Things just light up around here when the Mayor is in town! When he's gone, the tv is on and folks sit around bored with nothing to do. But when the Mayor is in town... well, the joint starts jumpin'!
The office utterly transforms. People virtually line up to have an audience with him in order to ask for this, or that favor. Whatever the result, there is typically something for the staff to do afterwards.. thus, printers start printing, people start writing, phones start ringing, etc. etc. Since I have no formal office, nor desk even, I just sit in the lobby of the Mayor on a chair near the A/C unit and watch the door swing... it never has a chance to close with all the people coming and going. No exaggeration! Right now I can count in my field of view 32 people! And the room is not that large!
A bit about the technology in this office... Yes, we have computers and printers and internet (obviously). No copy machine. Haven't seen a copy machine since Manila. The printers are older version - few laser printers. Anytime you want something printed you must print it from the computer... thus, there is great use of the scanner. No fax. Yes, lots of work at the good old fashioned typewriter... going old school... and.... remember carbon paper? Lots of carbon paper here! Before coming here, I hadn't seen carbon paper in probably 15 years! Dress is informal... jeans are ok. No to shorts if you are working, but people who come to see the Mayor are in shorts, tshirts... anything goes. No socks..... no hose. By the way, I have no idea why PC told me to bring 7 pair of socks.. I haven't worn socks in 2 months! Speaking of feet... most everyone wears flip flops.. but here they are called slippers. You can find slippers being sold in every market and they cost less than $2.
What else... oh, Ive wanted to comment on this.. as far as transportation goes there are few cars here in Lagonoy. But lots and lots of scooters motorcycles, bikes and something called tricycles, which are for hire. The tricyles are the german style motorcycles with side cars. The tricycles come with motors, or without (you have to pedal those). These are the taxi's around here. The motorized trikes have a covered area for the passenger so that the rain stays out. The motor less ones have a picnic umbrella that covers both the driver and passenger. The motorless tricycles are called 'padjaks' and they cost 5 pesos to use (43 peso = $1). The motorcycles here don't get much above 200 cc's. I wonder why folks in the US don't use scooters as much as the rest of the world? It certainly would save on gas, and if more people used them, it would be safer for all! It certainly would save on gas cost and petroleum usage in general.
In other news, I got a nice text from a PCV last night. Ive never met this gal, but we connected a few weeks ago via text thru another PCV who I do know. Dani lives about 4 hours away in a town called Daet, and is friends with a PCV I met when I was at the PC office in Manila. Daet incidentally, is the town that all the volunteers in Legazpi City have been evacuated to. So now Daet is crawling with PCVs.. some with nothing to do since they've been displaced due to the volcano! As long as Im talking about evacuation.... can you believe that they've evacuated over 60,000 from Legazpi City?? What a humanitarian effort that must be! And they have just no idea when the volcano is going to blow... they just know it will and that it can happen at any time. In the meanwhile, entire communities have had to put their lives on hold. A remarkable thing, really. (I think Ive mentioned all this before, but whatever....)
Anyway, I connected with Dani because I was looking to see if any PCVs go to Naga on the weekends, and if so, when that might be so that I could join and relieve myself from the utter boredom I sometimes feel on the weekends. Plus, it would be nice to connect with some non filipino's for the first time in 8 weeks!
Well, it turns out Naga IS a weekend destination for PCVs! Dani connected me via text with two guys who live in Naga who texted me last night as well. They are Aussie volunteers and apparently are a ton of fun! So, I just might be going to Naga this coming Saturday to drink beer with Aussies... look out world!!
No comments:
Post a Comment