are trying to help them, having someone teach/do/listen/understand what you tell them of their own free will is amazing.

We are returning to this island soon with the rest of the 50 filters for the poor and down-trodden of that area, so the training these people recieved will be put to good use in the near future (ideally, they will take responsibility for the installation of the next 40). Pictures to follow soon.

Vacation in the Philippines, a photo essay

2007-07-05T13:42:00.000+08:00
Before we get down to the business of telling you about my life, I just thought you would want a bit of bouyancy to get your gallstones jiggling. Here's the funny stuff.

Recently, a number of my friends from educational institutes past, Juan, Josh and Abby, came and visited me in the Philippines. After three long months of intense project work, I felt I deserved a bit of a break.

Sometimes I wonder about my choice of friends.

After a few minor delays and an afternoon of muscling through the hellish traffic jam that is Manila, we found our way to a boat bound for Puerto Galera, Mindoro.

A rare shot of the fearless tour-guide.

We stayed for about 6 days (the haze created by beautiful white sand mixed with San Miguel beer makes for an inaccurate concept of time) we stayed at Tamaraw Beach Resort on Aninuan Beach.

The closest bit of semi-offensive touristiness was called White Beach....

....a mere 5 minute rocky scramble away.

We hung out on the beach.

We played at an amazing natural waterslide in the hills nearby.

Abby and Juan got Dive Certified....

....with an excellent instructor named Noel....

.... but Josh and I decided that we couldn't let them have ALL the fun.

Some random hotness to keep the folks at home guessing.

We got in-situ massages at the place we ate dinner.

We drank a lot of this....

....and this.

Abby and Juan debating proper posture for perfect pictures.

We hung out in grass huts by the beach.

The sun set occasionally.

After we got tired of money-munching Mindoro, we headed down to Bikol to check out a very large waterfall....

....and with the support of a few random onlookers....

....we managed to clear a gargantuan tree from the pool....

....to make a few high jumping platforms safe again.

We went to the Naga City market, a place so far removed from the world of the supermarket that it took a bit of convincing to show my fellow travelers that here you COULD, in fact, buy....

....Pig Face....

....and Stingray....

....and Tapioca Balls for Halo-Halo (the national dessert, a dish that does not jive with most American taste buds)...

....and, of course, lots of random chicken pieces.

We also hit up the craft stores, like any good group of foreign tourists.

Thanks for coming!
See you again next year!!!

Facts and Feelings

2007-05-28T17:47:00.000+08:00
OmigodithasbeenalongtimesinceIwroteanythingformybelovedfollowers!!!

The Unexpected

Last month Juila Campbell, a fellow Peace Corps volunteer and close friend of mine, was killed by some fuckhead up in the Cordillera mountains of Luzon island. Since her death there has been an outporing of support for her and her family both in the US and here in the Philippines (insert some cliche here about being "family" once you join the Peace Corps). I would like to thank anyone and everyone who has taken the time to send any kind of caring message to myself, other volunteers or Julia's family. In this crazy individualistic world we live in it is nice to feel connected to those around you, even if the circumstances are as drastic as murder.

Again, thank you for your loving support and I am sure anyone affected by this tragedy feels equally grateful.

Work

BioSand filters. Let me tell you about BioSand filters.

As you may know from reading this blog, my primary project for the last 6 months or so of Peace Corps has been dedicating all my time and energy into setting up a BioSand filter production facility. The filter itself is designed using slow-sand filtration techniques that have been around for millenia.

Some facts about a single filter to put things into perspective:
- Makes up to 200 liters of contaminated water clean every day
- Good for 10-15 people by Philippine standards
- Requires no electricity or maintenance beyond keeping the outside clean
- Lasts a lifetime once installed
- Costs $28 including transport and installation

For my project UNICEF and the PhilAm foundation purchased 160 filters to be installed in various places around my province. That is up to 2400 people (or 32000 liters of water per day, depending on how you look at it) provided with safe drinking water for the forseeable future. That is fucking amazing.

The thing that is not so f'ing amazing is the amount of work that requires. Production, coordination and installation of all 160 filters has taken 3 months so far and is not over yet. Every day I go with the workers on a truck to take filters to where they need to go and convince people that I am not selling them black magic.

Fun?

What do I do for fun? I hang out with cool european aid workers and learn about why I should go work for the International Red Cross and move to Darfur. I go to the sites of nearby volunteers to escape election-related violence. I listen to the baby next door cry like he (she?) has every night for the last 6 months. I read a lot. I am actually learning to cook for myself; I can make a mean chicken curry if you ever feel a mite' peckish and want to drop in for a bite.

Random Thoughts?

This is where I come up with some kind of clever anecdote to leave my readers stunned and amazed by the lengths I will go to sacrifice my mental health and personal well being to help the needy of the world. Unfortunately for you readers, it is not that simple. There are a million things that go into making a good story but honestly I can't remember any of them. I heard on the radio once that it was about timing or something....I forget.

I don't know what it is about the culture here (and the nature of cultural differences is such that I probably will never be able to fully understand why people different than me act the way they do, though I can tolerate it without an issue) but names are a bit of a joke. When a politician in Mindanao, the area best known for its fruit and, oh yeah, Islamic extremists, names himself Osama Bin Laden, you know there is something a bit strange taking place. A grown man, not just any man, but a person RUNNING FOR ELECTED OFFICE, named himself after that bearded Saudi we all know and love.

Some other funny names (real names) of people I work with or have met:
- Boy Mayor; running for mayor of Legazpi City
- Flo Canada; a woman in my office
- Cindyrella Donghit; again, in my office
- Purification; just a first name, I can't remember the last, but it doesn't REALLY matter, does it?
- Bossing Boy; running for mayor of the town of St. Domingo near me.

A Story To Send You Off With

To give credit where credit is due, this did not actually happen to me, but to a fellow volunteer named Noah (the only person I have ever known to seriously compete in a rap battle against a Filipino and not do too poorly).

Noah was in the group of 15 volunteers, called a "hub group" that trained down here in Bikol with me. Noah is Jewish.

During training, all volunteers lived with host families and Noah was no exception. He ate, slept and shat in the same house as a lower-middle class Filipino family. These host family stays were designed to slowly integrate us into living in the Philippines and help us become more culturally sensitive. Of course as a host family, you basically had Matt fucking Damon just move into your house (Americans are quite the showpiece here). As a host family, you would be likely to ask all kinds questions to make sure the American felt welcome in your home:

- Where do you live in the US?
- How old are you?
- Do you have a girlfriend?
- Do you eat rice?
- You know already how to speak our dialect?
- WHAT RELIGION ARE YOU?

This final question was posed to Noah

"I am Jewish," he said, Jewishly.

"What does that mean? What do you believe in?" said his host mom.

"Well, as a Christian, you read the new testament and the old testament. We Jews just read the old testament."

"Oh, so you don't finish the book!"

And with that, I bid you good evening (even though it is probably almost breakfast time for most of you).

Impermanence

2007-04-18T13:59:00.000+08:00
Just start writing.

Put symbols through finger movements and spread an idea out for everyone to see all over the world.

The body of Julia Campbell, a fellow Peace Corps volunteer and close friend, has just been found near the village of Batad in Ifugao province. As the official and unofficial media have reported, she went missing on April 8th while on vacation in the central cordillera mountains of central Luzon island, the Philipines.

A google search for info about her disappearance

But those are the facts and facts are, by their nature, devoid of emotion.

Julia was a damn good cook. I would invite myself over for dinner on a regular basis, partially because I am lazy and didn't want to go through the motions of learning to cook, but mostly because she made a mean ginataan (A dish prepared in fresh coconut milk).

Julia and I were sitemates in Legazpi City, Albay (Bikol region) and were very close friends. In the Peace Corps time spent with other volunteers is prized; we all need support and can't find it when we are alone and without any kind of familiarity. The bond formed between volunteers is a very deep one formed in an environment of constant traumatic stress.

The counselor from the Peace Corps head office told us that any volunteer who goes to a therapist and tells his/her story gets the same reaction. All American therapists brand Peace Corps volunteers as "Shell Shocked" (or, for the more politically correct among you, suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder).

She had her stresses and would spout off to me at every chance she got about the trials and tribulations of work and school and her arrangements to go home. She had already been accepted to NYU and to say she was excited about going home understates it drastically. She had been planning a post-Peace Corps trip back through southeast asia. Her Peace Corps service was wrapping up and her mind had already begun to shift gears back to the NYC mindset.

Then she disappeared. Then her body reappeared.

I don't know how I am supposed to write about something like this.

How can I do a human life justice? As my mom once said, if a picture is worth a thousand words, then an experience is worth a million pictures; I would add that to describe the complete truth of any human life is beyond pictures or experience and that only sharing the moment with that other soul can give a glimpse of an understanding.

So far I have stuck with the facts as I understand them, so I guess I will continue:

Nothing is permanent. Sorrow comes from attachment to things assumed to be permanent (people, ideas, etc). There is no why in this instance. Her life was not "good" or "bad," "virtuous" or "evil." She was.

You can rationalize and discuss the hows and whys and shoulds of this situation, but there are countless emotions that will boil to the surface. These emotions cannot and should not be controlled; let them come. As much as attachment hurts when it is taken away, you cannot feel alive as a human being without those harsh, visceral emotions. It is better to have an emotional rollercoaster of a life than one that remains flat and constant. Embrace impermanence in all things including emotions.

About 50 of the volunteers from Peace Corps Philippines were sitting in the same room listening to information regarding the search for her when the news came in that her body had been found in a ravine near a trail. Until that instant, we were all tortured by uncertainty and kept happy only through the hope that this was a kidnapping and that she was still alive. Now we have certainty and, although we are not happy, we can begin the healing process. I wept for her and I will certainly cry again; she had a great deal of close friends, about whom I can say the same.

Rest in Peace, Julia Campbell.

BioSand Filter Training, tapos na!

2007-03-20T13:43:00.000+08:00
It feels like all of a sudden, the gears of my Peace Corps service have meshed: the people, both Peace Corps and Filipino, I work with are working side-by-side with me, I have been getting out and getting plenty of exercise, I have two dutch filmmakers staying at my house and my apartment is actually staying clean for more than an hour at a time.

I went on a 60km bike ride last weekend through the rolling hills of Albay. This place is simply beautiful. Once you are out of the city and the endorphin high kicks in, the ride becomes a fantastic adventure.

Up one hill, down the next, dodging crazy bus drivers who take crystal meth and don't sleep so they can drive for longer, flying past rice terraces on long, winding descents, the whip of the wind and the smiles of the children keep my spirits high. I don't rest for too long, the world looks better from the saddle. There is no destination, there is no goal, I am riding for the sake of spinning the wheels and seeing what magic lies around the next bend. I am free to enjoy it and not be judged. I just hope I don't get a flat tire.

The hanging road of northern Albay follows a serpentine path towards and away from the sea. Around each point of land is another small town with mothers doing laundry and fathers tilling the rice. The sea and sky are so still and blue that I am confused which one is reflecting which. The air is hazy, but there are no mosquitoes. Clearing the final hill gives a fantastic view of the mountain chain of Bikol; all the volcanoes have blown themselves to pieces except for Mayon, the upstart little nephew. It is amazing how rugged the shapes of the hills are in such a young landscape.

I like the Peace Corps.

Although this article is a little pre-emptive (using the past tense for the training that is currently underway) I thought it would provide some perspective into my work and allow for comments before I publish it in the Peace Corps newsletter:

Since the beginning of economic class distinction, the concepts of philanthropy and of service to your fellow man have existed, though sometimes in painfully low quantities. Since the beginning of human perceptions, there has been this idea that some things nature throws at us are not entirely supportive of our cause, as humans, to survive and provide for the next generation. Disasters have always been a sort of wild card that keeps humanity from getting too full of itself, although perhaps the people of Albay would not speak of it quite so light-heartedly.

Although the BioSand filter and associated IEC program were not initially designed as a quick, post-disaster solution, A Single Drop for Safe Water, the NGO responsible for the BioSand filter training at the 265 PST-2, in Iloilo, has been working with Page Weil and Mariah Klingsmith in Legazpi City, Albay to shift the paradigm of this filter’s use. BioSand water filters are point-of-use water filters that are best suited for installation in the homes of the rural poor, especially in locations with fecal contamination in the water supply. In February, A Single Drop formed a handshake partnership with ADRN (the Albay Disaster Relief Network; a group of NGOs setup to provide coordination and assistance in disaster aftermath around Albay) to work as counterparts to procure funding from UNICEF, the United Nations Children’s Fund, to fund a large scale BioSand program as quickly as possible.

Fast forward through the meetings, budget negotiations, and proposal drafts and redrafts, UNICEF supplied the necessary funding to A Single Drop to buy 6 BioSand filter molds and manufacture and install 100 filters within 6 weeks. The money spent will not only serve to relieve the effects of the recent disasters, but also to provide a long-term, sustainable solution to the problem of clean water in Albay.

We can now look back on the BioSand filter training at Aquinas University (WATSAN Page Weil’s HCA and a partner of ADRN) and smile, as the results have been nothing but positive. 18 attendees from various NGOs (all partners of ADRN) came to learn the technology and prepare to manufacture BioSand filters on a large scale. The trainers came from A Single Drop, the money came from UNICEF, the inspired people came from ADRN and Aquinas University, and moral support and day-to-day coordination was supplied by Page and Mariah. With very little coaxing, ADRN has taken on the responsibility of developing IEC plans before, during, and after filter installation. The people of Albay seem to be in good hands.

Completion of the technical training has left ADRN with 6 BioSand filter molds, trained staff, and widespread community entry through the placement of the initially manufactured 100 filters. ADRN now has the capacity to pump out 180 filters every month (each filter can supply up to 200 liters of clean water per day) and sell them locally to people who are still picking up the pieces of their lives from the wreckage of last year’s typhoons. Local material, labor, IEC and installation costs put the sustainable price of one filter at 1400 pesos. After initial installation there are no costs associated with the filter.

As this project gains visibility ADRN will use their training and local contacts to market the filter to all of the poor and needy within Albay. These inspired altruists will not rest until there is a pot on every fire and a BioSand filter accessibly placed near every contaminated water source; okay, maybe they will take a break for a Meryenda or two…

Work?

2007-02-16T21:46:00.000+08:00
I don't know who put this crazy organization together, but the idea of actually having stuff to do is a bit foreign to me. Joke lang (in case my boss is reading this)!!!

This week has seen the installation of the first of many BioSand filters along with a poster on my campus. Kids and faculty alike have been coming up to me and asking how it works and where they can get one if it really works as well as I say! Yay for small victories!

On top of building, installing and preparing to give a half-day seminar on BioSand filters, I am also working with the NGO "A Single Drop" to develop a program to bring around 700 filters to the province of Albay within about 6 months. These numbers will change, but for the sake of scale you should know that 700 filters is a CRAPLOAD!

This project will also serve to develop some kind of disaster preparedness plan for the poorer areas of Albay. This region gets hit by 20 typhoons every year with only minimal typhoon preparation or education. It seems obvious to us Americans to say things like "keep extra blankets around," or "make sure you have some clean water saved," but when you can't afford food or simply have no education, your life is lived very fatalistically. "Bahala na" is a phrase commonly used here to describe the attitude of the Philippine poor. Literally translated, it means "it is up to god," or "come what may." But I digress.

We are planning on helping rally the people to help themselves, especially when it comes to the massive amount of annual typhoon damage recieved by Bikol (not that things are regularly as bad as they were this year).

Anyhoo, things are going well here in Bikolandia; too much work to do, crazy hectic city life, fun when I have a free moment, and of course just sitting on my roof watching the stars.

End of ramblings, more serious posts when I have my serious face on.

Ingat kamo!

News. Weather.

2007-02-01T19:05:00.000+08:00
I haven't posted in a while. It happens. Sue me.

New Years in the Philippines sounds more like a war than a celebration (El Salvador memories). We set of fireworks and made merry.

I went to Hawaii in mid-January for 10 days and had an ABSOLUTE BLAST! It was just me and my parents, but we managed not to kill each other for 2 weeks... We all learned to windsurf and went hiking. Hawaii seems like what the Philippines COULD be if there was more money available and they kept everything really clean (oh yeah, and if they served cheese and guacamole on command). Pictures are coming soon, but it was an amazing trip to a beautiful tropical paradise.

I HAVE WORK!!! Finally, after 9 months here in the Philippines, work has begun to pick up. I am currently preparing to train a number of people at my university how to construct BioSand filters to be sold in the surrounding area. The BioSand filter, for those who don't know and are too lazy to read A Single Drop, to develop this project. They want me at the front of this project helping develop trainings to clean the water for the whole freakin' province! When things go well, they really go well here.

I have had a great deal of help in my projects from the people at Hands-On Disaster Relief who have been essential in assisting me make my first few demonstration filters. It is also work checking out their website; they have basically set up shop here in the nearby municipality of St. Domingo and have been working 'round the clock to help this place recover from its disastrous state. They operate in a really organic and wonderful way: They post on volunteer and travel websites about what projects they have and how many volunteers they need, and anyone in the area (aka. South-East Asia) can contact them and stop in for a few weeks work. They provide food and a roof over their heads, all you have to do is get there. Right now they are making tarps for peoples' roofs and building new boats for fisherman through donations from the US.

Anyways, that is the news and the weather. More on BioSand as it takes off, and it is going to REALLY TAKE OFF!

Ciao

New Typhoon Pictures

2006-12-12T15:09:00.000+08:00
New Typhoon pictures have been posted, by popular demand:

CNN article written by a fellow volunteer about a landslide zone near my office.
My Webshots Account
New album of Typhoon pictures

Other articles and pictures pending publishing.

New notes:
As the relief operations in Albay get organized and efficient, I have begun implementing the BioSand water filter project that I have talked about with some of you loyal friends/family/readers. I have recieved word from a number of people who feel morally obligated, or at least excited, to help financially in some way. The BioSand water filter project needs funding as well as some subsidies so that some of the poorer folks here can buy one. In essence, it is a filter that costs about $24 to buy and will provide up to 220 liters of clean drinking water per day for longer than you will live. It is a great project in need of funding. If you feel like you want to help with this, then I encourage you to contact me. Please don't feel obligated to give, but understand that if you do, this money will go to a good project and not to line the pockets of a local opportunist.

Side note: Although some of you may be encouraged to give goods instead of money, understand that the shipping costs and time will make it much more worth it to merely wire money this direction. Before you even think about sending anything, talk to me; I will provide any transparency in project execution that you might require so that you know I am not a lying sack of monkey poo.

Ouch!

2006-12-09T08:17:00.000+08:00
Long blog, cliff notes:
-Typhoon happens to city.
-Typhoon happens to Page.
-Page is scared.
-Page is okay.
-All other volunteers are just as okay as Page.
-PICTURES ARE HERE
-.....
-Profit

As many of you now know, through my Mom's emails and the large international news coverage, Legazpi City was just hit by the biggest typhoon in more than 30 years.

http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Philippine_typhoon_toll_may_hit_1,000

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Pacific_typhoon_season

Wiki's stories cover what anyone who is not a Bikolano saw, I am here to provide the front-line details about this massive disaster.

November 29th:

Went about my daily life; left work a little early after the school shut down the power, knowing that the typhoon was on its way. I didn't think much of this round of bad weather since the last typhoon, Milenyo, was reported to be the worst in 20 years. I figured, stupidly, that there really wasn't that much cause for alarm. Legazpi City had a signal 3 (out of a possible 5) and I was content to go to bed and not to work in the morning. The farthest extremities of the typhoon had begun to reach town and rain intermittently. I went to Julia's (another volunteer who lives in town) to camp out the storm with a friendly face. We cooked dinner and bought a coupla beers to pass the evening away.

November 30th:

7 AM: The last storm warning text message I would recieve arrived and said that this one was gonna be a doozy, specifically a signal 4. In the Philippines, typhoon strength is categorized by area, not by storm. It is said that a storm is of a certain signal in your area depending on the wave height and wind speed where you are specifically. Personally I think this system is decieving, people assume that the storm is going to stay one signal in their area and not get any worse, when that is the opposite of what is likely to happen. Typhoon Durian (appropriately named after the smelly fruit) was a signal 4 which, for a Filipino typhoon, translates to winds between 131 and 155 mph and 13 to 18 foot waves.

But enough science, all that is available on Wiki. Wiki does not go into what happens when you are poor, have a poorly constructed house, and then things are leveled by a giant tropical pain-machine.

8 AM: Still lying in bed. I like bed. Bed is warm. Bed doesn't have rain in it...yet.

9 AM: See 8 AM.

10 AM: The wind is beginning to pick up, but I am still not worried. Again, see 8 AM.

11 AM: It is hard to lay in bed comfortably when loose pieces of metal sheeting are being slapped against the roof by the wind. I get up. There is no more cell signal.

12 PM: The storm has been raging for a while and Julia and I point out the growing stream in the road outside her apartment. We laugh about how lucky we are that it is so small and that we are elevated above the road.

12:30 PM: Things really start to suck.

12:31 PM: The roof is getting louder and louder. The rain is now seeping in through the cracks in the roof and is raining in the dining room. We move all important stuff to the bedroom and hide it in Julia's dresser. The rain is now flying in through every gap or crack in the house. Some buckets are put down to catch the water as it falls.

12:33 PM: The first bucket fills.

12:34-1:34 PM: This hour was scary. Looking out into the street, the floodwaters rise from nothing to 4 feet in the road. 4 feet of water outside translates to 3 feet inside. We are standing on stools inside the apartment and watch as they, and then our feet on top of them, are submerged. A casual glance at the bathroom reveals that the floodwaters have overtopped the toilet. We are now standing in a mix of floodwater and raw sewage. Ew.

We look out the window at the front of Julia's place and see a jeep go floating by and decide that things are maybe a little TOO hectic to stick around here much longer. I contact the neighbors, who live in a 2 story concrete house and happen to be Julia's landlady's cousins, by climbing up to their balcony above the raging torrent that was once a street. In order to get Julia's 80-year-old landlady to that house, we have to wade through waist-deep water. The landlady is old, and waist-deep for me means neck-deep for her. If we had a camera out, this would have made the headlines of some major newspaper; the big, white american carrying the small, frail, old woman to safety over raging floodwaters. Oh well.

1:35 PM: I see that bucket go floating by, rendered useless by floodwaters

Afternoon/Evening: Once the floodwaters had risen to waist deep, adrenaline took over my brain and made the rest of the day a blur. We escaped from the storm to a large concrete house and were lucky enough to be fed and given a bed by the landlady's cousins. I pass out and have dreams about things besides large tropical weather patterns.

December 1st: In the morning, we look at Julia's place and try to do some basic cleanup. Basic turned into shoveling and scrubbing all of the mud from her floor. I return to my house to find broken glass and wet books, but nothing too intense. There is no power, no information, no cell signal and no running water. Julia and I clean all day long, sunup to sundown.

December 2nd: More of the same, but with an exciting twist. Around noon, when I am carrying buckets of water from the pump to the house for laundry, a man darts by me on his bike, almost running me over. At home, I would have just screamed at him, but this was unusual for the Philippines; people are generally courteous here. I look where he came from and see groups of other people running up the hills and, in general, going places in a hurry. When someone finally stopped to answer my inquiries, all he said was "TSUNAMI!!!!!!" and kept running. I looked down the road where everyone was running from and I felt what can only be described as pure terror. My mind froze and my body panicked. I told Julia and, within 30 seconds, we had both grabbed the 2 or 3 items we deemed essential and were on our bikes ready to ride. At that moment, the barangay captain came out and said it was just a hoax.

I found out later that 24 people were hospitalized and 3 killed due to the panic caused by this scare. I was more scared for my life in those 30 seconds than at any point during the previous day's typhoon.

Since then: I have been helping with any relief effort I can find. According to local authorities, 7-10 students at Aquinas University were killed when the floodwaters entered their boarding house. My university looks like it got hit by a giant mud-bomb. The morgues are filled with bodies. Barangay Padang (CNN web story pending) was completely wiped out by a volcanic landslide. Luckily for Peace Corps, myself and all the other volunteers (we are all safe and healthy) have been brought together for our language learning camp. We have been working half days and assisting any local relief efforts available the rest of the time. We play with the kids, we carry sacks of rice, we do whatever we can. This will probably continue for me once the other volunteers leave for their respective sites.

If you finished reading all this, I thank you for caring. If you skipped to this part from the beginning, then you are a bad, bad person.

Things that happen where you are not

2006-11-20T16:09:00.000+08:00
Greetings, loyal readers!! Hello to anyone who comes occasionally! Goodbye to anyone who is not here.

Over the last few weeks, I have actually had a ton of REAL WORK to do (scary, isn't it) so I haven't been much of a blog updator. There are designs and proposals and meetings, OH MY! Hopefully at least one of these irons will come out of the fire and bear fruit down the right track to the light at the end of the tunnel of love (too many metaphors?).

Honestly, I think I would put you all to sleep if I started talking about the proposals I have been writing. Instead, I thought I would talk about a few things that really give me a warm, squishy feeling inside. First, imagine that you just had a tray of fresh brownies dumped down the front of your pants. Got it? Let us begin:

- Geckos; instead of scary, evil looking spiders that may or may not kill you (USA) we have lizards very similar to the Anoles that I had in a terrarium in elementary school. Those died for lack of food. The ones here eat every gosh darn mosquito in the place. I love it. It is also incredibly cool to watch them run at full tilt along the ceiling. One would think that they would fall or simply forget that they were upside down and fail to plant that foot before lifting the other one, but no. They are probably the best good luck charm I have found here in this crazy tropical pair-o-dice.

Public Transportation; Let's face it, if you live in the good ole US of Oil and are trying to "live a normal life" without a car, you will be met by strong social, economical and temporal barriers. What I mean is that every aspect of American (specifically Sub-Urban and Rural) life is entirely governed by the assumption that everyone there is comfortable buying, owning, using and maintaining a motor vehicle of some sort. Bus schedules and many peoples' varied workdays and need for daily efficiency make public transportation a joke. Added to this is the food procurement process which, in "America," has been totally centralized to the point where mom and pop shops no longer exist and everything is run through freeways and parking lots and efficient, digitally managed lines. Okay, okay, I said these things would be positive; how are those brownies doing?

In the Philippines, what happens when you need to travel somewhere beyond convenient walking distance (and you don't want to use your bike for one reason or another)? You walk to the road, look at the column of jeeps headed your way, flag one down and hop on for the ride. Even public transportation in the US has to be scheduled and managed to remain thus (ever been yelled at by a bus driver who couldn't wait the extra two seconds for you two get on so that he could keep on his second-to-second schedule?. In the Phils, you walk to the road where you know you can find the route you want and within a minute, usually less, you have your reasonably priced ride and most likely some really bad music and mid-80's posters of Tom Cruise to go with it. There are a lot of reasons that something like this would not work in the US; I will not delve into all of those now, suffice to say that people are stupid and demand that any personal injury liability be put on someone else's shoulders insead of their own dumb-ass (McDonald's Coffee).

If you don't want a jeep and need to go a shorter distance, it is likely that a motorcycle-with-sidecar (tricycle) can take you there with a smile and a small shrine to Mr. J. C. saying something to the effect of "you had better pray that we don't crash, I need both my hands on the wheel right now!" It is also a brownie-esqe feeling when I see that, in a land devoid of phonebooth/volkswagen stuffing contests, they have managed to cram 13 Filipinos and all of their market purchases onto a 250cc tricycle. Good times.

- My third and final warm and fuzzy award goes to any person who I have seen on the street and has smiled back with nothing to lose or gain from me. Walk down the street here. Look someone in the eye, smile and raise your eyebrows a bit to say "How YOU doin'?" and they will respond in kind (though sometimes with less teeth). The kids run up to you and want to touch your hands and know your name. The men want you to get drunk with them at 8:30 in the morning. I have resisted most temptations so far. Everyone wants to know who you are, where you are from and "Wont you come meet my daughter? She is 23, just like you! She wants to go to the US when she finishes her degree!"

On the bad days, the constant attention feels more like an icepick to the nostrils than brownies in the pants, but that is the way Peace Corps goes. Due to the long, colorful, shared history of the US and the Phils, Americans are like royalty here. Everyone in my neighborhood knows my name, where I live, what I eat for breakfast on each day of the week, how many times I have gone biking this week and when is the best time to ask me to join them for a cold one or five (answer, after 12:01 PM).

Warm and fuzzies having been completed, you may now eat your tray of brownies.

Skype is cooooooool....

2006-10-29T20:37:00.000+08:00
I know I shouldn't be as impressed with technology because I surround myself with it on a regular basis, but SKYPE IS AWESOME!!! I am not only calling my parents, hands-free I might add, from the other side of the world, I am also blogging about it and referencing pictures mid-conversation.

If you are reading this and you have a computer and would like to talk to me, consider getting skype and we can do some free person-to-person calling.

The age of going to the 7-11 (or 6-12, depending on where you live), looking up the international rates on phone cards and then trying to hold a decent conversation through 8 second delay is now at an end. I am talking with both of my parents on two different computers and chatting and blogging and surfing and scratching my ass all at the very same time. If I wanted to, I could have a burrito and make it all really freakin' crazy.

Get Skype. Call me. We will talk about things and stuff.

New pictures!!!

2006-10-26T13:42:00.000+08:00
Lots of new pictures posted
Here
Here
And Here

Lots of stories associated with all of them. Specific requests for dramatic interpretations of the images within will be heeded

New apartment, new inspirations

2006-10-24T16:46:00.000+08:00
When I last left you, my loving audience, I was in the midst of a housing crisis; that crisis has been resolved in winning style. I have officially moved from my ex-host family's house to the campus hotel and from there (finally!!!) to my own awesome apartment. If you will notice in the previous sentence, the word "awesome" is enhanced not only with italics, but also with bold; lets just say that Blogger.com does not give me enough text formatting options to really do this word justice, but I digress.

Whenever my camera gets out of the shop (aka, my bedroom) and into my backpack again, I will post pictures of the rooms and the view. It is a brand new concrete building painted a really bad shade of institution green. I live on the second floor with an unobstructed view of Mt. Mayon and a good vista of the town and the airport. If you walk up one more set of stairs, there is a communal rooftop deck for box socials, suarees or just plain ole' lying down and staring at the stars.

#1 problem with moving into a new place: you have to buy a lot of new crap

I took yesterday off to cruise town and get my kitchen ready for Page's 2006 cooking experiment; more on that as details emerge.

This last weekend I decided that I needed an escape. I was feeling too bogged down by work (hard to imagine in the Peace Corps, but it is true) and in need of a bike race to participate in. As it so happened, luck was with me. This weekend was a two part experiment to determine how much my leg muscles have really atrophied since I have come here and to see how difficult it would be to do some serious travel with a large pack and bike. Another volunteer friend of mine, Katie, lives on the nearby island of Catanduanes . Their fiesta has been going on for the last few weeks or so and Katie had mentioned previously that a bike race was a part of that. Being an avid biker and occasionally liking a challenge, I decided to visit.

There were 2 races available to enter, the 20km "Fun Ride" and the 50km "Open Category Mountain Bike Race." Being totally sensible and not at all swayed by the wussy title of "Fun Ride" I of course chose the Open Category Ultra-Mega-Too-Hardcore-For-People-Who-Know-What-A-Duvet-Is Mountain Bike Race. Since I have done almost no training other than a two or three bikerides a week around the city, I felt that the preparations on the day itself were crucial for success.

I didn't have more than 2 glasses of wine the night before the race. I slept at least 6 hours. I filled my camelback. I sacrificed a collection of small mammals to the gods of the Shimano drive-train. On the morning of the race, I stretched, warmed up and talked with some of the other racers to try and convince them not to kick my ass too hard. Clearly there was a language barrier.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pwned

If the above link doesn't really do my moral victory justice, allow me to relate the events of the first 4km of the 50km race. Believe me, nothing really matters after the chase car decides you aren't worth chasing anymore and speeds off to follow someone with some skill....

Here is the image for you: I am sitting near the front of the pack waiting to begin. My gears are shifted for maximum acceleration, my camelback valve is open and ready to dispense and my legs are just itching to start the race. 10. 9. 8. 7. 6. 5. 4. 3. The first racer has decided he doesn't care about the count anymore and has started inching forward. 2. The second and third racers have taken the cue of the first racer. 1. GO! Plus 10 seconds into the race. More than half the pack is completely out of sight (not a joke). Plus 6 minutes or so into the race. The fat kid who I was hoping to actually compete with has disappeared from sight. Plus 7 minutes. The leaders of the "Fun Ride" have passed me. Plus 9 minutes. The chase car has stopped caring for my health and well-being and is well out of sight. I saw the chase car a little while later scraping some guy off the road who realized that concrete tasted better than winning and decided to stop for a snack. He was okay afterwards, but his eye was a little ground-beefish.

In the end, I biked about 20km and then grabbed the chase car on its return trip down the course (a there-and-back-again type of race). Embarassed, I finally made it back to downtown in time to catch up with the other volunteers who had just had a similar experience in the improperly named "Fun Ride."

It was a good time, and my first bike race ever.

There are a number of bike clubs from all around Legazpi city. I think I will start biking with them to train so that one day I may actually be able to compete on the wussy level.

I will have pictures from my apartment and site visits to local water supplies (yeah, I do actually do work sometimes) will be posted before too long.

Keep sending your emails, I love it when people do that. For every person that donates one email worth of care in my direction, I will pledge at least 5 extra minutes of hard work this week to help the people of the Philippines (okay that is kinda mean, but keep emailing anyway)

PEACE

Greetings after 6 MONTHS IN THE PEACE CORPS

2006-10-05T13:55:00.000+08:00
You may remember me as that guy who stopped posting on his blog more than a month ago for no particular reason. You may also remember me as that friend/relative/acquaintance/bitter enemy/personal trainer to whom you loved to talk at one time. Now there is a new way you can think about that guy Page: the guy who survived the biggest typhoon the Philippines has seen in 20 years fast asleep on a bus in the middle of nowhere.

I have not been able to post to this blog or answer any email for the last month due to the severity of the storm and the remote-ness of the training site of Peace Corps. For most of you, don't take it personally; I am not ignoring you. For the remaining few (you know who you are) I am ignoring you because of those nasty comments you made about my weight...bastards....

Last wednesday, the 27th, I was on my way back from Manila. I had just finished my Peace Corps technical training. I decided to take the day bus because I hate spending the night in such an uncomfortable place. The day bus usually takes about 12 hours. At around 5:30 PM, the rain picked up and the bus slowed down. I ate a big meal at the dinner stop because I figured it might be a long ride. Boy was I right.

We came upon a downed tree at around 7:30 PM and the bus driver decided to wait out the night there on the road (this being the only road leading from Manila to Legazpi). The wind was howling. The bus was shaking. A few times during the night, I awoke with a start to the sound of a large tree falling on the roof. I thanked my lucky stars that I was in a shelter designed to be watertight and not made out of tin and bailing wire.

In the morning, the remaining 45 minute trip to Legazpi took 6 hours as we passed tree after tree blocking the road. At every tree there was a team of at least 6 or 8 local residents who had their Bolos (Machetes) out and were wailing away on every branch they could see. I could see a lot of branches that needed wailing. I have pictures that will be published later on that show some of this mayhem.

THE KICKER: When I got back to my site, I knew that I had about a week to find a new place to live because the initial signed agreement between me and my host family was about to expire. Instead of taking into consideration that maybe it would be difficult to find a new apartment, what with all the broken houses and lack of water or electricity, SHE KICKED ME OUT! The worst part is, she couldn't even come out and say it! She had to be a passive-aggressive [CENSORED] and not even actually answer me when I asked if I could maybe extend the housing agreement a little bit longer!! When I mentioned the idea, she shook her head, got up and went to hide in her room! It is as though, because she is a Filipino who is well off, she can ignore any cultural ideas of accommodation and "helping her fellow man." I am moving into a hotel temporarily tomorrow. I could rant on this subject for many an hour, but you guys get the gist.

Training was cool, we learned how to make sand and gravel water filters that cost almost nothing. My project here at Aquinas will probably involve them in some way over the next year. The Bio-Sand filter is a great idea. I will post more on that at another time.

Oh yeah, and if you come visit me, we are going to Boracay island and sitting on a beach for an extended period of time.

Page

Active vacationing at its finest

2006-08-29T09:45:00.000+08:00
First, I should point out that there are NEW PICTURES UP!!!!

After weighing my options for the two weeks since my last update, I have decided that it would be better to actually experience something before I write any more.

I have been evacuated due to the erupting volcano, this is not news.

Friday I decided to take a vacation from my vacation and leave the peace and quiet of the Amor Farm Beach Resort in Donsol in search of better entertainment. A fellow volunteer, Richard Higgins, has a site in the town of Daet in Camarines Norte. He told me, earlier this week, that he was having a Solid Waste Management seminar. Given that my sector is Water and Sanitation, I felt obliged to attend.

By a strange coincidence, Daet also has the only good surf beach in the Bikol region. Must have been a lucky choice on my part to go....

SWM Conference Meringue

6 Volunteers
1 Local Official
3 Pieces Broken Audio Equipment
120 Eager Beaver Students
1 Pre-Arranged Conference
1 Not-Really-Pre-Arranged Thunderstorm
Paper
Markers
Sprinkles

Pre-heat oven to 350 F.
Mix in a large concrete bunker of a school.
Fully prepare conference and call local official to ensure community participation.
Slip rainstorm into mix when chef is looking at something else.
Giggle as chef swears in one of the hundreds of Bikol dialects.
Fall asleep after local official decides that it would be a good idea to read the recent government act on SWM to a bunch of high school kids.
Dream of electric sheep.
Awake occasionally to the soothing sounds of feedback through the speakers.
Conduct your portion of SWM seminar in loud booming voice reminiscent of Bill Nye the Science Guy.
...
Profit

After the conference, REAL PIZZA.

I must digress for a moment; when volunteers get together, our conversation drifts through many different topics. There is not one conversation that does not include the discussion of the foods we all miss from home. Don't get me wrong, Filipino food is delicious, but there are just certain nuances of the locals' taste buds that are not agreeable with American sensibilities; the closest facsimilie to cheese here is something called "Kraft Eden," the look/taste/smell of which makes me think of coagulated radiator fluid from the cold war era. Consequently, conversations usually sound like this:
"When I go home, I am just going to sit in in AirCon room and eat a block of cheese."
"I'll raise your block of cheese for two bagels with lox and a Dove bar."
"Oh you bastard, I'll see your bagels and ice cream and raise with a jar of pickles."

...and so on...

Cheese. Pizza. Turkey. Subs. BAGELS! Ice Cream. Real Coffee. Cookies. Pasta. Olive Oil. Spaghetti Sauce that is NOT LADEN WITH SUGAR!

There is a pizza parlor at the beach that had real mozzerella cheese and real pepperoni. That was nice. I ate so much that I got sick.

Afterwards, videoke. See pictures for highlights.

This place, Bagaspas beach, has an easy beach break and a really cool guy named Baker who runs the local waverider's club. Their surfboards were broken, but we got some boogyboards and had a good morning of it. I will return.

Until the volcano is done belching up lava, my address is whatever bus I happen to be on for the day. Who knows when this will end? My work misses me. I miss my work, but not enough to sneak back to Legaspi more than once a week. If things continue this way, I will go straight from my vacation to my second Peace Corps training in Iloilo City (Panay Island, Visayas).

Enjoy your dairy you bastards.

Goodbye for now.

ps - Has anyone recieved a postcard from me yet? I am curious about the world mail system.

Evacu-cation!

2006-08-14T13:23:00.000+08:00
As no doubt many of you have heard, the "World's Largest Pimple" (aka. Mt. Mayon) has reached alert level 4. Whenever a Philippine volcano reaches level 5, we say it is "pulling a 'tubo," as in Pinatubo. That is local street slang for losing your cool. No one wants to be caught in public pulling a 'tubo; imagine your girlfriend finding out you have skid-marks on the night you planned to propose. But I digress.

The mountain has started doing its thing and as a result, Peace Corps started doing their's: I have been evacuated from lovely, sunny, pollution-and-tricycle-free Legazpi City to Donsol. Donsol, as you may know, is the Whale-Shark capitol of the Philippines. It is also home to many quiet, peaceful beach resorts far from earshot of anything but the gentle lull of the "Inside Sea," for lack of a better name. As a result of this much more desirable locale, I have been spending most of my days sitting in a hammock, reading or doing some design work on one of my many proverbial "irons in the fire."

The official line is that, while the volcano itself may not pose any immediate danger to my place of residence, the hordes of panicky people in the event of a serious catastrophe would pose a grave danger considering how poorly I blend in here.

Although I am not doing real, honest, sit-down-and-wrack-your-brain-until-it-hurts kinda work, I have been learning about cultural quirks while sitting on the beach. During the calmer weather of the summer months, the ocean water surrounding the Philippines appear as large sheets of glass, occasionally disturbed by a passing Butanding (read: Whale Shark). The smooth seas make smooth sailing and easy fishing a regular part of life. When the winds pick up, at least in Sorsogon, the locals call it "Habagat" (I think that is how it is spelled). Habagat, while I don't know the origins, could easily serve as a worthy synonym for hunger and/or poverty.

When the water is choppy the fish hide and the fisherman follow suit. When the fish are no longer plentiful, the fish markets have little to sell. When the fish markets try to raise their prices to counteract the increased demand, the stubborn local consumer refuses to buy fish that are even 10 pesos more expensive and so the market cannot sell. There are no fish, the local commerce is screwed, and the words "poor" and "hungry" become rather prevalent all over town.

Now, to sound like an asshole tourist, I should point out that while the locals are having issues with the bare necessities, the weather is actually rather pleasant. There is a constant on-shore breeze, the skies are cloudy and, honestly, it is the perfect temperature for sitting in a hammock reading a book. I empathize, and I am actually trying to get some work done to help people out instead of sitting around like a bump on a log, but that doesn't change the fact that this is probably the perfect time to have been evacuated.

Oh well, back to the hammock for me.

Page

Recent happenings in and around Legazpi, Albay

2006-08-04T09:54:00.000+08:00
It is funny when people request me to update this thing, not realizing that time's meaning is very different in this cross-cultural setting. The days are over before they begin and the weekends feel as long as the weeks. In the timeframe I usually update this thing (around a week) I am supposed to be having experiences to write about, but time's slow pace makes this week deadline almost seem too rushed. Whatever, I will keep writing so that I can have two journals to look back on when my grandkids ask me what the hell I was thinking running off to a place with no cheese and chocolate flavored toothpaste (not kidding).

Although time seems slow and if feels like I could be getting a lot more done than I actually do, I still LOVE sitting on my ass reading yet another good book. Recent projects include Under the Banner of Heaven by John Krakauer, Waiting: The True Confessions of a Waitress by Debra Ginsberg, Emma by Jane Austen (Yes Dad, I am reading books by women too), The Tao of Physics by Franz Capra, and On the Road by That guy who spent a lot of time on the road.

This week the perception I had been nurturing of the Philippines as this gentle, slow place, full of friendly faces and slow change was suddenly thrown in my face:

There was a boy. Like most boys his age, he had a 21st birthday. Most boys his age get to see the age of 21 + 1/365 years. This boy did not. He was shot 4 times and killed. Considering the content and circumstances surrounding his death, I am going to cover my own pale, pasty ass by not putting them all here and making it convenient to find. If you would like my version of this story, comment on this post and I will send out a mass email to all interested parties; this way, you will only get the dirt if I know I can trust you (no offense to my anonymous readers, I just like following rule #1 to the letter and staying alive).

On a slightly less horrible note:

The volcano is getting pretty close to blowing its top like a middle schooler at his first dance with a "girl." Although the constant cloud cover makes it difficult to see the lava, the flow has now reached below the cloud layer; that is a relief in its own weird way.
"Yay, I can see the lava!"
"Oh shit, the lava is getting really close!"
"..."
"Yay, I can see the lava!"

I have also begun looking for my first apartment by myself. I never thought it would be on the other side of the world, but I have to start looking because all the rules and regulations of living in someone else's household are beginning to wear on me. I understand the right of a homeowner to be picky with their guests, but that does not mean I like living with that hanging over my head. Soon, Legazpi City party shack, complete with bowling alley and hot tub (aka, beer bottles, roundish rock and stove.)!! Come visit and I will show you at least 75% of a good time.

16823 people still have no idea what this refers to

Will update for 500 Pesos and a bag of mangoes...

2006-07-17T08:42:00.000+08:00
So I haven't updated in a while...sue me.

As the time passes, the days seem to get shorter and the weeks are beginning to fly by. Lots of meetings and lots of work to do has been keeping me busy enough to not really think about the time...although at times I really could spend less time "working" on the computer here. The weekends have been nothing but good times, everything from hikes and parties to scuba diving; this "Peace Corps" thing is a pretty sweet deal both at work and play.

I gave my first real "seminar" last week, though it had little to do with water, sanitation, solid waste or any of my official titles. After spending a good 6 hours removing a "Click this button for a chance to win a million dollars" piece of spyware, I decided that people here needed to not do that again. The seminar was a bit of a success in that, people showed up, not all of them fell asleep, and most of them asked me for a copy of the presentation afterwards. It seems that wherever you go, teaching sessions for computer basics are better than any sort of lullaby for knocking people out in record time....oh well...

Data. This is what I did all last week; analyzed data. Some people might comment on how removed that sort of thing is from a genuine "cultural experience." Others may say that I spend too much time hiding in front of a computer. I would say that they are right and wrong in several ways. If there is one thing they teach in Peace Corps, it is how to cope with frustrations. There is nothing more frustrating than finding out that more than 60% of the data that you just analyzed is not only inaccurate, but most of the people who gathered the data didn't take the time to get any of the information they were supposed to.

My main project, the Provincial Water Resource Management Plan for Albay, is currently in an analysis phase. Data has been collected on all the Barangays in the province and now it is time to go through and prioritize the data for who needs help and who gets it first. Unfortunately, we have so little accurate data that we might as well put a map of Albay on the official PWRMP dartboard and throw blindfolded. For the sake of bureaucracy and "doing things the right way," we are going to run with the data if there is more than 30% for any municipality and start helping people ASAP.

Okay, I know that you are at least a little bored/sleepy after reading about my work...now for a little comic relief:

Walking to catch a jeep, I passed a tricycle stand:

"Hey, you want Tricycle?!"
"No thanks, I am okay."
"Oh, then you must be Johnny Walker"

giggles

As I mentioned above, my recent weekends have been packed with chocolatey goodness and cream filling. This week's official "good time" was scuba diving. I have been learning scuba with a number of other volunteers (Vanessa, Noah, Mariah and Alvin). and we are almost done with the class now. Our instructor, [Scuba] Steve, has showed us all the mechanics of diving and equipment maintenance but I feel like he could have done more with the dive tables than just said "here are what dive tables look like, now buy a dive computer and you wont have to worry about calculations."

Honestly, if there is one thing that they teach you in school in the US, it is to NEVER TRUST YOUR COMPUTER! Computers can fail; computers cannot be held responsible for their own actions, humans can. I have done my own dive calculations for any dives of serious depth (beyond 40 ft.) which is to say, I haven't actually had to do any calculations because I have not been below 40 ft yet. The thing about scuba is that it is very easy to go too deep, it is very easy to ascend too fast, and it is very easy to not know that you are doing either. A diver has to pay strict attention to his/her depth gauge so as to not get into a bad situation requiring a decompression chamber. So when a dive instructor is telling you that you don't need to know something, that a computer can figure it out, alarm bells start going off in your head.

Regardless, I am being careful....I am doing my own calculations and dive planning with the assistance of my fellow volunteers who are already certified and experienced. For all you crazy kids tuning in state-side, I am taking precautions to ensure that I don't break rule #1 (Don't die)...you can count on me.

Now that you have read most of my blog, I have the real news of the day (its like desert after a nice dinner). Mt. Mayon, the perfect cone volcano, is ERUPTING!!! It would be less exciting if I wasn't within 12km of the place where molten hot magma is leaving the earth's crust like rats deserting a ship. A few weeks ago, Mt. Bulusan erupted about 100 km from me and all my blog readers sent messages with bated breath while I laughed and told them that there was no danger whatsoever....this is slightly different.

There is a guy here who is a vulcanologist who is also a former Peace Corps volunteer who (as it happens) worked at Aquinas University in the 1970's as a geology professor. His name is Chris Newhall. He has been studying Mt. Mayon since before I was born and, consequently, has a pretty good picture of what is going on in there. Right now, it is an amazing show; the lava flow has reached about 1km down the side of the mountain and the eruption scale is escalating quickly. It is very possible that either I will have to be evacuated or I will get some great pictures of lava spouting off of the top.

On friday night, before our weekend scuba lesson, all of the volunteers visiting Legazpi went with Chris to the PHILVOLCS observatory and watched the seismometers and scientists do their thing as the earth bled before our very eyes. I have some pictures that will be posted as the eruption continues, but for now I think that I will plan an escape route in case this thing gets hectic.

Have a good day, and don't worry about me. I don't plan on drowning in water or lava anytime soon...

Long weekend, project developments

2006-07-03T12:50:00.000+08:00
Isn't it great how politicians can own companies that they can then make laws to protect? I think that there is no better way to do things; I mean, who knows better what a company needs to be successful and at the same time socially conscious than a democratically elected politician or spouse? Oh wait...

Since I am not really supposed to be too inflamatory towards the country that is letting me stay here on its own good will, I will leave a few links sitting here. If you read them and make your own conclusions, then I can't control that.

GreenPeace report on Lafeyette Mining

Lafayette hires former head of DENR
"Sonny — the Aussies believe — can make their troubles with the government regulatory agencies go away"

WTF!??!?!?

On the more positive side of things, I was almost struck by lightning on the way back from this weekend's not-quite-the-fourth of july party. Almost all of the volunteers from the Bikol region came to party in Donsol (the place known for the Butanding...whale sharks). On the way to prepare for the party, Julia, the volunteer who lives in Donsol, told me that the Filcab driver asked her about her party. Imagine heading back home to get ready for some big event and the cab-driver knows about it and has probably invited his buddies; only in the Philippines.

We rented a videoke machine, we drank lots of beer, we cooked and ate lots of chicken and fish, we danced, we sang, we made merry, we told ghost stories, we made smores, we bought fireworks and got too drunk to set them off (so we didn't). Lightning, oh yeah... On the way back from the party, we all rented a van and were going over a hill when a lightning bolt blew up a tree about 100 feet from the car. By 'blew up,' I mean tree, flash of light, no tree, loud noise, obcenities, soiled undergarments, laughter.

More to come later when I can get away from the internet long enough to actually have some more experiences...

That Guy

This post is blatant plagarism

2006-06-28T11:21:00.000+08:00
I was reading another volunteer's blog page (V is for Vanessa) and thought that she made quite a few good points about care packages. Seeing how I haven't put any sort of standards, it is hard for all of you guys to decide to send me something; no, even though there is none in the country, I don't need toilet paper.

Here is a direct quote of her website and her comments (I edited some things out that I wont use, such as women's underwear. If you really want to send it I have a good spot for a bonfire in my backyard...):

"
Books!!! – Second hand books are fantastic & we all trade, so they’ll get lots of mileage.
specific requests (book of basic yoga techniques, book of card tricks)
Pictures - Of yourself, of family, of friends. Basically anything that I might want to look at...no porn...
Music – CDs, mix CDs, MP3 CDs…
Movies – VCDs (new, used or copied) or burned CDs of avi files (particularly good for television shows), NOT DVD's, I don't have a player.
Candy – Individually wrapped, non-meltable candy, ie starburst, werther’s, jolly ranchers, Mike and Ikes....
USB Flash Drive – I am without such an item and am in desparate need.
Games, Toys & Timewasters – Good for entertaining kids and keeping volunteers from going crazy. (Frisbee, hackysack, juggling balls, sudoku puzzles, etc...)
Dried goods - Dried beans (kidney, red, black, chickpeas), lentils and popping corn, etc.
ensure that everything arrives as smoothly as possible:
Use secure packing materials & more tape than you think necessary.
Print addresses VERY clearly.
Pack tightly, don’t leave a lot of room for items to shift about.
Try to distribute weight evenly.
Put a packing slip inside with an inventory of the package & my address…just in case it gets opened along the way, they know where to send it and I know what’s missing.
Apparently people are fairly superstitious and religious here, addressing mail to Father Page Weil or putting bible excerpts or phrases such as “God bless this package on its journey and all who handle it” help to ensure that it won’t get “lost” on the way.
Don’t put real value on the customs form- they paste it on the package and if someone sees a high (by local standards) value, it’s more likely to get pilfered. Best not to say more than 5 or 10 dollars.
Send mail directly to my site, the address is written below. Peace Corps won’t take my stuff, but it will take longer to arrive and I will have to pay to have it forwarded to me from Manila.
Airmail is fast, boat mail is slow. It will take approximately 2 weeks for airmail from the US. Boat mail takes 2-3 months
"

Mailing address for packages:

*EDIT - I realized, after posting this, that it is a really bad idea to post my real mailing address anywhere public. If you want the address to mail things to me, just post a comment or email me.

Alrighty, enough of that for now.

More pictures

2006-06-28T10:23:00.000+08:00
LAAAADIES AND GENTLEMENNNNN!!!!! In the red corner, weighing in at 187 lbs and wearing the pink boxers with green polka dots is the reigning champion, Billy Blanks! And in the blue corner, we have the new guy! He's big! He's bad! He is Page's most recent updated webshots album! Now with less MSG than ever before! Don't waste your money on Billy, folks. I think we all know how this fight is going to end and, from the looks of things, so does Billy.

Week three of Page's Crazy Funhouse!

2006-06-20T18:08:00.000+08:00
What is there to say at the beginning of week three...?

I am booked. In much the same way as I was booked in the Summer of Lost Dreams, every weekday I have work to fill my time and every weekend I have fun, crazy things planned! Here is the breakdown so far of my weekends here:

June 3-4: Went snorkeling in clear, beautiful water. Ordered my prescription snorkeling goggles. Got sunburnt.

June 10-11: Went on a site visit to Barangay Misibis in the Municipality of Tiwi. It was a crazy bushwhacking adventure hike through the wild jungle, complete with leeches, almost falling off of cliffs and fresh coconut milk from frshly cut coconuts (no diarrhea...yet).

June 17-18: Visited some volunteer buddies on the nearby island of Catanduanes. They have what we refer to as the "Peace Corps Mansion"; they have Air Conditioning, Cable, Internet, a beautiful kitchen and they live literally 100 yards from the beer distribution center for the island. Needless to say, our cross-cultural experiences this last weekend were limited to lying around drunk in their room watching most of the second season of Lost from Anthony's computer. There is not much to do on Catanduanes but believe me, we did less.

June 24-25: Going back to the snorkeling site with more people, more food, more booze and more sunscreen.

July 1-2: There is a big party at the house of a volunteer who has been here for a year already. She has a cute little nipa hut on the beach where we are going to eat and drink a ton and probably shoot off some fireworks. The first thing she said when we mentioned the idea of fireworks was that we should ask the local police chief...if he wants to join us...

July 8-9: 2 days of SCUBA training!

July 15-16: 2 MORE days of SCUBA training!

July 22-23: 1 more DAY OF scuba TRAINING! Then one day of coral reef investigation...aww shucks, that almost sounds like work...

July 29-30: Climb a nearby volcano (Mt. Isarog) with the local outdoor shop. It is a heavily forested volcano that has people living on its slopes, totally cut off from the outside world. I have met some villages like that already and they seem to get along fine, their kids just wear less clothing.

In general, projects are coming along. Aquinas University Foundation has me sizing pipes and designing bridges for the water project in Tiwi that I visited. I think they are going to have me manage the construction of that once the design is finished...this project really is a trial-by-fire for my engineering skills. "We need this, do it." "But, but, but, okay i'll do it (translation: I really don't know how, but I think I can find it out if you have the internet here...)"

As far as cultural experiences go, I think I stuck my foot really deep in my mouth for the first time since I have been here. My boss, Felix, took me out with his Barkada (buddies, aka. drinking circle) and we got to talking. The first subject any Filipino will seriously broach with you is the subject of marriage. I am not married. I am currently a single male (soltero in Bikol). Of course, that is an unacceptable status for someone my age, so they ask me if I thought any girls who work at Aquinas University Foundation are cute... I made the mistake of giving them a name. Now, due to the third party system of telling everyone else ALL OF YOUR BUSINESS, I think both she and I are going to be getting pushes from those around us to marry (because you don't date here, you marry).

Whatever. I am not marrying anyone anytime soon.

Ta ta for now, I have to leave this office of wonderfully free internet before they lock my ass in here and I am unable to makaon nin sakuyang pamanggi (eat my dinner).

Peace and Peace Corps

5742 people have no idea what this sentence references

The end of my first week at site!

2006-06-10T17:31:00.001+08:00
I know that many people read this post regularly and want to hear what I have to say, but I am only one person and can only get to the internet so often (this week it was 5 times...giggle).

Now that I have been sworn-in officially as a volunteer, I have moved in with a new host family. Peace Corps requires that I live with them for the first 3 months of service, although "living with" is a bit of a relative term in this case. The family I am living with is a college professor, her mid 60's father and the house help. The time I spend with them has sofar been limited to meals because she works a ton and so do I; there is little family time, unlike the Francias (my host family from training).

Many people have been quoted as saying that the kids are the best part of Peace Corps. Wherever you are in the world, children are happy and unaware. My project is not particularly grassroots development and such, I will not get to work with that many kids. I really feel as though I am working at a US office, but living here in the Philippines. It is nice, but I think it will be more of a challenge to make friends when my times is mostly spent at a job not near my community.

My job. It is awesome. I feel like some kind of superhero out of a movie. A character Tom Cruise might play (or that Julia Roberts did play). During the first week, I was thrown into the mix of things and told what my project is and given very important work.

[Names have been changed to prevent detection of my exact location by potentially interested parties]

There is a mine owned by Bill's Mining Company. Bill's Mining Company has a contract with the local government to operate their mine while maintaining locally required environmental standards. Recently, a whole lot of fish died on the island of Punga-Punga where the mine is located. Local reactions say it is due to the mercury and cyanide being leeched into the groundwater through improper environmental controls.

A commission at my university is organized and recommends, through its findings, that the mine have its environmental license revoked and it be shut down. Bill's Mining Company says "Billshit! We don't even use mercury for our mining (even though it is the preferred reactant for the extraction of precious metals in the mining industry)! We have been an upstanding young mine who is just looking to make a dollar in this harsh world of ours!" The commission's recommendation is passed to our beloved president Georgiana Madeline Areyousleeping who, by the way, has not had a hint of corruption on her record except that pesky tape that accused her of vote buying surfaced this year. GMA says "Nope. I think it is in the best interests of the Philippines [Read Philippine Businesses not people] that the mine stay open. Sorry local fisherman, you guys are SOL!"

Meanwhile, no one will buy any of the fish from Punga-Punga because all the local sellers and consumers are afraid of that big scary "M" word contaminating the breakfasts, lunches and dinners of their children. And we know that when push comes to shove, it is all about the children anyway. So, the fisherman are out of business and another study done by my university has shown that the water sources on the end of the island near the mine have tested positive for Mercury and Cyanide (don't forget, Bill's Mining Company denied any sort of mercury use on the island)

Enter Page. The superhero. Or at least the newbie environmental engineer who has a degree, a pocket full of dreams and a set of sandals that smell oddly like corn chips that have been in someone's armpit for a couple of months.
Page says "I can't go faster than a speeding bullet, but I can help you test, scientifically, all the wells on the island. We can show that the bastards at the bastard mining company are lying through their bastard teeth about local contamination. We can make a study that could potentially be used in court (depending on how we design it)."
Page's university says "Yay! Now can you get my kitten out of that tree?"
Page says "No. The nature of sustainable development is that you are helping people help themselves (Translation: I am afraid of heights, get your own damn kitty)."

The long and the short of things are that I need to help them design and implement a study that could potentially be used in court against the mine, or at the very least be good information for the citizenry of Punga-Punga and the surrounding province.

This is the first project. I have been here a week. God this job is gonna be awesome.

Lots and lots of SWEARING........-in, that is.

2006-06-03T14:59:00.000+08:00
If you can read this or if someone is reading this to you or if you have some special telepsychic link with the internet so you just absorb information, then you will know that I am now a 100% official US Peace Corps volunteer. The official swearing-in ceremony was earlier this week and the last training session has been given.

Our final set of training sessions were held in Los Banos, Laguna Province at a hot springs resort called Lake View. Go figure that a popular destination in a REALLY HOT COUNTRY would be a REALLY HOT SPRING!! The pool felt like someone had made one giant warm spot through their pants and filled the pool with it. All of the volunteers from Bikol, Northern Luzon, Southern Luzon, Mindoro and Palawan were at this training event; I got to see a lot of people who I might never have seen otherwise and some I may never see again.

The night after swearing was a crazy party of videoke and alcohol at a GRO bar with 30 of the volunteers from the day's events. Although the term GRO refers to "Guest Relations Officer," aka whore, I have no reason to think that any volunteers have partaken in such activities.

Last week, during the last sessions at Penafrancia resort near Naga city (my training site) we decided to take a day to go to the brand new wakeboarding complex that was built by the governor in this last year. You know there is a serious corruption problem when the Governor builds a wakeboarding ring for 100 million pesos and many people still die from the lack of decent health care/clean water every day. Now that I have stated my opinions on its immorality, I should tell you that the wakeboarding was freakin' sweet. That was quite a good time.

http://www.camsurwatersportscomplex.com/cwc/pages/index.htm

I spoke with my supervisor in the last week about the actual work I will be doing and the rate at which it needs to get done. Basically, he is giving me a month of settling-in time, after which I will be thrown into the mix and have a large report to finish by mid-september. Basically, in the next 3 months I have to choose, rationally, the dividing lines for all of the water districts in the province; they have yet to be looked at. I will relate more information as far as my project goes when it comes time to begin work.

For now, I am sitting in the Peace Corps office in Manila, nursing a hangover from last night's sendoff for the RVC (current volunteer who helped us coordinate our training and is now a good friend) Corey. Manila is large, dirty, full of prostitutes, cheap by US standards and generally chaotic. In general, I am excited to be leaving tomorrow, but not before I buy some things like snorkeling gear. I will be getting SCUBA certified in the near future, so that is kinda awesome.

For now, keep the comments coming, they keep me sane. I miss each and every one of you guys and can't wait to share more experiences with you.

CYA LATA

2006-05-20T18:17:00.000+08:00
http://community.webshots.com/user/gigamosh57

Know it. Love it. Go to it and look at the lovely pictures that Page decides that your eyes are worthy enough to see.

Site Announcements!!!

2006-04-17T18:10:00.000+08:00
Wow. There are too many good things and ideas to list. Things are beginning to happen.

We found out our sites today and I will be in Legaspi, Albay, Philippines. I don't know where within the city I will be, nor do I think I will be able to post that information on here once I do know (security and all that).

I will be working with a university in the area on the planning and design team for a water resource development and management strategy for the ENTIRE PROVINCE OF ALBAY! Imagine I was an engineer designing the water system to be put into Delaware; have some scale. The budget for the design portion of the project (what I will be doing) is 1.5 million Pesos (about 30,000 USD) which may not seem like a lot, but 30 grand goes a long way when the cost of living is so much lower.

My official Peace Corps assignment is great. I could not be happier unless they gave me a giant pile of dead bunnies to play with as well. What is funny is that at the same time they told me all the good stuff, I recalled a conference I heard about at CU. There is a type of ceramic filtration system that can be made by local potters from local materials for local purchase/consumption that WORKS!!!! Although it is not my original idea, it is the kind of thing that, with time and effort, could be turned into a holy grail for the third world.

Research has been done on its production and chemistry:

http://www.ideassonline.org/bros_testi_eng.asp?rec=122
http://www.potpaz.org/
http://www.edc-cu.org/filtron.htm

If my primary project does not pan out as planned, I am thinking of holding a seminar within Peace Corps (after learning the nuances of this particular idea) to teach other volunteers how to make/train others to make this filter.

This project has so many facets and so much potential that it simply CANNOT be ignored. Hard work will push it through.

I have to go eat delicious Filipino food now, Ta-ta.

ps - If you are reading this, you are likely my friend or relative. That having been said, JOIN THE PEACE CORPS!!! This is the most incredible thing I have ever done and I think all of my friends/family could potentially provide immense support to the third world. At least consider it...THEN DO IT!!!

Greetings from Naga City, Bikol, Philippines

2006-04-01T18:16:00.000+08:00
Peace Corps has taken the next step and moved batch 265 (that includes yours truly) from the cushy Manilla resort to a less cushy resort in Naga City, Bikol (Luzon Island). The food is delicious, although 5 meals per day can add up to a serious belly. The day goes something like this:

Wake up at 5:30
Shower
Breakfast at 6:30
Morning classes at 8:00
Second breakfast (Merienda) at 10:00
Mid-Morning class at 10:30
Lunch at 12:00
Afternoon Class at 1:00
Second Lunch (Afternoon Merienda) at 3:00
Late Class at 3:30
Dinner at 6:00
Free time after that

When we were still in Manilla, I realized that the sandals I have (Keens) are absolutely perfect for hacky-sack and found that I have developed some body awareness from all of that rock-climbing. Unfortunately for me, the guy who owned the sack I was using went to a different hub site. In order to remedy the situation, I used the free day we had when first arriving in Naga City to stitch one from fabric I removed from pants and sheets. +1 of hacky-sack making for Page!!!

But Page, what is this magical hub site you are talking about? Well, strange third person voice, I will explain the structure of my training program. Thanks Page!!

Arrival in Detroit - 76 volunteers
Arrival in Manilla - Still 76 volunteers
Training classes for a week - 76 divided by one training site still equals 76
Last friday, wake up at 3:45 to get on a plane to respective hub sites. These hub sites are divided according to geographic region, since there are 100 or so recognized languages in the Philippines. I will be learning Bikol-Naga (Bikol is the region and Naga is the local city dialect).

Arrival at hub site in Naga City - 13 volunteers; others are in Northern Luzon, Palawan Island, The Western Visayas and the Eastern Visayas.

Next week, split into cluster sites - 4 PCTs (Peace Corps Trainee), 4 different host families and 1 LCF (Language Cultural Facilitator; goddam acronyms)

9 weeks from now, finish training and go to my ACTUAL site. Unfortunately, the Peace Corps will not allow me to divulge the exact location of my site for security reasons, but I will be able to tell you in what province it resides...when I know.

Although I wont post my number on this website, I have sent it to everyone in my addressbook. If, for some reason, you did not recieve that email, yell at me for being a worthless pile of pig turds and I will send it to you. The best time to reach me is before 8:00 AM or after 5:00 PM here (that translates to 7:00 PM and 4:00 AM respectively for Washington DC, and 5:00 PM and 2:00 AM for Denver).

Side note - first vacation of PC (although it seems like a vacation the whole time)

WHALE SHARKS!!! http://www.camperspoint.com/article.php3?id_article=30

I get to swim with the world's largest fish tomorrow morning. This animal was my favorite as a kid, so I can't wait. I hear they can grow to be the size of a School bus; that's right, a fish the size of a bus and Page swimming along side with a big ass grin on his face.

Well, off for now, keep the emails and comments coming. You readers are my support base, and don't worry, I will send real letters soon.

Some notes from Pre-Service Training

2006-03-23T12:30:00.000+08:00
Yesterday and today have been very long, tiring and full of useful information. I learned yesterday that I am one of maybe 6 or 7 Water/Sanitation workers. This is out of 76 total volunteers in my training group.

There are groups of primary and secondary school teachers, lots of computer technician people, health volunteers and business volunteers. Currently there are between 7000 and 8000 volunteers serving worldwide.

PC has an annual budget of $317 million dollars, compare that to the estimated $800 mil - $2.2 bil for a B-2 bomber and do the math of value of your dollar.

Peace Corps was started almost exactly 45 years ago on March 1st, 1961. Ghana was the first country to recieve volunteers with the Philippines being the second. Since its beginnings, PC has seen nearly 180,000 volunteers.

Madness.

Packing for a multi-day jaunt to the other side of the world

2006-03-20T14:06:00.000+08:00
Today I went crazy-nutso on the packing. Clothing, electronics, duct-tape, socks, multiple pairs of sandals, all into 4 bags and weighing in at under 80 lbs. I used the Peace Corps packing list with little variation.

A big challenge was finding what is known in the local language as pasalubong; gifts for my host family(s). I brought a bunch of Moe's Bagels stickers and a giant bag of Sharpie markers. I hear that small gifts are good and that lots of little things are better than one big thing; this way everyone can participate.

My state of mind is one of chaos right now. It wasn't until 30 hours before my plane flight leaves for Detroit for staging that I really got on the ball and started thinking about all the other business that I have to take care of before I leave. Fortunately, I planned well and have only small things to cover so that I can go the Philippines completely free of financial responsibility.

Looking around my room where I am sitting, I can see all sorts of mementos from my grade school days. There are so many familiar items with long, intricate stories behind them. I am mere hours from leaving all this that I take for granted as familiar and am going to generate two years of thoughts and stories. Every item in my four pieces of luggage will have something new and unexpected associated with it by the end of my adventure.

It is really scary when I put my mind to work on the magnitude of what I have gotten myself into:

A trip.
To the other side of the world.
To a country the culture and language of which I have only a cursory understanding.
To live.
For 2 years.
To have limited contact with anything I could potentially call familiar, be it persons, places, things or customs.

Will my body only notice climatic changes or is moving halfway around this small blue sphere in the vast empitness of our universe enough to alter the energies that keep me alive and interested? I have always known myself to be exceptionally sensitive to chemical and physical changes in the world around me. Living in the tropics is going to be a trip.

Who knows? Oh well, the countdown begins...

The cosmic game

2006-03-10T01:46:00.000+08:00
A few rather magical and cosmic things have happened to me regarding this upcoming experience (for those of you counting at home, I leave on March 21st, 12 days) .

The Onion newspaper has always served, along with Zippy the Pinhead, as a sort of cosmic predictor of things to come. This article came out in the Boulder onion right before I left. While the content of the article is not what I am expecting out of my journey, the simple mention of the Peace Corps is enough to give me some indication that something/someone is aware of me.

The second, more significant happening came in a random email not addressed to me. As I have been corresponding with PC and all the future volunteers currently stateside, a lot of emails have been thrown around that are not properly addressed (they go out to everyone). One of these was headed by my childhood friend Allen Rathbone. I emailed this mystery individual to confirm that yes, he and I were both going to Peace Corps simultaneously and that yes, he was going to the Philippines as well. Of all the random happenings associated with this journey, this one is a bit much.

For now, back to cleaning up the giant pile of stuff that I brought back from Colorado so that my parents wont throw it away.

Thinking....again...

2006-02-07T03:23:00.000+08:00
Watching the Superbowl last night and talking to Pierre gave me some insight into how I will actually be spending my time. I commented on the water resource side of my assignment and he basically said not to worry, that I will be backpacking around the Philippines for 2 years. After mulling over the assigment for a bit, I realized he is probably right; all of the volunteers I talk to mention no more than one major project in that vast expanse of time (where does the rest of it go?). Basically, I feel like PC is going to be a life exchange program where I volunteer my time and effort in order to gain the perspective of the third world.

Current timeline:

Feb 12th - Quit Moe's Bagel
Feb 25th - Going away party
March 3rd or 4th - Leave Boulder with Ian
March 21st - Leave DC for PC staging in Detroit
March 23rd - Leave Detroit for (Bum-Bum-BUM) MANILLA

When I was a kid, I remember reading in a science book that if you drilled a hole straight down from the continental US, you would end up not in China but in the Indian Ocean. The Philippines are nearly adjacent to the Indian Ocean. To quote Jim Carey in The Truman Show, "you can't get any farther away before you start coming back."

Testes, Testes, One, Two....Three?

2006-01-30T03:38:00.000+08:00
This is the first post of what will soon become my Peace Corps Blog. My name is Page Weil and I have been fully invited/accepted to attend Peace Corps Philippines Introductory Training in March '06. If all goes well in learning the required language (Tagalog?) I should be doing water sanitation work on the other side of the globe for the next coupla years.

For now, I am scared poopless. Uncertainty creates a headspace of trying to overplan the situations I may or not be getting myself into. I have been doing a log of reading and preparing, but recently I got some really good advice from a guy on the PC Philippines Google Group:

"...log off the internet,
and go outside and play. Hang out with your friends
and family, and consume dairy products while you still
can. Play in the snow, drink in the winter air and
just be there- wherever you are, fully present. You
will all be absolutely fine when you arrive, with
whatever you have. All questions will be answered, all
secrets revealed, and most anything you need can be
purchased here. And it's kinda fun to just poof! one
day find yourself on an airplane for the Philippines
and know that until that moment you were fully present
to those around you. They and you will appreciate it."

Yeah, yeah, TL;DR, I know. Basically it says that I should have as much fun as I can now and worry about PC when I get there. Although everyone I know has been telling me that I will be totally fine, I am Page the worrier and will try to plan everything until the day I die (or come to some sort of life-changing epiphany).