Dance, Dance, Dance.

From August 19, 2008


The last few days have been a bit of a whirlwind. The majority of the time has been spent in training sessions, which are typically pretty interactive and definitely involve an air-conditioned room. I like that. And we even get snack! A lot of information has also been thrown at us and has sunk in quite a bit, but some of it is still working its way in. Besides trainings, it’s been a combination of eating, socializing, singing videoke, eating, birthday celebrations, buying cell phones, drinking water, and oh yeah, eating.

Yesterday, two groups of dancers came and performed for us and they were both beautiful. The first was a group of children from Kanlungan sa ERMA Children’s Chorale, which is a non-profit that helps to protect and develop children who are abandoned, prostituted, exploited, abused, and trafficked. They were absolutely amazing. All of the songs were written and choreographed by the children, and they spoke of the hard times they have gone through—hunger, abandonment, crisis, etc. Watching the performance was incredibly moving.
The second performance was done by the University of the Philippines Los Banos Dance Troupe, which is a college-aged extracurricular group that performs cultural dances. The dances depicted different aspects of Filipino culture, including dances from Mindanao (the Southern Muslim region) and Ifugao (a northern tribal group). There were also many traditional Filipino dances, each representing something different. The dancers were amazing and really showed true appreciation for the culture.

It makes me wonder—does the United States have a dance? Can you imagine what it would be? Perhaps it would be the ridiculous chicken dance, which is performed at only weddings and church picnics. Or it could be the line dance, which originated from country music – truly American. Or perhaps it is one of my favorites—the sprinkler, the bus driver, the lawn mower, the flight attendant, and the list goes on. Hmm.

Today, we were able to visit the Peace Corps office and go to the Mall of Asia, which is the largest mall in ALL of Asia. The purpose of the trip was to purchase cell phones, but we were required to stay in groups with our guides, who will be our LCFs (Language Cross-Cultural Facilitators) and TCFs (Technical Cross-Cultural Facilitators) at our training sites for the next two and a half months. This mall was absolutely huge, from what I could gather. We only spent time in what seemed like the technology wing, where there were oodles of stores to buy phones, computers, gadgets, etc. The mall also had a full-sized ice rink inside and I’m sure plenty else in the other sections. After the big cell phone purchase, we had about an hour before the bus came so my group headed straight for the ocean, which just happened to be across the street. Convenient and oh-so-salty. The sunset was beautiful (well, not as beautiful as last night which I unfortunately did not catch on my camera). And the hair was crazy. Serious.

So anyways, that’s about it. We’ll be finding out about our clusters tomorrow, which will be about 5-6 people. As a CYF, I know I’ll be heading to either Bacolod or Dumaguete City, which means I will be permanently placed somewhere in the Visayan region. If you check out a map of the Philippines, the Visayas are all the islands between Luzon (the northern island with Manila) and Mindanao (the southernmost island). Thursday, we’ll be heading to PST host families – wish me luck!

Also, P.S. I got a cell phone today…obviously…so if you want my number, just send me an email and perhaps, just perhaps, I will give it to you. Ciao.