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A Development Worker's Blog Back to where it all began March to August. Yes, 5 months out of Habitat. Busied myself in a number of ways here in our beloved Bohol: trying to raise pigs the organic way; going back to where a country begins, the village of hard work and still fantastic dreams; wracking nerves and brains complying with donor's requirements for two projects which were about to end; exploring caves in Lamanok island; sharing memories separately with two families of old friends, one from Habitat and the other from UNICEF; getting what the doctor called low-level flu, which does not quite disable you, but it makes you feel your limbs are too heavy to carry; remembering old friends and other relations; trying to find ways on how to feel on one's skin the late afternoon rains; reaffirming one's true worth and resolving in the end to just move on and just "follow your dreams"; cleansing oneself of toxic thoughts and heeding the advice to just think of others; getting out of oneself and discovering the antidote against pain and cynicism and hopelessness; trying to smell the roses and look at sunsets ... In the end, there is the persistent call to go back to where it all began, the search for a father whose bones where scattered far and wide to look for a proper home, away from the restrictions imposed by institutions which take care of properties such as cemeteries and not care where the dead among the poor can park their bones and their spirit prayed to and remembered with candles against the wind ... farewell my foot-loose friend. on monday, 24 august, we return to work not to habitat, but to a bilateral agency which seeks to do innovative work in a cluster of municipalities to demonstrate how to make local governance a fertile ground to help grow the local economy. farewell organic pigs, exotic caves, timid rains, unmerciful procedures that work only for the rich and powerful. yes, yes, back to development work. sabi nga ng isang kaibigan, balik sa walang kamatayang development work. will keep you posted. cheers!  [ more ] SOCIAL ENTERPRISE PROJECT 2008-10-25 Nestor Pestelos
Dr. Nestor M. Pestelos (lef), president of the Bohol Local Development Foundation, and Alvin Luis O. Acuzar, program coordinator, signed recently a Memorandum of Understanding regarding the release of funding from Peace and Equity Foundation to enable BLDF to support social enterprise initiatives in Baclayon, Tagbilaran City and San Isidro. Acusar signed the agreement on behalf of Floriano Bernales, chair of Bohol United Sectors Working for the Advancement of Community Concerns, Inc. (BUSWACC). The BLDF project staff, standing from left are: Eulalie Albuladura, Administrative Manager ; Myrna Angalot-Lu, Finance Officer; Renante Manungas, Project Diretor; and Dr. Pomie Buot, BLDF Executive Director. [ more ] PACAP PROJECT FEATURES Lamanok Revisited 2009-04-16 Paul Vistal (Revised from the article published on November 2, 2008) Today, we remember those who came before us. This article strives to remember a people of whom we have no memory, save for their shattered bones, weathered rock shelters, and the blood-red marks they left in a place that mystifies us even today. A place called Lamanok Island. A place so called because those who seek favor for their petitions would bring ugis nga manok (a white rooster) to the tambalan (shaman) and leave it in the island. How long it has been called so is unknown as there are none today who can remember. About a month ago, we were with a party that accompanied to the island Fr. Rene Javellana, Ligaya Fernando-Amilbangsa, and Nanette Matilac whose contributions to Boholano culture were featured in LifestyleBohol last week. They had been invited to Lamanok along with noted composer and theater director Gardy Labad by BANGON as a treat during their stay in the province. On the way to Anda, stops were made at the churches of Baclayon, Valencia, and Duero. Each stop was an immersion into Boholano heritage. Midmorning, we finally arrived in Anda, at a purok house nestling at a cliff’s edge just off the highway. It has only been a year and a half since my first visit, when the Bohol Alliance of Non-government Organizations (BANGON) and the Bohol Local Development Foundation invited LB over to feature their eco-cultural tourism project for the community of Badiang, Anda. Coming again to the island, I found that some things were as we left them in our first visit. I also found some things changed. With sure steps, we made our way down rough-hewn flights of stairs as we held onto bamboo railings. This was certainly less slippery a passage than when we first came. The boat ride in the midst of the mangrove forest is now replaced with a walk, sometimes in the shade and sometimes in the sun, of a few hundred meters on a bamboo walkway at the end of which fishermen in their bancas (outrigger boats) await to ferry guests to Lamanok. Disembarking from the bancas, we gathered in a clearing where our lunch was being prepared but of which we were to partake much later. The first order of business was to explore the island and for this the group was split in two. The first group, composed of the newbies to Lamanok, was to visit the rock shelter where the hematite paintings were found. The second group was to be taken to another rock shelter that had previously been accessible only by rigorous rock climbing and to which the community had made makeshift ladders and placed weather-beaten beams. There were more skeletal remains there than I had seen before and these did not look like they came from just one person. But it also seemed impossible to complete one skeleton from what bones there were. Not far from the pile were two halves of a boat coffin that time and decay had eaten into. As with my first visit, we bewail the displacement and loss of the bulk of the archaeological finds in Lamanok. We are told that there are other places in the island where they made their dwellings but these are far more difficult to access. At this, we could only imagine how grueling it must have been for those first Boholanos to simply be alive and survive every day. My second visit to the hematite rock shelter found less of the paintings than there were before, or maybe it was just imagination and imperfect recollection. But we noted the distress that marked the guide’s face. Some pig-headed visitors never seem to get it into their heads not to touch the paintings, letting curiosity loose and permanently defacing our heritage. Every which way you go on this island, from the rock shelters to the Shaman’s Trail, from the cave that is called Ka Iska to the cave that gives the island its name, you have to watch your step, not only because the trail is difficult but also because you may not be the only one abroad on this island. If you lose your way, you’ll likely end up in what local folklore says is the biggest cacao plantation of the “dili ingon nato” (the people who are not like us). Here in Lamanok, “Tabi, Apo.” is not uttered out of habit, but out of respect. That there is a presence in the island is acknowledged. Many visitors to Lamanok, even on their first time, have sensed it. No wonder that it has been a place of ritual since before the coming of any occidental to our archipelago, from a time when our religion was characterized by what we would say today is pagan superstition, animist beliefs, and ancestor worship. But we need to understand that at the root of this our ancestors felt man’s connection to something infinitely greater than himself. Perhaps they could conceive of nothing greater than the world that was around them and the elements, but they did sense the immortal, and we can see, through their hematite paintings, how they strove to be remembered for more than just a generation, to be a part of the immortality that they could feel was around them. Today, we remember those who came before us. [ more ] Henry Tacio's Column Reporting for the Reefs 05 June 2008, Gerry E. Tacio, Jr. Label | tacio Killers that Travel in Packs 05 June 2008, Henrylito D. Tacio Label | tacio Do You Know Where You\'re Going To? 19 March 2008, Henry Tacio Label | tacio Reaching the Top of the World 10 March 2008, Henry Tacio Label | tacio The Tranquilizer with No Side Effects 08 March 2008, Henry Tacio Label | tacio Mar Patalinjug's Column The Hydrogen Future 13 June 2008, Antonio C. Abaya Label | patalinjug Shattered Forecasts 21 April 2008, Juan L. Mercado Label | patalinjug And Not Enough Food for Everyone. 17 April 2008, Tony Abaya Label | patalinjug In Memphis, Clinton Calls for Cabinet Post on Poverty 06 April 2008, Elisabeth Bumiller and John M. Broder Label | patalinjug Nursing: the Recession-Proof Job Market 31 March 2008, Aaron Smith Label | patalinjug Features Lamanok Revisited 16 April 2009, Paul Vistal Label | features Cervical Cancer: Women\'s Silent Killer 24 March 2009, Henrylito D. Tacio Label | features "Hard As Flint" (Philippine Daily Inquirer) 27 February 2007, Juan L. Mercado Label | features In Kentuckyâ's Teeth, Toll of Poverty and Neglect 27 February 2007, NYTimes.com Label | features A Question of Blame When Societies Fall 25 February 2007, George Johnson Label | features |
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