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.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Saturday, December 09, 2006
Ouch!
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.
-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.
Monday, November 20, 2006
Things that happen where you are not
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.
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.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
Skype is cooooooool....
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.
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.
Thursday, October 26, 2006
New pictures!!!
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
New apartment, new inspirations
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
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
Thursday, October 05, 2006
Greetings after 6 MONTHS IN THE PEACE CORPS
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
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
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)