Hey everyone. I know it's been a couple of weeks since we've updated the blog but I can assure you, we haven't forgotten about it. We flew into Manila on Saturday and will be here until the end of the week. We'll do our best to provide you with an update this coming weekend. For now, know that we're doing well and look forward to sharing more of trip with you in the coming weeks. Highlights include a real live monkey, almost meeting the president (of the Philippines), our trip to Payatas (where people make their homes at Manila's largest landfill), lunch at Randall's farm - a truly holy moment and much more. To be continued...

This past week and a half has been pretty hectic. We went up to stay with Tito Mon for a few days last week. Mon is doing some amazing things with self-sustained, organic, waste-free farms that could drastically impact the landscape of poverty here in the Philippines and throughout the world. I’ll spare you the details as you probably aren’t as fascinated by them as me. Mon is a very wealthy landowner here with a heart for seeing poverty alleviated. He had a near death experience a few years back that changed his heart and perspective toward friends, family, wealth, the environment and life in general.

Mon took us up to the mountains and showed us some of the rice terraces and various contour farming methods. His motto, “there is no unproductive land, only unproductive farmers.” Mon’s methods allow him to grow nearly any crop he wants, even on the top of a mountain. We joined a group of farmers from Bayawan City, which is in the south of the island we’re on (Negros). Mon could name his price to run seminars, educating farmers on his methods. Instead, he does it for free. To see hearts changed, wealth redistributed and lives molded.

Moving ahead. Last Sunday we visited Promise City Church with Emma and her daughters. The church is pastored by Rick Sutcliffe – the same Rick who runs Joyland (mentioned in Brooke’s last post) with his wife Suzet. It’s an Assemblies of God congregation –Rick is from Australia – with a penchant for exuberant worship. After service, we joined Rick and Suzet for lunch. Rick wants me to speak at Promise City in a couple of weeks. We’ll see how that goes. Suzet and I had a wonderful conversation about community development and the work they’re doing at Joyland. Brooke and I will likely be spending a few nights there this week studying their project more fully and working with some children on their conversational English.

So, on Monday I spent the day with Ricky Lacson at the Couples for Christ meeting. It was more of a “nuts and bolts” type of meeting but still, it allowed me to gain a perspective into what they are about as an organization. Couples for Christ is responsible for founding Gawad Kalinga so the two are significantly intertwined. They are very much concerned with building communities that enable people to live with dignity.

Come Tuesday, I started feeling pretty ill. I’m not sure what it was, but all week I was sick with a stomach bug of some sort. Brooke saw me through until I was better on Friday, when she began feeling sick. So, this week has been hard. A lot of complaining, aching, sleepless nights, etc. But, we’re both feeling better now and looking forward to this coming week at Joyland.

Friday, Emma and I were able to visit two more GK villages with Ricky Lacson. These were much larger than the one’s we were exposed to the initial week. They were complete with schools and worship facilities and even farmland. In November, I have agreed to stay in the two communities for a few nights, to get to know the people better and how exactly their lives have been impacted by GK.

Until next time, know that we’re doing well and attempting to serve our God by loving others. Keep us in your prayers and trust that we miss you all dearly.

Hey everyone. Hopefully we'll be able to leave a more detailed post in the next day or two but for now, I just wanted to check in to say things are good. We've been pretty busy and our internet access has been sporadic. Keep us in your prayers and we'll give an update soon.

GK Bonbon and Joyland

I know that Josh already posted a bit about our first experience with a GK site, GK Mangrove Village in Ducatan, but we didn't take any pictures there, so I'll try to describe it a little bit. (Scroll down and read his post first, if you haven't already!) The homes there are built right on the shore, so they are set up on stilts to prevent flooding at high tide. While most GK villages are made of cinder block and concrete, the houses there are made of wood as termites aren't an issue in the salty soil. The floors are made of split pieces of bamboo and the houses are painted in GK's signature bright colors. Dogs freely roam the island here, and Ducatan is no exception. There were dogs and puppies everywhere, some that looked well cared for and others that were decidedly street dogs. There are signs everywhere around here warning about the dangers of rabies, so it alarmed me a bit to see these unkempt dogs playing with the children here. Ducatan also has a school building (the children sang their "ABCs" to Josh and I through the window) and a health clinic provided by GK.

Upon leaving Ducatan we went and had lunch at an excellent chicken barbecue restaurant with the group that we were accompanying. We were there with our friends Emma (pictured above), Ricky (pictured left), Mikmik and Paolo. Mikmik and Paolo (pictured together, below) work directly for GK. If I remember correctly, Mikmik is specifically overseeing projects here in Negros Occidental and Paolo oversees projects for the entire region of the Visayas. The restaurant we went to was decidedly not fast food, and we spent more time there than we had originally planned. When we finally finished up, we piled back into Emma’s truck and headed off to our second GK village of the day, GK Bonbon.

GK Bonbon is an area within a larger resettlement area. Tito Ricky mentioned to us back at the first site that some of the most successful GK villages are resettlements, where people are given new land away from the slum area where they previously lived. It was startling to see the difference between the GK houses and the non-GK houses (pictured, right) in the resettlement area. The GK houses were quite solid, beautifully painted and carefully landscaped, whereas the non-GK houses directly across the street were quite a bit more makeshift.

As we pulled up to the village, we noticed that there was a large group of people sitting under a tarp that had been hung out in front of one of the GK houses. Tito Ricky turned back to us in the car and explained that this meant someone had recently died and they were gathered together to support one another. I felt incredibly awkward in this situation, as simply arriving to anyone’s home unannounced is something I prefer not to do, let alone arriving as a stranger and a foreigner to someone’s wake. Emma told us that the gathered people playing cards out front were actually gambling to raise money for the funeral.

We set off down the road a bit, where Tito Ricky introduced us to a woman who was standing out in front of her beautiful blue house. She had carefully planted pepper plants and other indigenous fruit trees out in her tiny front lawn. She took us inside, where her house had been carefully divided into three small rooms and a bathroom, with her cooking area out the back door. She lives there with her husband and five children, the youngest of which sleeps in the bedroom with her, while three of the other children share the other bedroom and the fifth sleeps right inside the front door. Keep in mind that even with an area of only 235 square feet, these houses are huge steps up from how the villagers lived previously.

On our way out of GK Bonbon, Emma’s truck became stuck in the mud right outside the house of mourning. In an instant, a group of men and children from the wake surrounded the truck and pushed us out. We were quickly back on our way, and headed to Joyland.

Joyland is a school and orphanage that's been founded by Emma's pastors, Rick and Suzette. Rick is an Australian and his wife, Suzette, is a Filipina. After spending about 15 years living and pastoring in Oz, they've returned to the Philippines. They were the most recent tenants of the house where Josh and I now live (along with their son, Ben, who Josh mentioned in his post), and about three months ago they moved on to the campus of Joyland.

Joyland is a beautiful community they've established that serves many local needs. While it is indeed an orphange, it is also a school for local children. As Suzette explained it to me, "If a child's family can pay for them to go to school, they pay. If they can't pay, they pay in sweat, and if we take them in, the tuition is free." Suzette and Rick have a very well thought-out plan here, and they've put a lot of love into the project.

Currently the campus has five buildings, one classroom (pictured above), one office which will eventually be the mess hall (pictured below), two dormitories that fit 30 kids each (these will be more classrooms, once they are able to build smaller huts for the students), and Rick and Suzette's family home (which will eventually be the office, as they will also be living in the student huts).

The purpose of their education is really to make them employable by the time they are old enough to leave school. Knowing that a new International airport is being built in Silay right down the road from their campus, Suzette is planning to have courses available in hotel/restaurant management in anticipation of the need for hospitality workers that will come with the new airport. Already, she has a couple of her laborers taking lessons in cooking, in order to one day start a small restaurant on campus that will use the organic produce that they grow. Rick and Suzette have put absolutely all of their personal savings into this venture and have more yet to do. As Rick told us, "If you wait for all of the funding to come in, you'll never get started, so when God gives you a task to do you just have to do it. The money will come."

We stayed at Joyland longer than we had planned and didn't make it to the other GK sites we had set out to visit that afternoon. We needed to get back to Talisay so that Emma could pick up her kids from school. On our way home from Joyland, we passed this ox-cart that was being driven by a young boy. Emma pulled over - well, it's more correct to say that Emma parked in the road and Josh opened the truck's back door to take this picture. He just missed getting one of the boy and his friends waving back at us.

Negros Occidental

The flight into Manila was smooth and rather uneventful. In fact, thankfully, we even managed to get all of our luggage – and on time. After retrieving our bags and going through customs, we proceeded outside to meet up with our contact Mhel from Singles for Christ. The only problem was, Mhel was no where to be found. We scoured the crowd and the various placards on display. None of them said “Josh” or “Brooke” or “Josh and Brooke” or “Brooke and Josh” etc. By this time, the street was filled with people, all looking for a contact or cab. I must’ve bled, “Westerner in need of assistance” because within a few minutes, two different security guards and a woman, who appeared to be an airport maid of sorts, offered to help us find our contact or assistance with the phone. The cop gave me seven pesos to make a phone call. Still, no Mhel. Eventually, the woman whom I perceived to be a maid allowed me to use her cell phone to contact Emma Randall, our primary contact from Heart of the Father. Finally, some sort of contact. Emma informed me that Mhel was trying to text her and told her that he is on his way. About that time, Mhel arrives. Brooke yells over, “Josh, here’s a guy with a placard that says ‘Josh’.” Bingo.

Mhel (pictured above) is friendly and eager to meet us. He’s in his late 20’s and his nonchalant approach to life is particularly typical here in the Philippines. There’s simply no rush. On the one hand, it’s rather refreshing. On the other, it’s probably been the toughest adjustment coming from a region of the world that is fast-paced, that places emphasis on the transaction in a relationship and prioritizes punctuality and efficiency above all else.

Mhel, Brooke and I called for a cab and made our way to our condo downtown. Mind you, it’s about 11 pm at this time and everything’s dark. It’s extremely humid and has been raining for about 3 weeks on and off. The drive through Manila was exciting and contradictory to the rest of Filipino culture. Everyone drives like a New York cab driver here. It’s almost as if they’ve adopted the “hurry up and wait” approach to life. Anyway, we arrive to our condo which ends up being in one of the more upscale portions of the city. As Mhel puts it, “where all of the money is made.” We settle in, unpack our bags, and go to 7-11 for some siopas (see picture).

The next morning, we went out to breakfast at Jollibee – the Filipino version of McDonald’s – with everything from burgers and chicken to traditional local food such as beef tapas and garlic rice. After breakfast, we returned back to the condo, cleaned up and headed off to Manila’s domestic airport. Mhel had to go to work early that day so, we told him just to take us to the airport when he went and we’d wait there until our flight for Bacolod City. At 4:30 PM we headed out and were on our way to our new home.

We arrived at the Bacolod City airport around 6 PM Saturday and finally met our contact, Emma Randall. Emma said, “I looked at all of the people waiting for the luggage and saw this head towering above all the rest. I though ‘that must be Josh’.” She knew we were exhausted so, in typical Filipino style, she drove us to our new house as quickly as possible – with one short stop along the way for chicken BBQ. Bacolod City is renowned for their chicken BBQ and I can now attest to its greatness.

We finally arrived to our new home. We live on the lefthand side of the building pictured above and have a bedroom, bathroom and a kitchen/living room area. It’s much more than we expected and we were pleasantly surprised. AC and a warm shower, what more do you need? Shortly after arriving we headed off to a party, yes a party. It was a wonderful birthday celebration for a fourteen year old girl in our neighborhood. The sense of community here is marvelous and is to be commended. There, we met several wonderful people who all made us feel at home. The fed us, took us in, cared for us, and treated us like part of their family. There, we met Ricky Lacson. Tito Ricky not only owns our subdivision but is the head of productivity for GK and has a heart for bringing the rich face to face with the poor with expectations of poverty being alleviated. He is a well respected member of the community here and seems to make friends easily, whether it is with the rich or poor. Oh, and he was educated at Philadelphia’s own LaSalle University – bonus points Ricky, bonus points. After the party, it was home and to sleep.

The next day, we intended to attend church with Emma but jet lag has a funny way of knocking you off your feet at a moments notice. Brooke and I woke up around 5 am, were up for 3 hours, and woke up again around 12:30pm. Weird. Emma and her 3 curious daughters Deborah, Anna and Ellie arrived with lunch. They brought their friends Ben (left, with Emma in the background) and Joe (below, flanked by Anna, Deb and Ellie), two ornery young men, along from church. Needless to say, with 5 youngsters in the house now, Brooke and I were awake whether we wanted to be or not.

Skipping ahead to Monday. A group of us headed out to a few of the village sites today. Admittedly, it was hard. The children were enthralled with us. Many of the young boys would climb steps in an attempt to become eye level with me. The children were beautiful. I now know what Jesus means when he says whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it. Amidst their poverty, they smiled, laughed, played in the street and were simply alive. The life in their eyes was unlike anything I had ever seen. Their innocence was contagious. But they were also hungry.

We were welcomed into one of the villager’s homes. I counted her and 8 children living in a space, no bigger than a few hundred square feet. She was holding her youngest daughter Ariel. Ariel must’ve been a year old, tops, and she had big beautiful brown eyes. I held her hand and pinched her cheek in an attempt to get her to smile. I think she was a bit in awe of us as she had probably never seen someone’s head almost hit the roof of her house before.

As we made our way though the village, we found out that several of the fishing boats had been destroyed by the bad storm the night before. Without fishing, they have no source of income. GK is working to develop alternative sources of income – easily sustainable micro-businesses within the villages so that fishing is not their only means of subsistence. We noticed, at one point, Emma was lagging behind a bit. She was surrounded by the villagers. She came to learn that many of them had not eaten for 7 days. She bought them all food, mainly rice. Again, because the fishing has been so poor due to the weather, it has been even more of struggle to eat than normal.

As we left the village, Ricky began immediately talking about chicken BBQ. It caught me off guard a bit as we had just come from the worst poverty I had ever seen. I thought, “How can they be so numb?” Well Ricky and Paulo, one of the other GK workers, apparently picked up on our silence and explained the desensitization that most of them have undergone. They see it everyday. Ricky explained, “These are the poorest of the poor.”

As I thought about what he said, strangely a part of me became envious. Not of the poverty, the starvation, the combined stench of human waste with the salt water of the Pacific, but of the humility and curiosity with which they approached life. They were the image of God not yet corrupted by the ravenous quest for mammon. They were lives uninfluenced by the powers of consumerism and a market-driven economy. Their quest was for their daily bread, nothing more. They are those whom Jesus calls blessed, for theirs is the kingdom of God.