If a picture’s worth a thousand words

Annie and I went up to Baclayan twice this week. I love it more and more each time I go up. The view is absolutely gorgeous. You can see the mountains as well as the ocean and the coves. Stairway just finished building one of the cubos (huts) up there, so Annie and I have been enjoying our merienda (snack) and sometimes lunch on the balcony.

On Wednesday when we went up, we presented Ate Susan, a basket weaver and the owner of the sari sari store up there, with the idea to do a photostory on the women and basket weaving process in Baclayan, in the hopes of eventually using it to market their products outside of Puerto Galera. She seems very open and excited to work with us. Hopefully we can get their products into the cultural and fare trade stores in Manila!

On Friday we met with her and a few other women from the community and completed a few assessments of the community, including an annual calendar and a community map. These will give us an idea of when exactly the women create and sell their baskets, as well as information about resources and the women's perception of their community.

We are pretty stoked about this new project and can’t wait to learn and document the process of weaving the baskets from start to finish, as well as learn better both the resources and needs of the community. We will start next week after Annie and I return from our trip to the mountains! Banaue, Batad and Sagada, here we come!

Little village baby, way up on the mountainside

So I’m back in the Philippines, and back at Stairway now, and can’t wait to get started back up on everything. This week Annie and I will be going up more often to Baclayan, a village about an hour long hike up the mountain where Stairway is building more facilities. After visiting a few cool stores in Manila, we began to think about how awesome it would be for the women in Baclayan to market their hand-woven baskets in Manila. As of now, the women simply wait for tourists to wander past their village in order to sell them baskets. This, however, is clearly not a reliable source of income for these women, so we are hoping to see what they think about creating a cooperative that could sell their products regularly.

The people who live in Baclayan are Mangyan people, part of an indigenous tribe here in the Philippines. They were forced to move from the lowlands up to the mountains and are continuously taken advantage of by the Tagalog people. A small example of an injustice that occurs is that the Tagalog people in Puerto Galera will buy the baskets from the Mangyan women at unfairly low prices in order to sell them to tourists for high prices. They make money exploiting the hard work of the indigenous women, who need the money much more severely.

We will be talking to one of the women, Ate Susan, first to see what she thinks about our idea.

Let the sun shine in. By the edge of the ocean, we can start over again

I’m leaving tomorrow to go back to the Philippines. It’s been a surreal two weeks at home, and of course, I am hesitant to leave my mom, the girls, and Michael. But I know that I need to be back in the Philippines right now. My dad was so proud of the work I was doing there, and I know he would want me to finish what I started.

I will be back in Manila in time to take the GRE on Thursday, which is a relief. I wanted to get the test in, so I’m glad I will get to do that. Luckily, Annie is also taking the GRE the day before, so I won’t be in Manila alone. I get in on Monday night and she will meet me at the hotel on Tuesday around lunch time. It will be good to see a friend right away, for sure.

Please pray for safe travels and peace for my family while I am gone.

Round my hometown memories are fresh, oh the people I've met are the wonders of my world.

Not exactly sure how to write about this…but for the sake of keeping up this summer’s blog, I will try.

Today was my dad’s funeral. Yesterday, the wake. I have never seen more people in a 24 hour period. Nor have I ever felt more loved and supported by all of the people in my life. There must have been over 1000 people who came to the wake…it was such a long day, exhausting, but I didn’t want it to end. Seeing all of those people coming to say goodbye to my dad, all of the people’s lives he touched, was incredible. I have never felt so many emotions at one time. I was sad, confused, in shock. But at the same time I was so proud to have had such an awesome dad. Erica put together a slideshow that played in the background with pictures from my dad’s life, and looking up at those pictures I was so happy to remember all of the amazing times we had together. He loved us so much, and we love him.

Despite of all the sadness, I can't help thinking that we are so blessed. We have the most amazing family and friends in the world. I couldn’t imagine having gone through the past few days without them. Thank you, everyone…you know who you are <3

We’ll see what the next week has in store. I know I will be returning to the Philippines but I’m not sure when.