Guimaras SEAS

So I couldn't get around to it in June, but I have finally gotten around to catching up on everything here at site. Now, as I describe my final two weeks of last May, I will conclude my typical style of blog posts (as I will describe in full next time)... 

The work didn’t slow down after our buoy deployment and Tan-Luc Marine Protected Area Launching Celebration. In fact, if anything, the next two weeks were even more busy than the first two of the month.

The Monday following the MPA Launching was our “Trainer’s Training” for our “Safety on the Seas Swimming Program.” Despite living in an island nation, many people here don’t know how to swim. Every time I’m on a rocky boat, going to and fro Iloilo and Guimaras, I wonder how it must be like for most these passengers who would be helpless if the boat went down. During Peace Corps training, we were taught that if you are on a boat that does sink, swim away from the life jackets, because that’s where all the panicking passengers will go.

This inability for most people to swim is also interesting because when you get to the beach, there are always so many kids in the ocean playing around. What I’ve learned though, is that although kids are comfortable in the water, they don’t know how to swim properly. They never learn any swimming strokes, so once they get a little older and spend less time in the water, they still don’t know how to swim and are therefore scared to get into the water.

I wanted to teach kids how to swim, so I thought about the best way about going about doing this. I had the idea to talk to Tita Dali, the head of the Municipal Disaster Risk Reduction & Management / Climate Change Adaptation Council (MDRRM/CCAC). “Disaster risk” has been getting a lot of attention recently in the Philippines, and I figured there were many funds available. I was right. I talked to Tita Dali, and then the mayor, and then I was ready to move forward with the training.

Funds from the MDRRM/CCAC provided the equipment for the training (stop watch, kickboards, life jackets, snorkels), snacks for the participants, and meals for the trainers. For trainers, I got helpers from the provincial DRRMC and from the provincial Guimaras Environment & Natural Resource Office. I also got the help of 8 trainers (ages ~18-25) from the barangays where the kids were being trained.

The training itself was a huge success and was a ton of fun. We had kids agoes 12-18 from two barangays come for three days in a row. About 70 came in total. Kids from Brgy. Dolores came for the morning, and kids from Pandaraonan came in the afternoon. These are the two barangays closest to Guisi, the beach where the training was held, so there was no transportation cost for the campers. The barangay councils helped picked the kids, and our eco-tourism project partners helped with the logistics of distributing meals and supplies to all the campers. 

The weather was great for the whole week, and the participants all had a great time (even the one kid who stepped on a sea urchin seemed to enjoy!). The kids seemed to really take in the lessons about water safety, and they showed much improvement in their swimming strokes by the “long swim” on the final afternoon of the training. They also loved the snorkeling part. For many of these kids, they’ve been going to the beach since they were babies but have never seen corals or anything underneath the surface. Considering most of these kids spend their summers “lagaw lagawing” (meaning roaming around), the opportunity to have a planned swimming camp was a clear highlight of their summer.

The trainers (trying to) put on sunblock before we begin

Two of the provincial rescuers demonstrating some swimming rescuing techniques to the other trainers

Practicing dragging with my buddy Rose Jane from the GENRO

The rescuers demonstrating some first aid techniques to our participants

Practicing back floating

Briefing the campers before the day's activities

Giving out certificates at the end of the camp. This camper, Dibs, was the fastest on the long swim. Even beat most of the other trainers

The Dolores Batch

Our final activity for the month was the SEAS Camp (Stewards of the Environment & Advocates for the Seas). Funding for this camp was secured through a grant through USAID and was planned and organized by all 5 volunteers on Guimaras. This was our second time all working together (the first being the booth at Manggahan Festival), and in the end it was very successful. We organized 2 three-day overnight environmental camps. The first camp had 3-4 environmental club officers from every high school on the island of Guimaras (about 70 kids total), and the second camp had kids from the barangays where Stef, Rob and I had been working to establish Marine Protected Areas (about 60 kids total). The purpose of the camp was to promote not only environmental awareness but also our new MPAs. Both camps were held in Barangay Tando, right in front of the Tan-Luc MPA.

The camp had lots of activities and games for the kids. Highlights of the camp included a coastal cleanup (the garbage from which was used for a “bottle brick” making project the following day), a “scavenger hunt” where the different groups had a list of activities and challenges to perform in front of the different facilitators, a mangrove planting in waist-deep water, a Jeopardy-style competition game, 2 movie showings (The Goonies and Space Jam), community interviews about the MPAs, garbage disposal and climate change, and a talent show, which was my personal highlight. One of the other main events from the camp was that we took all the kids snorkeling within our MPA. Again, like the kids in the first camp, many of these kids have spent their life living by the ocean but have never seen what’s underneath the surface. When Ar-Ar, our youngest camper (at 11-years old), and son of one of the barangay officials in Tando jumped in the water with his mask and snorkel, he immediately put his face in the water. He looked up, with wide eyes and shouted to the boat captain, “Manami sa dalom!” (meaning: so nice, underneath).

In this camp, we had a lot of time to discuss both before and after what they saw and what it all means. We had watched Planet Oceans and showed pictures of corals in our presentations, but what the kids saw underneath did not look like that. They really had fun snorkeling but also could see all the damage that had been done to the corals here and why it was so important that they stop destroying them and start protecting them instead.

This activity was rather hectic, as we had to take the kids out in boats to get to the coral reef, and then many of the kids were not so comfortable in the water. Of course all had life jackets, but with the number of jellyfish in the water, it was an exhausting activity. Thankfully no one got stung very badly, and it seemed like the volunteers (who were constantly putting ourselves in between the kids and the jellies) got the worst of the stings.

What I also really appreciated about the camps was how the whole barangay came together to make it happen. The huge tent that was set up for our MPA was fixed and maintained to provide shade and rain protection for the kids (and for our LCD screen and projector). Huge tubs of drinking water were filled up constantly for bathing. The cooking for nearly 100 people, 3 meals a day, was done by 5 guys over two open flames. The makeshift electrical system was made out of the wires and bulbs that I had brought down from the LGU. And the barangay provided barangay health workers as nurses, barangay tanods for security, and fisherfolk with boats for the snorkeling activities.

Our water bottle giveaways

Leap frog was one of the challenges of the "scavenger hunt."

My host brother, Nonoy, participated in the second camp. He had a great time and still can't stop asking me when are we going to get to see more corals. Here he is during the scavenger hunt.

We broke the kids off into 4 groups during both camps and had lots of cheers in between activities. Good way to get the kids interacting with kids from other barangays.

Here's Franko and some of the other kids from Tando

Beach clean-up

Getting ready to go snorkeling

Stuffing "bottle bricks" with the trash that had been collected the previous day

Mangrove planting

Talent Show. There were many dances and songs, some performance, skits and even an amateur fire dancer. That one was slightly terrifying for the facilitators, but the kids seemed to love it!

Here are the 5 volunteers being given our gifts from the Department of Education

Denise and I with the chiefs and dish washers at the end of the second day of the camp

In the end, I’m happy that the month of May is well behind us. I arrived back from a long trip to Tubbataha Reef and China with my family with more on my agenda that seemed feasible. The day after my trip started the 8-day booth at the Manggahan Festival, followed by one week to make up for what I had missed and then move forward for our upcoming activities. After Manggahan, there was a buoy deployment scheduled, but buoys were not yet made, rope was not purchased, and the list of volunteers was not even discussed. The MPA launching was planned but no funds were available for snacks, no communication letters had been sent and the huge cover for the event was not yet been delivered or had even been found. A swimming program had been discussed and funds had been approved, but the dates had not been finalized, the kids from the barangays had not been chosen, the trainers had not yet committed, and transportation had not been settled. And two environmental camps were happening, but no electrical equipment had been found, no drinking water was ordered, food arrangements had not been made, permission slips had not yet been returned, mangrove seedlings could not be found, no equipment for activities had been purchased, and plans for the snorkeling had not been decided. But nonetheless, as things always seem to in the Philippines, everything got done, and with little stress along the way. By this point, I’m fortunate to know how things get done here, and I knew that I was working on very reliable people, in the government, with the other volunteers, and in our communities. While by the end, I was ready for a well-deserved rest, our activities were all hugely successful, and I couldn't have asked for a better way to end the summer.