Some Little Peculiarities

Welp, hello again, dear readers. Hopefully this finds you all well again! I figured I'd take a bit of a break from the ongoing narrative to share some of the little peculiarities that we experience here. So, here it goes!

Well I've talked about my daily schedule in previous posts, but a question I get a lot about my daily schedule is how the language barrier is. As it turns out, English is one of the national languages, the other being Tagalog (pronounced Tah-gah-lick), or the most common language for native Filipinos. As a result of English being a predominant language, Matt and I have been a little slow on learning Tagalog, and so far most of our education on Tagalog has revolved around names of foods and juices. I guess we need to start somewhere! But, most of the monks are FLUENT in English, so far the professors and students we've met are fluent, and so the language barrier is almost non-existent. A lot of times, when Filipinos are talking amongst each other, they'll speak in both English and Tagalog in the same sentences, they just click in and out of both languages. We wish we understood what they were saying, but just listening is a pretty cool experience too. The Tagalog language, by the way, is a mix of native languages as well as Spanish, which is a direct result of the Spanish colonization from the 1500's-1800's. But, the only time that there is a substantial language barrier is on Thursdays. You see, all of the prayer times we go to, all of the masses we go to, are all in English, EXCEPT on Thursday. On Thursdays they call it 'native language day', and so all of the masses on Thursday are in Tagalog. Even though Matt and I don't really understand what the Priest is saying or what we're singing, it's still really fantastic to be part of this experience, especially since the language just flows so beautifully. There's really not a choppy nature to it, it's just...well it's like a river flowing, which is interesting being as the word 'Tagalog' literally means 'native of the river' or 'river dweller'. Ironic? Who knows.

Another interesting peculiarity is that for every meal we have rice and fish, and with that we either have beef, chicken, or pork. Again, the only exception is on Fridays, when it is only rice and fish. Now, I think I can speak for both Matt and I when I say that we haven't gotten sick of rice yet, but we're getting...a little...tired of the fish smell. I mean, we still eat the fish, but every so often it'd be nice to have a burger and fries...or something to that extent. While this is the case, the great thing about Fridays is that yes, we do only have fish, but the cooks make it a little more appetizing by changing it up a bit. A few weeks ago that resulted in us having crab for dinner...so..we were given the whole crab and had to break them open. Last week we had Snapper, which is apparently one of the most expensive fish to buy in the Philippines. Last night we had Jumbo Shrimp, and again, we had to peel the shrimp. Love. It.

So, back to the narrative of my life. There are three substantial things that happened this past week. First and foremost, the off campus bombing. I know last time I only touched on it briefly, but a lot of details have come out since then. First off, the bombing was an intra-fraternity war that our students got caught in the middle of. That's right, 2 LAW fraternities, fraternities with lawyers, the future of this country, were fighting, and apparently here fighting isn't just pranks and jokes, it's 'I am going to hurt you.' Needless to say it's been tough for Matt and I to comprehend, and a lot of people have asked if we have these sorts of things in the U.S. We answered that frats in the U.S. are guilty of a lot of pranks and occasionally hazing, but this sort of thing in the U.S. is categorized as terrorism. Also, the bombing wasn't done by a homemade bomb, it was actually a grenade. Seriously, come on. Thankfully most of our students have been discharged, and were discharged within a day or two, but three of the girls ended up going through amputations just to save their lives. Just dealing with this bombing, and the relative lock-down that happened in the college and monastery this week has been incredibly eye-opening and just so...new..to us. While it shocked most people around us that 44 of their students were injured, SO MANY of them just wrote it off as another ruthless attack in the city. To feel so little shock, so little...fright about an event like this...it makes you wonder what horrors and events throughout your life shape and form you into just moving on from tragedies so easily. Thankfully, to the relief of many, the President of the Philippines, Benigno Aquino III has promised to use the full force of the state to bring those people to justice. The National Bureau of Investigation (aka FBI) and the police task force of Manila have been charged in finding the bombers, and apparently there are already several substantial leads.

As a result of the tragedy, most classes were suspended or canceled this week. The next two weeks are finals weeks, and then the students have a two week semester break, so...Matt and I have a 4 week sabbatical from teaching. We do have a lot planned, though, and have been meeting frequently with the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, who is a great guy and has really taken a liking to Matt and I. Apparently...when the semester begins in November...Matt and I...will have...our OWN CLASSES. That's right, folks, starting soon we'll no longer be Special Guest Lecture Professors, we'll be LEGIT Professors. Dolla. Dolla. BILLS! Matt will be doing a humanities/philosophy/art class, and I'll have my own section of Filipino History/Constitution/Political Science. So, the next 4 weeks will be spent in faculty meetings with the C.A.S. and learning/planning our classes. We're both waiting with voracious anticipation.

And finally, ending on a great note, this past Wednesday the San Beda Red Lions had their last regular season game of the NCAA season. Entering the game they were 15-0 and were playing the #2 team in the nation, us being #1 of course. No team has ever gone 16-0 in the regular season (though in a shorter season a team had gone 12-0 before). So, we got to the arena, and it was PACKED. There were drums pounding, horns blowing, and people cheering. The arena was split right down the middle, all red on one side (San Beda) and gold/yellow on the other (San Sebastian (BOOOOOO!!)). To make it even more suspenseful, the two front-runners for MVP would be playing against each other (Sudan Daniel for the Red Lions (Sue is actually from California, so Matt and I have had some great convos with him and have started becoming friends) and some guy named Abueva from the Golden Stags (a real nut case and showboat)). Well to just cut through the suspense, the Red Lions did, in fact, win! So, for the first time in history they were the only undefeated team! We were invited to the post-game dinner with the team, who were a little relieved, a little celebratory, but were still very intent and focused on the next step: the playoffs. The playoffs here are quite different from the U.S. There's no big tournament. In fact, only 4 teams qualify, and because we swept the regular season, we were actually put straight into the Championship series, a best of 5 series. So, the #3 and #4 seeds will play an elimination game, then the winner of that game plays the #2 seed in an elim. game, and then the winner of that game plays us. Our next game is October 9th, and since we swept the regular season we were given a win in the Championship series. So, as long as we win 2 more games, without losing 3 first, we win the Championship. The team was a little relieved to have made history, but they are pretty intent on just continuing to win out, and finish the season with a perfect record and a Championship.

So, exciting things on the rise! Hope things are well! Good luck Johnnies!