I was too exhausted to write last night, this may become a trend...
Tuesday started with our first team meal together, as Leon has arrived! We departed for the job site at about 7:30, and hit much less traffic than we did on Monday. This was a blessing, and a curse, because yesterday's half day took a lot out of us! After our morning stretch and quote of the day, we were off to work.
To the world, you may be one person, but to one person, you may be the world.
We set out to conquer the dirt field. The pictures do this task absolutely no justice. When we stuck our shovel into the ground, one of 3 things happened:
1. We got a really good scoop of dirt, ready to be moved to the lower areas of the foundation. This happened about every 25th attempt.
2. We hit a big rock and had to shovel around it in order to isolate it and pick it up. This was often followed by red frogs jumping out of the hole and scaring the crap out of me. Anyone who knows me knows how much I jumped. The kids thought this was quite funny, especially Janel, who decided to scare me with a chicken foot/talon. A real one. I drew the line there.
3. We pushed the shovel into the groud trying to sever the roots of the grasses growing in the area. The roots were strong, and we were thankful to have axe man Steve and axe women Cassandra and May Yen (the Singaporean Farmer) to loosen up the dirt and roots. Unfortunately, fire ants really LOVE Filipino grasses, and we uncovered quite a colony.
Making it look easy.
I have NEVER seen as many ants as I did on Tuesday. It was quite beautiful to watch, but the fear set in as Steve, Leon and Cassandra were attacked. Their advice: make sure they don't get on your shoes. Let me tell you how glad I was for my decision to wear knee socks today. I got about 10 on me and ran... Feeling very much like the city girl of the group. All the veterans seemed like this was no biggie, and at dinner we heard stories that proved them right! But this huge ant colony was scary and intimidating to our workflow. That was the last area anyone wanted to shovel. I called the redistribution of the ant colony "urban sprawl"... Hahaha lame architecture humor.
We *thought* we were done in the late morning so Steve went to find Jun to get his approval. We all knew that when we looked at our dirt field, we were not 2" below the top of the concrete block unless we squinted our eyes a little. Jun of course brought over his mason to tie some strings to show us where we needed more dirt removal, and the truth came out, we were most definitely NOT done. This was probably the hardest part. In the morning we were fresh and ready to work, but it was a bit discouraging to see how much area we had to remove 1-2 inches from. So it was us and the fire ants, with Cherry unloading the wheelbarrow over and over for us (that woman is amazing!), and sometimes little Janel too.
We finally finished to Jun's satisfaction a little bit after lunch. The sky was overcast for the majority of the day, but wowza it was hot. Dri-fit is amazing. To conquer that job though, felt good. Our backs, thighs, arms were all spent as we walked over to the gravel pile. We shoveled gravel into used cement bags to use as the substrate for our concrete mat foundation. There were 3 teams on the gravel pile. Apparently Steve and I picked the good side because the girls on the other side kept saying 'do you smell that?!' And we we're happy as clams shoveling away with happy nostrils. We got a real system going, although we could not even come close to filling those bags, they were HEAVY! We thought well over 50 pounds. My mantra was 'lift with your back, not with your hands'. At 3:30, Jun came over and told us that it was time to go (as if we weren't watching the clock ourselves).
Cassandra makes miracles happen with Valentines Tootsie rolls
Puteh teaching the kids first aid
We left the job site exhausted but grateful that we had accomplished so much. I know the pictures look like we made a dirt field, but I promise, a lot went into the dirt field! We brought our fearless leader, Jun, and Christopher, our (fearless) driver with us to dinner. We had quite a wait for our food, but it was well worth it. My lamb adobo was UNPARALLELED. The flavor, texture, everything. May Yen generously offered me a bite of her squid, cooked in its own ink (still wondering if that is a good thing to be cooked in ink), she said that was good too. I'd say all in all a flavorful meal for everyone.
Jun asked me at dinner if I thought it was a mistake for him to work us as hard as he did. I said no. I told him it helps us know our own strength when we are pushed. But that was a bit of a reality check for me. While I am glad he asked me so I could respond, I realized that not only do we become stronger when we do things that challenge us, but we become even stronger when we take on these challenges with confidence and optimism. A can-do attitude goes a long way here, and will help us through the hard parts. Yesterday, I thought hauling concrete blocks was hard. Jun says mixing concrete is the hardest. We haven't even gotten to the hardest... But that is when we will realize the power we have as a team.
Tough stuff
On the way home, Steve, Cassandra, Joan and I began taking about the children of Navotas. There were a lot fewer today than yesterday, which Cherry said was because there was a 6th grade test on Monday so everyone else was out of school. This was a bit encouraging to us because it seemed like so many of them didn't go to school when we were there on Monday. As the day went on, more and more children came over. Some to help, some to play in the gravel (and get in the way a lot!), and some to stir up trouble. The children were completely unaware of the danger of a construction site at home; I would never even be let near a pile of gravel, let alone with a shovel and 10 other kids. They were so cute, but so many were unsupervised. This became apparent when there were obviously newborn kittens that began appearing in the children's hands. They were running around with the kittens in a way that made us very uncomfortable, but there was no one to tell them to stop. Well... we told them, but that didn't really work. Perhaps their parents are working, or doing other things to make ends meet, but it was quite obvious how directly poverty impacts culture and parenting. The GV veterans shared stories of past GV programs and how the quantity of impoverished children here was far greater than anywhere else they had ever been. It was a hard conversation to have, and it makes you feel so helpless, but we can only HOPE that providing many of these children and families with a home will help the parents have the resources to keep their children safe and supervised.
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