Head First Into Philippine Culture

In order to experience the true culture of another country, I believe it is important to go there yourself. Also it is equally important to go places outside the typical tourist spots. The reason for this is that no matter how hard a country tries to keep its cultural integrity intact, visitors from foreign lands bring much-needed money into the economy. This creates a trade-off as the areas tend to become homogeneous with the foreigners that visit there.

When I first planned to go to the Philippines my goal was to do one small deed to help out the local people of Tacloban. They had recently been devastated by typhoon Yolanda. Knowing a missionary that worked in the area I contacted him and arranged to come and build a tiny house for a 72-year-old woman that had lost everything including her husband in the storm. I knew no one else in the Philippines and I was trusting in the knowledge of my friend to help me get by, however as it has been said “the best-laid plans of mice and men often go astray.”

My friend was called home suddenly about halfway through the planning stages of my trip and my contact with him became extremely limited. This left me with nothing but the name of my contact from a local church in Tacloban. I had already purchased the tickets and I was determined to go. In retrospect it was probably the best thing to happen to me because now, I knew, I would not be subjected to days of being treated as a tourist. I was about to be immersed head first into a world I would have never known existed.

My flight to Manila was uneventful. Not so much can be said of the travels from that point on. I had booked a flight from Manila to Tacloban on a local airline. It was to my dismay when I arrived to find that only small turboprop planes were now being allowed on the landing strip at Tacloban. The airport there had suffered severe damages from the storm.

Having to reroute to Cebu and catch a smaller plane to my final destination proved a challenge since I could not speak Tagalog and the service desk struggled with English. Finally, I managed top get my bags taken care of and a flight plan worked out. When I arrived at the airstrip in Tacloban I could see why only small craft were being allowed to land. The terminal was in ruin. Windows were covered with plastics and boards. Baggage claim was a truck tossing bags through a hole in the wall onto the conveyor that had long since ceased to turn.

Undaunted I grabbed my bags and headed out front in hopes I could find my contact person. I was greeted by dozens of cab drivers and local tricycle operators wanting to give me a lift but the Pastor that was going to take me to his home in the local barangay was ready at the gate. He spotted me quite easily since I was the only American in the crowd. We went back to his church compound and he gave me a room in the house to sleep and showing me the shower area. I unpacked and showered to find one of the local boys from the Church waiting outside my door. He was eager to take me to the dining area for the evening meal. Seeing the foods on the table I knew that great expense had been made in the preparation for my arrival. I had not eaten since the flight to Manila so I am sure they were very happy with my appetite and the fact I tried everything set out for me. I excused myself after dinner and went to my room for some sleep since I had not slept laying down in over 3 days. The bed was a sheet of thin foam laying across a few boards held up on cinder blocks. I slept through the night like it was the nicest bed ever. The next morning I was wakened by the same young man that led me to dinner the night before. We had a nice meal of rice, eggs and cereal and I was told to gather my bags because I would be staying with a family near the build site. Along the way the evidence of the disaster was everywhere. Entire neighborhoods seemed to be built of UN and Samaritan’s Purse tarps.

We pulled in beside a small bamboo house. It stood on large bamboo poles and had bamboo screening for the walls and a thatched roof. It looked like a vacation brochure from the outside with a little garden of okra and sweet potato growing in front. The house had no electrical service, no running water, no internet and the family spoke zero English. I was introduced to the family I would be staying with and my driver told me that Eldin, my host, had the information for our contact with the carpenter who would be working with. I was told I would meet the woman we would be building the house for the next day. My driver then bid me farewell and drove away, leaving me standing with a backpack and the smiling faces of this family who welcomed me in with no reservations whatsoever. I was shown the area where a toilet had been put up and I could bathe. I was then given the only bedroom in the house. For the next ten days Eldin, along with his wife and daughter slept in the kitchen floor. I protested this but they felt it an honor to be able to let me sleep in their room. On the floor was a thin piece of foam scavenged and washed from the flotsam of the storm wreckage.

Part of my mission there had required that I had raise donations from several of my friends. This was used for the construction costs and to share with the locals in need. I had converted this to the local currency while I was in Manila and I took what was around $50 USD and gave it to Eldin. I spent the next little while trying to explain it was from American’s who wanted to help out the families in need there. He took the gift and showed his wife and they both thanked me profusely. The wife then took some of the money and headed to the market to buy food for the next few days. Eldin did his best to instruct me on how to “shower” there using the water stored in containers and showed me their small garden. I gave his daughter a small stuffed bear I had brought and she immediately found it a place of honor in the corner niche with the few other items the family owned after the typhoon. Eldin’s wife returned and fed me a wonderful meal of fried chicken and rice and I enjoyed the rest of the afternoon watching the local children playing in the street. They were seemingly unaware of the devastation on every side. As the evening began to creep in, Eldin’s nephew came to visit. Fortunate for me he spoke a little English and he told me the story of the day the storm hit. Like Eldin, his own home had sat near the beaches and was now totally gone. He said the storm hit like a ten-foot wall of water. It came in and smashed everything in its path and as it retreated it took all it had claimed back with it, lives included. Feeling compassion for people who could smile in the face of all they had been through, I went to bed excited to be able to give something from my gifted American life back. I could hear the soft prayers spoken from the kitchen beside me of Eldin as I drifted off to sleep.

Rising with the sun I got dressed and went out to find that Eldin’s wife had been up hours already making our breakfast. Cooking is all done outdoors on charcoal under a crude makeshift shelter covered by a UN tarp. With our stomachs full and ready to go Eldin and I walked up to the street to find a local tricycle driver to take us to the worksite. Our carpenter would be meeting us there and deliveries of cement, sand and blocks had already been arranged. It was my first time riding a tricycle. I have to say I am amazed how many people you can stuff into one. I found myself riding side saddle on the back of the motorcycle itself and having a difficult time because my legs were much longer than the average Filipino. Because of this I was constantly dragging my feet as we rode along. The ride took us through some of the areas still untouched by relief efforts except for the removal of hundreds of bodies claimed by the storm. Many of those had been buried in mass graves because there were not enough people to claim the deceased. It was like riding through a city built of tarps and any other scrap that could be cobbled together into a wall or roof.

Arriving at the job site I was amazed that directly beside where we would be building was an untouched large colonial style home with a single old man living inside. I would later find out that this was the home of the brother in law to the woman I would be building for. Even though he was willing to allow us to build her a house on his lot beside his house, he would not allow her to stay with him because he blamed her for surviving while his brother was one of the thousands lost to the violence of the storm. Meanwhile, the woman we were doing the work for was living in a makeshift hut in the back with mud floors and a straw bed on the ground. I watched as local children played out back where rats were fighting over scraps thrown out. As I stood there a jeepney pulled up and our carpenter hopped out. He was a young man full of smiles who laughed all the time. Unfortunate for me he did not speak English because he seemed to be such a joyful soul. He did understand most of what I said and he was very skilled so things went fairly smoothly. We got to work digging footers and mixing concrete. By the end of the first day, we had the footers dug and poured for this tiny home to be. This would be our schedule for the next six days. We stopped only briefly around midday for some water, a banana and whatever small snack Eldin’s wife had packed for us. We would then take a tricycle home for a shower in cold clean water. This was hand pumped into containers we would carry up the stairs to the bath area. Eldin’s wife always had us a wonderful and filling meal on the table by the time we were cleaned. As we sat after our meal the sun would set and the house would darken. I don’t think I ever slept half as good, in any five-star hotel, as I did those nights. Every night the soft sing-song voice of Eldin reading his bible in his native dialect, beside a small solar light lulled me to sleep.

By the end of my stay in Tacloban, we had completed the small cinder block building that would become the new home of our little lady. We had all came to care about her very much. She was always thanking us and wondered at this strange American. Someone who had came from nowhere, to do something for someone he did not know, for reasons she could not understand. I just smiled and took the cool water she offered me as we worked and thought life really does not get better than this. The day I took my leave of her and the other locals there, who had came out to meet this odd American, I felt sad to have to go. I had been accepted into the lives and homes of these local people. I had tasted a culture unsullied by the taint of tourism. What I had found was a people who could see the good side of any situation and wear a smile in the face of utter devastation. In truth I felt far more indebted to these people than I could ever explain.