A Peace Corps Thanksgiving
I spent a few weeks in Manila last November to rest, heal, and gather my thoughts and strength after the Yolanda experience. This time also gave me the opportunity to be included on group trips with other friends that I am never able to normally visit or see. Many PCVs had already planned an annual getaway to Sagada, a small town in the mountains up north, to celebrate Thanksgiving. I had otherwise planned on not attending. But there will be a real turkey (OVEN roasted), mountain air (in stark contrast to the Manila air to which I was breathing), mountain trees, mountain people, mountain crafts, mountain things. And cold air! So I went.
By now when I visit another place in the Visayas it's nothing new, but I can still appreciate it as a beautiful place regardless. Baguio City, in Benguet province, immediately reminded me of San Francisco. The windy roads, misty cool air, expansive views, pine trees, steep slopes, and hills stretched forever covered in houses and structures served as a different scene from the Philippines I was used to. We rode first class on an overnight bus from Manila that left around midnight and arrived around 6:30. We went to a Pancake House after we disembarked and for a moment we could have been in Any Mountain Town, North Carolina.
Major differences that I noticed: paved roads, brick buildings, no native homes (nipa huts), a relatively organized downtown, no motorcabs or trykes (taxis only), chimneys protruding from roofs, wooden homes, sidewalks. Were the people in Benguet province relatively better off than those in the Visayas? Perhaps. Are there systemic poverty and infrastructure issues present? Most definitely. I was only able to see a slice of Baguio, but the area is plagued by overcrowding, lack of effective waste removal, street children, low incomes, etc. A lot of the displaced poor in Mindanao (typically the Filipino muslims) initially move to Manila, then work their way up to Baguio, looking for work, a home, stability. In that respect, it was similar to the Philippines that is more familiar to me. Baguio most certainly is a charming place, by far the most unique city I've visited in the Philippines. I highly recommend a visit.
The road to Sagada is long, curvy, and at times perilous, but full of unexpectedly fantastic views. The farmed terraces that cascade down to the valleys are a spectacle of the way in which most of the Philippines is able to receive year round cold weather vegetables. The sunny day kept my face glued to the windows, hypnotized by what I was seeing. I'm never able in this country to see so far and yet feel like everything is so close.
Sagada is a cool place. The entire travel time from Manila is about 15 hours on a bus, so it is not necessarily a trip you make on a whim. Even though it is remote and actually nestled in mountains, it was surprising to see how many foreigners were there. Backpacking Europeans, Australians, and other “sociale” type Filipinos were roaming the streets, looking for the next café to sip coffee in or relax with a view. The locals didn’t even pretend to stare at us as we trotted around town for the next beer, hike, or meal. No “Hey, Joe!” or “Hey man, where you going?!”. It feels odd to be taken for granted for once.
Instead of blaring videoke machines and speeding motorcycles, I heard country music and whistling pines. The language is so different here than in the Visayas. It sounds more like Japanese, some syllables pronounced with a high, jib-jab accent, and others softened out to sound more like nothing I can understand. The people also seemed a bit shorter than normal. Perhaps because of their isolation they haven’t mixed genetically with the more mestizo-type Filipinos in the lowlands and metro Manila? Despite all the differences, there is more familiarity here than not. Sacheys of shampoo still hung from sar-sari stores next door to fried chicken and soup canteens.
I always find it interesting whenever I travel here that there is a certain unspoken sameness to the people. Most in my town have barely left Hinunangan, yet at an entirely different altitude and climate, over 500 miles and a 50 hour bus ride away, the food is the same, the expressions are the same, the shuffling of feet are the same, and the organization of home and community are the same. When I tell some of my Filipino friends where I’ve visited, their eyes light up and their heads tilt back, and the trigger of questions begins, like a pitching machine. Are the people not as friendly as Cebuanos? I heard they eat dog, do they eat dog? How cold was it there? What is a chimney? There are only the small things that differentiate regional Filipinos, but the nationality is still very clear.
I’m not sure if it was because I was still reeling a bit from Yolanda, or that I was on a legitmate vacation, or that I truly thought this might be the last week I will spend in this country for a long time, but I treated this trip as a last hurrah to service. I grew nostalgic for my service and all the friendships that I made in Peace Corps. I tried to reconcile with myself that I did all I could, that if this ends now, this week, I’ll be satisfied and ready to move on to the next thing in my life. There were so many unknowns. If I return, would I be working in a leadership capacity in Manila? Could I ever physically return to site? What is the damage like in south Leyte? Will any volunteers be able to return to the region? How are my friends and family in Hinunangan? I vacillated between wanting to resume service as it was, or leaving it all behind, moving on, and simply accept the opportunity I jumped at a year and half ago.
At times I felt exasperated with my work and completely dispassionate, especially towards the end. But at the same time, it is hard to let go of this carefree wandering stage in my life, and readjust to the easy familiarity of the States that I miss so much.
Thanksgiving before Thanksgiving was a time in Peace Corps that I will never forget. Most of us together, after the experience of Yolanda, recreating just about everyone’s favorite stateside holiday in cold weather in a foreign country made it one of the most memorable Thanksgivings I’ve ever had. We had all the right ingredients: stuffing, turkey, mac and cheese, fresh greens, fudge, apple crisp, red wine, and a room to ourselves to mingle and chill in the mountaintops of the Philippines.
Before dinner, my friend Zac was recording small interviews about what we are thankful for, for one of his many videos that he made about our Batch 271 Thanksgiving trip. When he asked me what I was thankful for, I paused, thought for a minute, and said “friendships and good people”. Lame. Who isn’t thankful for friendships? Or good people? I was put on the spot and had a glass of wine already and it was the only thing that immediately came to mind.
Later on I kept thinking about all those people that I may be leaving behind in my community, Tacloban City, Bataan, and other places where I’ve fostered relationships with Filipinos over the past year and a half. I think what I’m really thankful for is that I have choices. And I’m thankful for the decisions (mostly) that I’ve made with those given choices to get me to where I stood then, in Sagada, enjoying great food with even greater company, harnessed with a wealth of experience. I’ve always felt that our biggest job (and hardest to deliver) is to make people in our community feel like they have choices. Choices to work, to leave someone, to serve, to run, to move up the ranks, to love, to find a passion, to see other places. It is a value that we live and fight for in the States, but not so much elsewhere.
What it comes to then is that I’m thankful to be American.
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