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Expat2Phils.com » pagpipinta sa pulo » Jul. 20, 2008

pagpipinta sa pulo: North II Zambales

Jul. 20, 2008 Newsletter by Tara C. Alverson

I know it’s not the end of the month yet, consider this a midway
update. I am getting busier now that I see the end coming up. I return
to the states October 1st. Just a few days back I returned from a three
day trip up to the Zambales Province. It’s a three and a half hour bus
ride north from Manila. You might remember the infamous eruption of
Mt. Pinatubo that devastated the cities of Zambales back in 1992. The
evidence of the lahar mud slides can still be seen throughout the region,
especially the town of Olangapo. It was a long journey from Dumaguete,
but well worth it.
While in Zambales I visited the Jireh Children’s Home Orphanage
in a small town called Castillejos. It was originally established by a
Japanese Missionary team that still comes to help out with the children
and different outreach programs. 28 children call this place home. They
have no where else to go, as they’re parents either abandoned them
and or couldn’t afford to feed and raise them. Everyone has a sad story.
Neglected, abandoned, beaten, sexually abused by family members;
these kids have gone through more then most of us could imagine. But
they continue to smile. What resilience, and yet it has to be hard to
help a child get past those types of hardships. It’s sad to think that these
children have also been neglected and abused by previous orphanages
and children shelters in the area. Jireh Home seems to offer a safe haven
for these kids. There’s a grade school on the property where the children
from the Jireh Home and the surrounding community go. It has over 100
kids in attendance. There’s also a basketball court, playground, pig farm,
community garden, a really big caribou and a soon to be established
library on the premises.
While I was in Castillejos, I staid with Katie and Rick Hartland
who came over from England a few years back. They have worked in
Hong Kong for different missionary teams. Rick is a medical doctor who
has recently started a medical outreach up in the mountains to the triad
people. He plans to have a hover craft built so that he and the medical
team can get up the mountain and over the lahar’s during the rainy season.
Katie has been teaching English to the children at the grade school.
The kids seem to light up when she’s around. They live with very little,
giving most of what they have to the children and the people in the surrounding
community. It’s easy to pretend your one thing, but to actually
do it is completely different. I think they are amazing.
I was asked if I could paint a mural in the library of the Jireh
Home. I thought about it and I said I would. I think it would be a great
experience for the kids to help out with. The plan is to have the kids
paint a large map of the world. Then we could paint some animals,
maybe some birds, butterflies, ...a dung beetle. It should be a lot of fun. I
will likely travel back north to do the mural in the beginning of August.
I also have a plan to paint a few animals in the Dumaguete
Orphanage as well. As it doesn’t look like we will get the chance to go
dolphin watching with the kids, I thought I would bring the dolphin’s to
them, ... well, at least on their walls.
Another good note. You were able to help donate over 150 kilos
of rice to the Precious Women’s Program in Dumaguete. It will be handed
out to more then 40 women in the community affected by prostitution.
This basic necessity helps tremendously as 4 kilos of rice can feed a small
family up to one week. It cost about 3,750 pesos. (Around $70 US.)
Since I’m on the subject of rice, let me go off on a small tangent,
being the inflating cost per kilo on rice throughout the Philippines and
the rest of Asia. It was already hard on the poor to feed their families, this
isn’t helping. One of the reasons for the high expense of rice is that it’s
being grown specifically for export to other countries, mainly western
countries, causing the price of local rice in some places of Asia to sky
rocket. And the grotesque thing is that the rice that is being exported isn’t
always being consumed as food, but rather put into cars, in the form of
‘bio-fuel’. That’s right, some people are starving while others are driving
their extraordinary large pick up trucks with nothing in the back of the bed
for cargo, and or sitting in their fabulous sports cars, capable of doing 120
mph in less then a few seconds, however idling in the midst of the heat
and traffic, and for every gallon of gas gone to the wind, another crop of
rice is born to fuel the furious fit in the hopes of ‘being green.’ (I’m not
red in the face yet.) ‘Bio fuel’ bureaucrats and oil fiends are pointing the
fingers at one another, all the while missing the point. Perhaps being, we
could tread the earth a little lighter, that a practical lifestyle can save the
world. I know, I’ll be home in less then three months, hoping to ride my
bike and help the world out, but I know I’ll get stuck in my Honda on I-5
during rush hour (should be called schmuck hour), like everyone else. It
just sucks to see people unable to feed their families because the world has
‘better’ ideas. $80 bucks might fill your tank for a week, but it could have
feed one poor man in Dumaguete for an entire year.
But on the lighter side, I may have lost a pound or two. I’m going
to be busy painting so I’ll send off the next newsletter the mid of August,
when I get back from painting the mural in Zambales. That’s right,
I’ll be taking a long bus ride, polluting the air all the way up to Zambales.
I might be guilty, but I’ll still have a blast spending time with the kids and
painting on another island. Thank you for the continual support.
North II Zambales: Pagpipinta Sa Pulo - T.C. Alverson - T.C. Artworks - July 20, 2008

Photos on page 2: Big Carabou under tree (water buffalo)

Photos on page 3: Pig at Jireh’s Home, Pig Farm; Jireh’s Home, Garden

Photos on page 4: Ram; Camera shy carabou (I’de be shy if I had a rope through my nose too)

Photos on page 5: I fell in. It was fun. M. Falls, Bohol
Man Made Forest - Bohol

pagpipinta sa pulo Newsletter is copyright Tara C. Alverson. Reprinted with permission.

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