In the Pursuit of God

I have had these pictures uploaded for some time now. As you all know Easter was some time ago. However I have been neglecting writing a blog on my Holy Week experience in the Philippines. This is for a number of reasons; the most glaring is it may lead me to discussing the religion here. This is one of the few things, I grudgingly admit, I don’t enjoy in the Philippines. It is also the topic of which I would like to choose my words very carefully so as to not overtly offend any person. So up to this point in time I still don’t know what I want to write regarding it all. You may notice a lack of anything poignant in this blog for that very reason. However I realized I had to post these pictures sooner or later or they would be left in the proverbial dust.

This blog will focus on Good Friday, however Holy Week as a whole was full of parades, and activities, and of course lots of Masses. I participated in very little of Holy Week, I kept my distance as a consciences observer.

On Good Friday I went to the Island of Gimaras to witness the celebrations in the Municipality of Jordan. I must admit at first I was grotesquely excited for this experience. People had been telling me for the past year that on Good Friday in Gimaras they actually crucify people. Not to the death of course, but the act itself is recreated. I had a hard time believing they still actually nailed people to the cross, so I took it upon myself to witness this to be sure.

There was a play of the days before the crucifixion of Christ. Through out the play, which was in Illonggo, I kept wondering are they really going to nail a living person to the cross. The overall local consensus was yes, but I was still quite skeptical. Then came the part in the play were Christ was flailed with a whip, there was very little acting. I repeat. Flailed. I than asked did this person volunteer to act as the Christian savior Jesus Christ. Sure enough, he volunteered.

It came to the end. This was what I was waiting for through the two hours of the play. Now that the time had come, I wasn’t sure I wanted to watch. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be there. I wasn’t at all aware of how a person could volunteer to have nails driven through his extremities.

For the actual crucifixion the play changed venues from the plaza pavilion to the top of a hill a short walk away, all the while Christ carrying his cross. This was a time of mad rushing of people to get “good” seats. I decided I would hang back; I have a camera with good optical zoom. I’m glad I did stay back. I’m upset I didn’t get closer. I still don’t know which it is.

After it was finished I talked to a number of locals about it. They saw I was clearly a little perplexed by this whole celebration. I than voiced my concern for the volunteer. I mentioned his physical wounds to the people. They all told me not to worry, that the wounds of the person who volunteered would heal very quickly. They assured me that all the wounds of volunteers in the past healed in a matter of days. I didn’t voice my very real skepticism, but I did ask why did they heal so quickly? They told me, “Because he did it for God.”

What did he do?

Where do these belong?

Ah. It has been some time, almost a month. A lot has happened in the past month and more will be happening in the next month. It is the month of May where fiestas are a plenty, school is just around the corner (it starts in June here), and I have a plethora of visitors to come. Excitement is building.

I have mentioned to some of you how my work here has wave like characteristics; there is an ebb and flow to things. The past weeks, and this current week, are on the flow side. For all the times I may have mentioned work was slow in the first quarter of this year, I am now seeking my retribution. The women’s cooperative I am working with continues to surprise me, and they are gaining confidence in themselves and their ideas every day. As stated, school is just around the corner, and my counterpart and I have come up with some interesting new ideas to continue student environmental advocacy in schools and with out of school youth. I’m excited to distribute the books, which I was lucky enough to find funding to duplicate, to all the schools regarding environmental education. The composting project is steadily growing. I have learned some new methods through a German NGO on producing Vermi-Tea, which is an organic spray fertilizer that can be produced at a tenth of the cost of the price of chemical spray fertilizers, and I’m trying to develop ways to increase the private business sector in Miag-ao to participate in a number of environmental programs.

My life isn’t as crazy as that may make it sound, but I am trying to get a little ahead due to the influx of visitors I have coming this month. My friends Mikey and Gwyneth will be arriving in the Philippines this coming Friday from England. Through interesting twists of fate four years after meeting Gwyneth I ended up living in the Philippines twenty minutes from where she was born. Her parents, Filipinos, recently returned to their home town here to retire. A week after they arrive my Parents and Sister arrive, followed a week later by my friend Jennifer from Switzerland. I’ll note again, I’m excited. It’s going to be a good month.

So that brings me to these pictures. I have had some of these for a while now, but I never had a blog to put them in. So this is a Sari Sari (mixter) of pictures. The first three are of kids I met just yesterday at my house, they were to cute not to put up. I know I say it a lot, but I'm such a sucker for the kids here, they are so damn cute.

(Above) This is looking across the street from my house out over the plaza. The sky really was gorgeous this evening. To bad I was to lazy to walk the 30 seconds to my beach and get shots there of this sunset. Susunod na lang.

(Below) These were hanging up all over Iloilo city in the past six months. This is just one view of the interesting, and never boring politics, of the Philippines.




(Above) Ooops, Dropped something? No worries here, if you ever need an M16 you can just find one laying around anywhere. I’m only slightly joking.

(Below) These are Takas. That is the sound the make at night. TA KA. It is the only time I have seen two like this here, and you could get very close to them. They had a tug of war style battle for over two hours on the floor of my neighbor’s house.