New beginnings

Today was the first day it hasn’t rained. At least not that much. But I still got Dad’s old Nissan Terrano 4WD stuck on the way out this morning. It just bottomed out as the wheels displaced the wet mud in the forest track. We are the only ones that use that access way with vehicles, but yesterday a man named Victor had come from Banaue to buy the old 2WD Nissan engine that I wanted to get out the workshop. To do that, he had brought a truck in which had caused the damage. When I came in afterwards to bring in fresh supplies of drinking water I managed to come down the hill but it was clear that next time I would have to park in the village until the track was improved again.

Bunog village

So we walked across a set of rice paddies to Bunog, the small village adjacent to the guest house and hired one of the waiting tricycles to take us to Sunday church. That not only included Rodelyn, the housekeeper and her 6 year old son Mark-Joseph, but also another village woman, 8 crates of empty coke bottles, 2 sacks of rice and a man that jumped on the step board at the next intersection. He then helped counterbalance as we went up and down the hills, with me hanging on as the pillion passenger, on a muddy track that was only intermittently concreted. With chicken and children scattering in the bends, I barely glanced sideways at the hidden valleys that appeared through the trees.

Ifugao is a remote province in the mountains 10 hours drive north of Manila. Most of it is forested with rice terraces squeezed into the valleys. With little other economy, it is a poor rural area. But the breathtaking landscape is a destination for adventurous travelers willing to go off-the-beaten-track. The area of Banaue, half an hour up the road has been called the 8^th world wonder with rice terraces climbing the mountain sides of the deep valleys. There are three UNESCO World Heritage sites in this province alone.

Ifugao Province in the Cordilleras

Kees, or the easier to pronounce Kayes as he had taken to call himself, had come here a decade ago to visit a child he was sponsoring and never left again. Instead, he invested all his passion to help street children from Manila and families in the Burnay Valley with all the money and energy he could, but to the detriment of his health, and, as some here say, his life. Whether or not the deadly disease that struck him down last September without warning, was a result of stress or simply old age catching up with him at last, he had used that time to leave a mark in the hearts of many here, so Lucia, the wife of the Burnay Senior Residents Association, whom I had earlier given a lift home had told me along the way.
The tricycle delivered us safely to Lagawe, the small provincial centre and local market town 5km or so away, and we were dropped off at the Catholic Church that Rodelyn goes to every Sunday. Of course by now we were late and the ceremony was in full swing with people queuing the length of each of the four aisles leading up the huge cathedral as a choir sang. The service was in English and when the priest began to speak far in the distance, his voice was amplified through a PA system. But the noise of children shouting and babies crying made it hard to hear the words nevertheless.

Entering Lagawe, gateway to the Ifugao

On the way out Jovencio Dipia-o came up to us. He is a retired bank manager that my father befriended and who had been keen to join as a trustee when with my borther Tim we re-formed my father’s trust after the memorial service in Lagawe, back in October.  
I had first met Jovencio 8 years ago, some time before he retired, when during a previous visit my father had made me co-signatory for his bank account - just in case something should happen to him.

With Jovencio was a long-haired man I had noticed earlier and who introduced himself as the manager of the Lagawe Organic Coffee Growers’ cooperative. I had planned to take more coffee home with me again this trip and so was keen to learn more about the origins of the locally made produce. We promised to see each other again ahead of Christmas.

Before going to the market to find a tricycle that could take us home, Rodelyn wanted to take her boy for a haircut. We ended up at Leo’s who I already knew from my most recent visit since I had visited him then to collect an outstanding debt to my father. At the time I had discovered that my father had been helping out various local people with small loans. Leo assured me that when I would catch up with my father’s friend Peter Vasquez, that all affairs were settled up.

In the meantime Leo and I exchanged Facebook addresses since he wanted me to see the charitable work he was involved in. He pulled out a folder with letters of requests and thanks from local schools, addressed to him as the president of the local ‘Gays Association’. Leo and his friends had provided free haircuts for teachers and children for the national Teacher’s Day, and had also gone round to collect small financial contributions from local shops and individuals towards food parcels for malnourished children in surrounding villages. It was clear that here as back home, school principals have to be quite proactive with fundraising.

Bunog village

On the return leg in a less overloaded trike, I jumped out one village before ours to look for the local Barangai Captain, the elected village district head. At yesterday’s trustee meeting we had agreed that to explore what and whom the trust should focus on first, we would spend time asking questions and talking to local leaders and residents in the Burnay Barangai. Correct protocol then meant that we should check in first with the 'Kapitan'. I already knew Gregorio from before. He was a likeable man, a retired policeman who spoke good English and was well respected locally, currently serving his third consecutive term.

The plan was with these introductions out of the way, as well as presenting ourselves at the local office of the Ministry of Social Development, protocol would be fulfilled and that then another trustee, Nora Luglug, would next accompany me to visit the Burnay Primary School. 
Peter Vasquez had brought along Nora last time, when he had heard that the Gorter Children’s Trust would survive my father, since she was keen to be involved in any community development in her home district. Nora was a former school teacher who had been vice mayor of Lagawe during the previous term and now ran a hardware store and the quarry in the river that runs through town. Located deep in the Cordillera mountain range, the Ifugao province does not lack waterways and rocks.

A Planning Meeting was scheduled for the following Saturday. There were five trustees who had been left with much enthusiasm when I told them the story of the Aotea Family Support Group. They wanted to try to build a local community group of their own and begin by working with children in need of assistance. I warned them that it had taken the Support Group 25 years to get to where we are now, and we agreed that the first year should just be treated as a feasibility study before we would even think about seeking institutional funding.

The desire to help others, no little thanks to both the traditional and Christian culture in the mountains, had already been shown in their own efforts. Connie Lacadin, who works as human resources officer at the Mayor’s office, told us of how years ago she and her husband Mel had taken in what ended up to become three children, in addition to their own. They had been brought to them by acquaintances from remoter valleys. Connie and Mel provided them with foster care in town to ensure they would receive a good education. They proudly recounted the achievements of the now grown up children as if they were their own. 

Bunog village, entrance

Poverty is the main reason, especially for those without land of their own to farm, I was told, why some families in rural villages have difficulty to provide for their children with adequate nutrition, health care and the costs of education. Children in such situations are put to work early and typically never complete schooling and don’t even get a proper start in life before hitting the first obstacles of poverty and the wrong company.

To find out more, we agreed that we would also go to visit the local kindergarten, talk to rural health workers and organize a group of mothers to do a focus group discussion.
Just like old times I thought as I walked home from Gregorio’s village, comparing in my mind this valley with other places I had visited when I worked as an international aid worker. Except this time was different, I realized, since I had not come for a well-resourced foreign organization but was helping a local grass roots group get off the ground with not much more to work with than the house and the goodwill left behind by my father.

The KK Gorter Guesthouse, as it will be called from now on.

Back at the guest house, it wasn’t long before Robert Pugong came up from his home in the village down below among the rice fields. The carpenter had helped my father with the interminable house construction over the years. Kayes had built a big house overlooking the valley with 7 bedrooms for children in foster care and accommodation for supporters. Robert was thus my first choice to employ as part-time caretaker and handy man.

It soon became apparent that Robert had his work cut out as together with Mel Lacadin we inspected the guest house. The latter was now supervising the house maintenance on behalf of the trust. Before he had returned to his home town to run his own glazing business, the former engineer had been part of the sizeable Filipino expatriate overseas workforce that are the country’s most important source of foreign currency. Mel had worked in Lybia, Abu Dhabi and elsewhere, he recounted.
The house was just fine it seemed, except that the foundation piles were infested with termites, the bearers under the guest wing had disintegrated, the rattan roofing overhead had failed to protect the purlins from rot and needed replacing with steel, and if we didn’t terrace the entire hillside below, Robert would soon have a new neighbour. But with a little help Robert was going to be able to deal with all that, and so we prioritized the job list for him. 
By the time we finished it was starting to get dark and we agreed that we would wait until tomorrow with getting a water buffalo to pull the jeep out of the mud. Maybe it will be dry again tomorrow?

After I had helped Rodelyn clean up after dinner, we lit a candle under the Christmas tree that she had pulled out with the decorations from the store room. She had only been employed by my father a week before he was taken to hospital and had been left behind alone, but she had proven herself very responsible and resourceful. 
Rodelyn Erica had come recommended through friends and was from a village south of Manila. I asked her if she was happy to stay on, so far from home. “Of course. It is a very beautiful house and I am my own boss here. I only want to bring my 10-year old son here as well, when the new school year begins in June. My daughter can stay with my parents because she needs to finish college. She is 16.” The children had not seen the father for many years after an intermittent relationship that had fallen victim to her former partner’s vices. The t-shirt she wore the day I arrived said it all in bold letters ‘I want no boyfriend.’

Rice harvest in Burnay Valley

I asked Rodelyn about her life before coming here and she told me how she grew up as the eldest of six, helping her parents work the rice fields. She had paid her way through studies by working in factories and as care worker in hospital, to become certified in ‘Cosmetology’ which meant pedicure, manicure and hair culture, she explained to me. 
But she spent many years just getting by with irregular jobs while she lived with her parents and three children in a one room house. The now 45 year old appreciated the regular income and was keen to improve her English so she would be a good hostess for visitors. And, she said, through working in her old trade “as a sideline” she had already made new friends in the neighbourhood.

Then we talked about how she was used to celebrating Christmas. She was happy when I proposed to her that we should invite Alfa with her young son from Manila for the holidays, together with her two minor brothers and sister. I had seen Alfa in Manila again when I had arrived this time, to help with her missing identity papers through a solicitor friend of my father’s. They were orphans that had been helped by my father. Filling the house with children seemed like a nice way to celebrate Christmas which my father would have liked very much.