Bohol: My Work: Pt. 3

Bohol: My Work: Pt. 3

I woke up coughing to the smell of smoke, and looked around with my eyes burning to see the rest of the room covered in smoke. A little freaked out, but still bleary-eyed, I looked around and saw no one else freaking out. It was about 6 AM, and the lights in my room were on, but some of the other guys in my room were still asleep on the bunks, and the guy putting his shoes on said it was just breakfast being made. Since we had a window that overlooked the kitchen area that was open all the time, the smoke from breakfast was pouring into our room, though it was less bad in the living room area. I was tired enough that even with the lights on and smoke filling the room, I decided to set the alarm for 30 more minutes and try to sleep more.

This of course didn’t work. After falling into that half-sleep, I woke up coughing probably five times before I decided to leave and save my lungs, eyes, mouth, and nose. However, out in the living area, all the seats were taken, and the seats on the porch were taken too. Tired, and not wanting to stand around for a half hour until breakfast, I decided to try and go back into the room and read or something while I braved the smoke, which by now had made all my clothes and other things smell like smoke. I tried to get some stuff and get dressed, but the smoke was extremely distracting. I’m still not sure why it happened, since there was never again any smoke pouring into the room, but that was one of the roughest mornings I had in the Philippines, with me having to wake up to smoke and not being able to even stay inside the building without being assaulted again by the fumes.

Luckily, we were able to dispel the smoke with fans after an hour or so, and breakfast with the other 20 or so helpers was fine. This time, knowing what to expect, I sat around with Juvy, until once again we dashed into the black pickup to go wait by Bohol University again. This time, I shared a crammed seat with an older Filipina lady who I don’t think spoke any English and a few girls younger than me. With the pastor and Juvy again in the front seat, and the big joking guys in the back smoking cigarettes, we took off again for a new relief site.

The day was largely similar to the previous one. It took a few hours to get to the place, and on the way we passed both beautiful and damaged landscape, including more busted chocolate hills, and muddy river with carabao (the local cows) lining the sides, rice paddies, damaged homes and buildings, rock slides, and a brilliantly white beach surrounded by mangroves on a dark blue and gleaming ocean.

Our stop was once again up, up, and a little more up on a one lane gravelly and rocky road. The barangay hall, whose meager shade had been expanded by the big guys and the tarps, sat on a leveled area basically on the side of the hill, and tall trees, bamboo groves, and general jungle surrounded it. There was a mostly demolished church and some crumble-stoned houses at the top of the hill, but most people in this town lived deeper in the jungle in houses reached by winding jungle paths.

Again, as soon as I left the truck, stares from the hundred or so people greeted me. Kids were pointing, older ladies were pointing and whispering to each other, and a toothless elderly lady yelled “Hi” to me and asked me to sit next to her, laughing uproariously when I said that I would love to, but have a seat elsewhere. I did get a chance this time to see the beginning of the whole process, as a barangay official gave a speech in Bisaya, followed by a medical professor from Silliman. Since we got there closer to midday, I got a chance to get off the pile of rubble that had previously been someone’s home that I was sitting on during the speech and hand out plates of food to the people in the crowd. Far from being sad or embarrassed or even desperate for the plate chock full of food, the people of the community graciously accepted the relief, and often laughed at my “salamat” or asked if I could give them a hug or more food.

As I helped pass things out and create some relief packages, I got to know some of the new relief workers, as both the people from Mindanao and the Silliman guys with whom I slept were elsewhere. Today, it was people my age or younger who were there helping, and Juvy introduced them as part of the youth group in the Tagbilaran UCCP church.

After a few hours of putting together some relief and having more staring at the “Americano”, the debriefing started in full, and the kids broke off as the adults circled up. I decided once again to join John and the girls with their kids to help out. That day was easier, as John knew I would be there to help again, and so had planned for me to participate more and do some more things with the kids. Using my large knowledge of silly kid games that I had gathered from two summers of being a camp counselor, I was able to entertain the kids for a half hour or so, and continued to be the photo and snack guy. I talked more with the people my age from Tagbilaran as we watched the play from a pew that was pulled up from the nearby pile of rocks that was now the church.

So, after another long day, albeit with minimal actual relief work accomplished by myself, we packed into the black pickup and left, this time with lots of hand wavings and racing after the vehicles. I felt more assured about my work. Sure, I hadn’t rebuilt the church or made a more passable road out of asphalt with my bare hands, but I talked to a lot of people, helped out with the kids, and passed out some badly needed food. One guy that I talked to was with the high school group, and he said, at 17, he had three small kids at home and not enough food. We made sure to give him some extra relief for his kids and wife. Things like that made me feel like I was making some sort of difference in people’s lives.

Of course, while we were driving back, Juvy told me that, once again, when asked what people learned or remembered most about our relief efforts, the people responded that the “Americano” had made the most impact, just by being there. That still feels odd to me, but if I helped just by being visible, I guess that is good. Perhaps I made it seem like the international community cared about their livelihoods after the accident? Though I am not sure if I can claim that I really am qualified to portray something like that in any way, I am glad my mere presence helped.

We drove home again, with the sun sinking over the palm trees, and encountered a slip up in the form of a flat tire. Our caravan stopped in basically the middle of nowhere on the side of the wooded road, and while we waited for help from afar, we got out, hung out on the road, and many people even walked over and talked to the family whose house and farm we were in front of.

I just sat back, relaxed, and enjoyed what my official post-undergrad job was at that moment. I was watching the sunset in the middle of the forest, eating some of the bread and drinking the lemonade we got as a waiting snack. The noise of happy voices and laughter drifted from every direction, including the porch of the local house, who had invited people in to use the bathroom and take a rest. The sounds of roosters crowing and goats baaing came from the farmyard, and even a few lows of the carabao with the giant horns tied up nearby. The big guys who were usually on the back of the truck were cracking more jokes about the earthquake (including fairly bawdy jokes about “potholes”), and they kept asking me if I “liked Filipina girls”, and then “if they liked me”. In short, life was relaxed, I was in a beautiful place, and even in the middle of a disaster zone, happiness was pervasive in the people around me. If this was how the rest of the next few weeks was going to play out, I thought, it wouldn’t be too bad at all.