Let's Talk about some Jollibee

Sunday afternoon I was invited to a Jollibee birthday party for a six-year old girl who lives with my previous host family. The host family treated me like family for my first six months in country (still do) so this girl is like a niece to me. She’s super cute and I wouldn’t have missed her birthday party for the world. Her mom is a nurse in LA and the little girl moved to the Philippines last May and is staying here for a while soaking up all the Philippine culture her six-year old heart can handle. Anyway back to Jollibee...

Well, what is Jollibee?

Wikipedia says it’s “an American-style fast-food restaurant with Filipino-influenced dishes specializing in burgers, spaghetti, chicken and some local Filipino dishes.” I can live with this as a definition for Jollibee. It was started in the Philippines in the late 70’s/early 80’s and since then has expanded to be an international corporation. There are even Jollibee’s in the states. So the mascot is an awesome bee which I have kindly provided a picture of and the other kids are the ‘gang.’ I just read this but apparently Jollibee had a tv show called Jollitown from 2008-2010. Oh wiki, how I love you.

Oh here is something else I didn’t know- Jollibee Food Corporation totally owns Chow King and Greenwich and some other fast food restaurants I didn’t recognize. Basically Jollibee rules the Philippines.

So birthday parties at Jollibee...

I’m almost embarrassed to say that this was my first one. I haven’t been to a McDonald’s party either. I should really make friends with more kids. Or not.

Here’s a mini story before my Jollibee party:

I went to Tacloban (the location of the waited 2:00pm birthday party) a little bit early to pick up some t-shirts and maybe have a bite to eat at ... well ... at McDonalds. I feel wrong saying that. Here I am blogging about Jollibee and I have to throw McDonalds into it. I wasn’t alone. I was with good friends who really wanted McDonalds. (Louise, you agreed that you wanted it too!) So- two points to this story:

1. One of my friends may have eaten her McDonalds meal, decided she wanted to do it all over again, and did. I obviously encouraged this. All I could think about was that one time Maggie bet me a pedicure that I couldn’t eat 4 Krystal burgers and a fries... Was it four? So yeah, she ate a second set of chicken nuggets and fries just because. I was impressed.

Okay part 2. This is actually a transition story. So we are sitting at McDonalds waiting for 2pm to arrive because this is the Philippines. You don’t arrive early. I text my host sister and ask her if she is at Jollibee yet at 1:57pm. By 2:03 she responds with ‘yep, wer r u?’ So we head off to Jollibee... When we get there, there are already a lot of people there! As in I literally felt late. So note to self, Jollibee birthday parties operate on American time.

The Party Chapter.

Well first of all the birthday parties are held in a back room that’s a little isolated from the rest of the restaurant. This is a six-year old party so there are kids everywhere. Every. Where. I am kindly sat at a table where the volunteers who joined me for this event all sat. We were distributed party hats. (That clearly makes it a birthday party.)

Krizia, the birthday celebrant was dressed up in a very elegant hot pink princess gown. The host of the party then insisted on the celebrant coming and sitting in a chair in the front of the party. I know Krizia and this is not her idea of fun. So then the host has someone say a prayer, someone wish Krizia some birthday wishes, and then begins party games.. Woo!!! So now we get lots of kids playing relay style party games and games that require parents to search for items like a scavenger hunt, ‘Find a dollar bill’- all the kids scramble towards their parents looking for said options. (And yeah- when the host said ‘Find a dollar bill’ everyone looked at our table... Umm no. We do not have dollars. But you know what, some people did.)
So then we get food. And they kept the food coming. First we got spaghetti. Yum, Filipino spaghetti... I can’t wait to make this delicacy for you when I get back home. Then we got fried chicken, rice, and some gravy to dip our chicken in. Then we got a coke float with chocolate syrup in it. Then they handed out optional burgers. Then finally they offered us rocky road ice cream Sundays. (best part.)

Lastly, there is a type of piñata style thing that they hold up and let kids grab snacks and toys and stuff off. When I say kids I mean vicious moms trying to grab stuff for their “children”.

Oh, that was not last. Last was the arrival of Jollibee himself. And he was something. He strutted himself in, dancing to pop music**, and jumped onto two tiny chairs and scooted around on them. It was slightly amazing to see this costume bee throw himself onto two tiny chairs and not bust his ass. So then you get to take pictures with the Jollibee. So actually, that’s when we decided we had been there long enough. I wonder if there was more to the party. I’m almost positive that it was ending.

** There is no volume control in the Philippines. Pop music was blaring pretty much through the entire party- enough so that you shout to the person sitting next to you. The host uses a microphone and is also really loud. My eardrums will be ruined by time I go home.

2 Honorable Mentions.

1. There was this one rambunctious little boy who seemed very curious about our table. So Mark stuck out his hand to give this boy a high five. The boy literally jumps in the air and high fives him with the entire weight of his body. It was very cute... the first four times. After that I wanted him to learn a new trick like go sit down and be quiet.

2. The second was actually really sweet. So Krizia’s mom lives in LA lS ike I mentioned earlier. They had her there at the party on Skype. Super sweet. I want to have my family come to my birthday party in the Philippines on Skype! And, I didn’t even know Jollibee had wifi!

So that’s a Jollibee party! Until we meet again...

Is this real??

Sometimes staring at a blank word document screen is motivating and at other times it really isn’t at all. I am sitting here in an empty computer lab on the second floor of the newest building my school has, with a mountain staring back (exaggeration- it’s just a big hill). My co-teacher is sitting with me working on clearing our students for graduation. We are actually taking a break right this minute. I’m not exactly sure what we are taking a break from... I think she told me that so I would stop bugging her about planning projects and talking nonstop about work (again- let me be clear, this does not happen daily, just occasionally and really just for the last 15 minutes or so). Therefore, I’m using this time to just write. It keeps me quiet, I look like I’m working, and I can actually process the day. Especially on a day like today when I find out some interesting news. At least I think its interesting news.

I’ve learned that it is best to not get too excited about ‘big news’ in the Philippines that’s why I’m calling it ‘interesting... EVERYTHING is subject to change and most things seem to be an exaggerated version of the reality (but really, what’s not?).

So, one of my co-teachers had a meeting with Globe, a cell phone and internet provider here in the Philippines, while I taught her class and one of my other classes. I happened to see her as I was leaving for lunch so I asked her and another teacher how the meeting went. They both give me the twist of the hand that means so-so (I’m not trying to fool anyone at home into thinking this is a Filipino thing- just the standard sign for ‘so-so’) but asked if I’d like to join them to look at the building that has been promised to me as a library. Of course I would! So I walk with them, examined the building like I’m some kind of expert building contractor (literally, I walked around looking at water damage and roof damage. My dad should be proud) and met some Globe people. The building is awesome except that there is some places in the roof that leak which cannot happen if I’m going to put books there. It needs to be painted but it’s overall a sweet space. I probably had the same expression that a first time homeowner has. I was really excited. So these Globe people are basically doing the same thing that I’m doing only they have their own agenda and cameras to take ‘before pictures’ (show offs).

This is where you should go ‘what? Their own agenda?’ That’s right. They were looking at my building and talking about a computer lab and a multimedia center. I am sitting in an empty computer lab right this minute. A REALLY nice computer lab. We have 30 working computers, all flat screen monitors, wifi, a lot of awesome software, and an integrated technology teacher who teaches 4th year kids Microsoft Office, Blogging, brief computer programming, etc. It’s a pretty impressive program. So say what? More computers?

So this is when I speak up. Excuse me Globe people, did nobody tell you that this was my library building and I’m not giving it up that easily even if you do want to do awesome things for the school and spend money that I don’t have! Yeah, I didn’t say that. Instead I asked if this could be a learning center/technology hub/ advanced library where we could have books plus a lot of awesome multimedia stuff like a film room, etc.

Their response: Sure.

Then they left. What the ??? What just happened? People don’t just waltz into schools and offer to buy them a bunch of stuff, so what is this? This is when I probably started to annoy my co-teacher with a lot of questions in which I must say she patiently answered.

So this is what I’ve got so far (this is all according to teachers at my school and again let’s just assume this is exaggerated as well as subject to change) and this is a ‘to be continued’ type of blog but yeah apparently we were chosen to be a ‘Global Filipino School’ which is some type of Globe/Microsoft technology global learning program. We are one of two in the Philippines. We work on projects, show them to Globe, and in return they provide us with resources to make our projects happen and apparently a multimedia center.

So I’m a little excited. This could be a lot of fun and could give my school access to amazing resources. This could be challenging because even if this project has nothing to do with me I couldn’t stand by and watch resources go to waste at my school. This could be exhausting because now teachers are kind of looking to me as to what do we do next as far as projects (at least something motivates them).

And then there’s part of me that feels like this could be a buzz kill for me. What about me? What am I supposed to do now? Suddenly putting together a remedial reading program, getting books, starting a theater department, and doing a few teacher trainings don’t seem that impressive. However, I’m not going to compare. That’s a dangerous mindset to get into...

So- back to positive, is this real?? Oh yeah one more thing- apparently the ‘launching’ of this Global Filipino School program, opening of the multimedia center is going to be a really big deal and there is talk of very high government officials being invited to this event.

Okay enough rambling until tomorrow...

Tsunami Warning

I rolled around groggily in bed trying to sleep through the afternoon heat, my back drenched in sweat even with the fan blowing directly on me at full blast. I had left school an hour earlier than normal to try and catch some rest and kill the headache that was accompanying my sore throat.

I lost hope in actually sleeping and laid still on my back with my eyes closed, listening to the sounds of voices downstairs and the sound of my cell phone beeping somewhere from inside of my sheets tangled under my feet.

Text messaging is a regular part of my life here as it is was at home. This is our means of communication with other volunteers, co-workers, hotels, Peace Corps staff, etc. My phone beeped again. I attempted to find my burgundy Nokia phone with my feet by feeling for vibrations somewhere at the edge of my bed. Success. I dragged the phone up my bed with my foot until I could grab it with my hand, not once opening my eyes. Yes, I am this lazy. I open my eyes just a sliver in order to read the texts that had come through, ‘Just FYI Leyte is under a tsunami warning,’ and ‘I don’t think I’ll make it to Palo tonight, we have a teacher send off that I just found out about.'

I gave sluggish one or two word responses to each text and then let my eyes close again. At this point I actually begin to process my text messages.

A tsunami warning. Is this like a tornado warning at home? What does that even mean?

My phone beeped again. This time from ‘PEACE CORPS’ informing all peace corps volunteers that there had been an earthquake in Japan and all Pacific coast volunteers in low lying coastal areas should seek higher ground due to a tsunami threat expected in the next half hour to two hours.

Interesting. I have no idea what that means.

My phone beeped again. This time it’s my closest PCV neighbour who lives just a few blocks away, ‘are you home?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m on my way over.’

I guess I should get up now.

I rolled out of bed and shuffled around my room until I found my laptop. I sleepily clanked down the steep metal stairs just in time to greet Holly, the volunteer I was expecting. She followed me to the dining room which I utilize as my interneting room.

Google. Tsunami Warning for Leyte. I scanned.. ah, bingo. 1-3 meter waves could be expected.

Holly and I exchanged glances that said ‘we have absolutely nothing to worry about.’ So we decided to stroll through Palo. Kids were playing in the streets, men were enjoying their barkadas every few blocks or so, and women were wandering around getting their chika from their neighbors.

Our community was obviously not concerned. As we walked through Palo, we talked to our Warden and our Regional Manager and expressed to them we felt safe. They also did not seem concerned. Holly and I aimlessly walked through Palo for awhile until it was dark and I wanted to rest again. (Headaches are death in the Philippines).
Anticlimactic, right? I thought the same thing until I saw damage Japan suffered. Yesterday, while walking through Tacloban I made an obviously grimace that another volunteer noticed. My grimace was for a newspaper headline that showed that the death count in Japan had reached 1,300. Today, BBC suggests 10,000 will be reached.

I never once felt scared until after I already knew I was safe. Receiving emails from my best friends up in the middle of the night their time made me realize that what happened in Japan was real, and just because we were fortunate enough not to experience any repercussions from the earthquake doesn’t mean it couldn’t have happened.

My heart goes out to Japan. I am thankful for our safety and I am thankful for my lack of fear. I wonder what it would have taken to make me feel genuinely scared in that moment. . .

Yeah, I like it... It’s like my late lent to blogging

I miss blogging. As I sit here on a purple yoga mat on my bedroom floor, MTV Asia blasting unfamiliar rock tunes from the TV sitting 3 feet in front of me, a fan blowing too much cool air into my face, I ask myself why I haven’t been inspired to write, inspired to blog, inspired to stay connected, inspired to share the stories that are dying to be shared. Why? The truth is, I don’t know.

Side note: Billionaire music video is on now so I think I’ll take a mini dance party break. Actually I want to write about this song for a minute because I think in a small way it relates to how I feel right now. So- for those who don’t know Billionaire is a song about a guy who wants nothing more than to be a billionaire. He sings about everything his life will be once he is rich. He can’t wait. ‘ I wanna be a billionaire so ehmm freakin bad’... So this is kinda is exactly how I felt about wanting to be a Peace Corps Volunteer. I wanted to be a Peace Corps Volunteer ‘freakin bad’. I had it set in my head that this is what I wanted. It’s all I thought about. It’s all I dreamed about. It consumed my thoughts. And now here I am. So now what? Am I living my dream? Did I get all the things that I wanted out of this? Did we become billionaires?

For me, I think I did. Actually, obviously I did. I’m in the Philippines working at a school doing almost exactly what I thought I would be doing, almost. I am living my dream. Okay- connection time. I think it’s easy to blog about your dreams, to talk about blogging about your dreams, but living your dreams is tough. I feel ordinary again. I imagine being a billionaire is exactly the same. Eventually your life just is what it is. I LOVE it here. I have a lot of fun and I feel inspired almost every day but I think it’s not the same type of excitement I had during the application process because it IS my life. Wow, pop music is dictating my blog today but as Ke$ha is singing to me right now ‘you know we’re superstars. We are who we are’ Maybe I’m taking this out of context just a tiny bit, but it’s kinda true right? So I’m a Peace Corps Volunteer, we are who we are.

Okay- I didn’t want to spend a lot of time on this blog because the real purpose of this blog was simply to say.... I want to blog. So a challenge to myself: A blog every ... what’s fair? Day? Week? Month? Umm okay, how about this, I will TRY to post a blog every day until Easter! Yeah, I like it... It’s like my late lent to blogging. Maybe that should be my title.

Wish me luck. Anyone who knows me, knows that I will need it.

It's been way too long, I know

For Grandma and everyone else:

Okay- it’s been a minute since I posted a blog, I’m aware of that. So, on November 12, 2010 I swore in as an official Peace Corps Volunteer. SO- this is where the two year mark begins.

After the swearing in process, I stayed in Manila for an extra night before flying back “home” to Palo. Manila is HUGE. Seriously, it’s intense. I stayed in a little tiny corner of the city and only saw that tiny corner. However, that did include really big malls with lots of food choices which is exactly why I stayed in Manila for an extra night. Yes, my life revolves around food. I’d say 50% of my thoughts on a given day could easily be food related... or maybe I’m just hungry right now. I don’t know.


I’m not sure if I have explained trikes or not but a picture says a thousand words? I borrowed this from the internet, it’s not me. Trikes are a popular mode of transportation around my hood in the ‘pines. I ride one nearly every day for many reasons. 1. They are a practical form of transportation. In other words, they get me from point A to point B in a very timely fashion 2. They are relatively cheap. A trike can manage to get me all the way to school for the low price of 10 php** (** sometimes, this requires arguing with the trike drivers... on one occasion very recently I even argued in Waray Waray, accusing him of charging me more because I am an American. That was fun). 3. They are a brief escape from the weather: rain or sun.

Even though, they seem like the perfect form of transportation, I dread getting into a trike. I always have, what’s the word... An experience? And by experience, I do mean near death experience. Trikes make me feel close to death....
One time I was on a trike that nearly ran over a man. We were cruising down the highway on the way to school and that means swerving in and out of many modes of transportation: cement trucks, jeepneys, petty cabs, bikers, motorcycles, walkers, etc. and all of a sudden a biker falls off of his bike into the highway right in front of us. Right. In. Front. Of. Us. So I did the most logical thing I could think of in that moment- I closed my eyes, which I can’t say for sure since my eyes were closed but I’m pretty sure that my trike driver did the same thing. He screamed, I screamed, he swerved, I screamed again, and then I finally opened my eyes to realize that we did not hit a man. I really don’t know how. But God bless.

Another time, I was riding home on a trike with another volunteer, who lives right down the street from me. It was a very short trike ride- maybe half a mile. So, whenever you get to your destination you just tell the trike driver “dinhi la” meaning just here, and he will pull over and let you get out. So I see my house, and I politely say “dinhi la” like I always do and he looks at me with a look that says “oh, sige” or okay, and starts slowing down to what I think is to pull over. I gather my belongings and his money to hop on out. After that I’m not sure what happened. Somehow, we were off the road, trailing through puddles and rocks, and gravel, and heading towards this dirt road across from my house. I banged into the side of the trike a few times, and then after hearing us shout “para” or stop, he bust out laughing and stopped the trike. I still don’t get what happened. Why didn’t he just stop? Eh, the mysteries of trikes. Anyway- I was sporting a few bruises on my right arm from that lovely trike ride.

Okay- one more short trike story. This happened yesterday. My battle wound is still sore. I get a trike to go to school (this will most likely be the start of every trike story I tell) and it appears that it is going to be a very safe and normal day. There wasn’t too much traffic, there wasn’t any rain, there weren’t any weird people falling onto the highway, nothing. We get to the market near my school and he stops and looks at me, so I remind him that I want to go to the high school. He takes off again, and this time it’s like he’s in a hurry. It’s only a few blocks but he decides to take these blocks really fast. I’m trying to hold on a little but I failed to notice the speed bump coming up in front of us. I’m going to just go ahead and assume that the trike driver didn’t notice it either, so yes, we went flying over it. At this point, my entire body lifts from my seat and I smash into the metal top of the trike. It. Hurt. I have a cute goose egg on my head too. I’m still a little bitter from this injury. I know he saw that speed bump... Bastos.

Please don’t let any trike stories discourage you from wanting to ride in them. They are perfectly safe modes of transportation sometimes. And you can cram a lot of people inside of them. I’ve even fallen asleep in a one! Maybe next blog I’ll write about all the different modes of transportation that I’ve slept on in the Philippines.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I missed you all. However, my Thanksgiving was awesome. On Thursday (the real Thanksgiving) I came home from a typical day at work, relaxed for a few minutes, and then began making chocolate chip cookies. The recipe came from Maggie (thanks, again), however I am not Maggie. Maggie can so easily turn flour, eggs, chocolate, and probably toy trains, into delicious, beautiful cookies. So I tried. I followed her instruction kinda. I say kinda because I know you are supposed to measure everything and do exactly what it says but I’m not that patient. Anyway, the dough was superb. I ate a lot of it. I’m going to guess that I ate at least 4-10 cookies worth of raw cookie dough. It was delicious. However, the final product did not turn out pretty. My chocolate chips were melted before they even touched the oven; the cookies were very much so lacking my sister’s touch. The good news is that PCV’s are extremely easy to please and they gobbled up my cookies before we actually had our Thanksgiving dinner. Win Win for everyone! So Friday, I traveled 7ish hours to San Antonio, which is an island in Northern Samar along with about 30 other volunteers. We stayed in a cute little resort that let us prepare our Thanksgiving feast (on Saturday) there. Some of the volunteers worked really hard and prepared a feast for the rest of us. Yeah, while they were cooking, I was swimming in crystal clear water, snorkeling out on the reefs, lying around in hammocks, snacking, etc. Perfect day. The dinner was all Thanksgivingesque food and it couldn’t have been better. I would obviously like to be with my family for the holidays, but having to spend it away, I can’t think of a better way to do it.

Okay- I had several more stories lined up, but I am losing steam.

Miss you and love you!

Remember Me??

Once upon a time there was a girl named Celia who joined the Peace Corps and promised her friends and family she would keep a regular blog .... then she fell off the planet and nobody heard from her ever again. The end.

Okay fine, that's not really the end. In fact, a LOT has happened since I last blogged way back in August.

So- I arrived in the Philippines. I had a week of orientation in a fun little resort called Island Cove with about 145 other kids who decided they wanted to be Peace Corps Volunteers. There, we found out where we would be training until November. The drum rolled, and I was placed in Leyte! The crowd went wild! (tiny exaggeration) So then I hopped on a plane with 15 other volunteers and moved to Leyte for training. So, in Leyte, I’m staying in a sweet little historical beach town known as Palo. You should look it up so you can see it on a map and stuff. My house is literally a five minute walk from the ocean and that’s going at the pace of a 90 year old woman with only one leg.

I live with a host family. A really really big host family. And by big I do not mean fat, however it is obvious nobody goes hungry in my family. Seriously, there is nanay and tatay (mom and dad), they have 6 girls, three of whom live at the house (25, 17, 12), and then the 25 yr old has two kids (5,2) and then there is another 5 yr old who is the daughter of one of the grownup sisters not at the house. THEN there are three young people who are the nieces and nephew of my nanay? Young people in that sentence means somewhere between the ages of 16-23 but they have only recently started talking to me. And then there is a 15 yr old hired as house help because her parents couldn’t afford for her to be in school anymore. And then there’s me, the clumsy, awkward, but loveable American. Oh yeah, the house is nice! Nanay and Tatay’s room and the 25 yr old’s room both have aircon. Yes, that indeed means I go into their bedrooms, lay down on their beds and sleep. They love me that much. We also have wifi and HBO. So basically having HBO is an upgrade to my life in Atlanta. Thank.you. Peace. Corps.



Alright so that’s my family. What else you wanna know? What I do? So during our 12 training, I have language class in the morning from 8 until 11:30ish where I attempt to learn Waray Waray. Then we have lunch at home with our families. Katapos, we have technical training from 1-4ish on MWF and that’s basically just teaching us how to teach and then on TTH we go to Palo National High School and actually practice teaching classes. After classes, I just do normal stuff. I hang out with the family or other volunteers, I eat snacks, I watch tv, eh, not much exciting going on during the week. Over the weekend we have fun though. Honestly, I never know what a weekend is going to look like. Sometimes we sing videoke (karaoke but with amazing videos displaying nature scenes or girls in bikinis playing behind the words), sometimes we drink San Miguel all day, sometimes we bbq, sometimes we go to the beach, sometimes we go to Tacloban (well, once), you get the idea right?

I’m inpatient. I wanted to be extremely sequential about this blog but I give up already. I went to Manila last week for Supervisor’s Conference (a conference where we meet the supervisor’s of our school and find out what our permanent sites are) and I found out I am staying at Palo National High School. Holla! So- yeah. All the details I just wrote above. That’s gonna be my real life Peace Corps experience.

Swell.

At first I was maybe a little disappointed. I don’t get to move to a new city. All the people here already know me and the other volunteers. The kids at my school have met so many volunteers so, I’m not special. However, now that I’ve had time to process what this really means.. . I am SOO excited. I went to the high school and met all the teachers today and they really took me in. They were so sweet, they already introduced me to all the single male teachers, invited me to go to church with them, told me they would show me how to make my favorite dish, Sweet and Sour fish, gave me an extra juice pouch, and basically just showed me that they are there for me and promised they would take care of me and not sexually harass me since that violates Peace Corps policy.

That’s all I got for now. I hope that in some way sums up what’s been up the last six weeks. If you want to know any specific questions, ask me and I’ll make sure to
enlighten you.

I miss you and love you!

I'm Here!!

Okay- I'm going to make this one quick... not nearly as long as my airplane post but I wanted to at least write SOMETHING for you guys :)

Anyway, it's hot. lol- duh. .. but surprisingly, not THAT bad. It's just the normal heat. It feels like Georgia. Have I mentioned there are quite a few Georgia volunteers here? 4+!

We just finished our first day of IO (Initial Orientation) and tomorrow I get to have my first round of shots.. Yahh. I got my phone number today! I am going to post this on Facebook. I'm pretty sure but not positive if you call me I can receive it and it will just charge you and not me. For now this is the only option since it is only loaded with texts. Otherwise, Skype is the best option for this week.

I will be here until Friday morning.

Anyway- so there is an animal park here, I'm going to try and check it out really fast. I promise I'll post more soon :)