My Parents

My parents came to visit me in the Philippines this past July, for a week. My parents who have always held the liberal card, the open minded, simple hippie lifestyle. It turns out, they are not as young as we all thought they were any more. The dirt, the poverty, the sadness that can be the Philippines if you look at it that way was overwhelming for them at times, as it was (and sometimes still is) for me. But it also turns out, it was really really great to see them. And through the ups and downs of that one week, it was also to be one of our most memorable experiences shared together as a family.




The Philippines
What a daunting task to describe a visit to our daughter Jessica in the Philippines, where she lives and works as a Peace Corps volunteer. So much to say. Our first trip to the East. In the hot/humid season. We had always thought of ourselves as adventurers but now we weren’t so sure.


Our arrival at the airport in Manila found us disoriented. But we found Jessica and everything was wonderful. It soon became apparent that we were completely dependent upon her in this unfamiliar environment. She knew everything; we knew nothing. She got us a cab to the pension. Then we headed out toward her barangay. A jeepney to the train. Oops, no train because there was no electricity due to the TYPHOON that we missed by less than a day. No drainage either. Water everywhere. PEOPLE everywhere. Where to now. Another cab, Jessie and the driver haggling in Tagalog. Another jeepney to a trike and a bit of a walk and basically we kind of made it to her bamboo hut (left without it’s vaunted electricity and water because of the typhoon).


We spent 2 days around her barangay and in Antipolo and then set out for resorts. Air conditioning? What a relief. But does it work? Don’t count on it. Don’t count on anything.


So how to describe our visit? A chronology? Impossible. Maybe this:


Dirty, crowded Manila, Antipolo only somewhat better, strange stores, strange new currency (Jessie, hold all my money), chaos, poverty, glass buildings, dilapidated shacks, bamboo huts, power lines everywhere congested and chaotic like photos of New York circa 1910; begging children, children and their families living on streets, children sleeping on sidewalks, policemen with machine guns, jeepneys with crazy decorations everywhere inside and out (this is my jeepney, this is me), loud music w lots of bass, crowded jeepneys. Passing money. Traffic, no traffic lights, like riding bumper cars at the fair, every man for himself. Getting on, getting off, don’t hit your head. Trikes (yikes!). Sit inside. Sit outside on rear. Exhaust. Foul air in general. Burning garbage, smells like marijuana, like a nice campfire, no, smells like burning garbage. Cover my mouth. So hot. Sweat beyond caring. Conserve energy. Go slow. Starting to understand.


Bumpy roads, dirt roads, clusters of black rubber hoses along road, that’s the water supply? The view across the valley so green and pretty, the tropical foliage, bamboo, the banana trees with clusters of green bananas and a banana heart at the end. Eating bananas (you thought you knew what a real banana tasted like?). Eating pineapple. Mango. Fish. Rice. Rice paddies. Plowing a flooded rice paddy with a carabao. Rice growing. Everywhere. Beautiful stretches of green rice fields. Mountains. The bamboo bridge and bamboo houseboat that I’ll never forget. Water - rivers, lakes, clean? dirty? the beach, the harbor, the ocean, aquamarine colored water like in the Caribbean maybe nicer, fishing boats, snorkeling over a magnificent reef.


(I pause here to note that on our first day in Bohol I stepped on a sea urchin and am finally recovered only now, more than 3 weeks later (the stubborn little spike, the nastiest of the dozen or so that refused to be teased out by a needle, finally got infected just enough to be forced out.)


The young adult locals love videoke, they all sing wonderfully (do they really?), all the people we met were so terribly nice, friendly, respectful, generous, interesting. Some fascinating stories among those that told them. The children in the orphanage and at the school were wonderful young people, full of life, overflowing with affection. Many had sad stories in their past but Jessie said don’t feel sorry for them, they’re OK now, they’re here. Wonderful, beautiful children. Wonderful people caring for them at the Center.


Such a strange culture, so American in many ways but not at all really; quite Spanish in language influence, Catholicism, architecture, but not at all really. It’s Asian, Oceanic, but kind of not really. I kind of don’t get it. The Mall of Asia. Bamboo. Coconuts.


Beautiful landscape, wonderful ingenious thoughtful people, poverty, chaos and inefficiency, silly politics and commercialism. They call the Philippines the “sick man of Asia”, but I’m not so sure you’d find too many Pilipinos agreeing.





We took nearly 150 photographs and Jessie has recently posted that much again on Facebook. The shots of mountains and trees and animals and water look great. But the pictures that the mind carries of the streets of Antipolo, the road in Jessie’s barangay, and the children at Grace Christian Mission cannot be properly shared with anyone who has not already experienced them for oneself.


On our last day, killing time at the Pension in Manila where the PCVs come and go, we had the chance to meet several of Jessica’s colleagues. They made quite an impression, all of them carrying that same sense of purpose and adventure, the dogged determination to rise above all hardship. If anyone can do it, they can. We left full of affection for the people of the Philippines, admiration for the dedicated people of the Peace Corps, pride in our daughter Jessica, and a little bit more pride than before for our own country.


It’s also great to be home.