Year in Photos

"Security Wall" around Bethlehem

 As we get older we all seem to comment how the time flies and how the year passes so much faster than it did when we were younger. This year has reminded me how big changes do have the tendency to make the time feel like it moves more slowly as now looks rather different than 12 months ago. Saying that I did get back to the UK for Christmas thinking what a long year it had been only to be shocked that a whole year had passed since a neighbour of theirs had died since that only seemed like a couple of months ago to me. Our brains do funny things with time.

And so for a quick overview of the more unusual bits of my year in photos, since photos seem to be largely more popular than text and anyway if you want more text I have a whole 6 months of blog posts to follow!

March and April (Nicaragua, Panama and Costa Rica)

• A week of training on industrial automation for work in Costa Rica, still delighted I could learn something new and in my second language. 
• A whistle stop 24 hour trip to Panama for work, a new passport stamp and a stop by the famous Panama Canal on the way back from site. (Would have been better without having the sun in my eyes for the photo)
• One and a half day women's retreat immediately after arriving back from Panama, beautiful location on the Nicaraguan Pacific coast and an opportunity to make an unexpected new friend - Dawn.
• One of many tasty cook-ups of foreign food with my friend Lisa, her family and anyone else we could rope into eating adventurously! 

May and June (Nicaragua, UK, Israel and Palestine)

• More food from other foreign places with Lisa and co!

• First visit home to the UK for the year. Two days sightseeing in London with mum as a belated birthday present for her.

• As always lots of fun with niece and nephew.
• Another new passport stamp as I joined a group tour for the first time in years and made my first visit to the Holy Land with lots of opportunity to learn about current events as well as seeing historical religious sites.



At Temple Mount, Jerusalem

• Also managed to catch up with Jenny, a school friend I haven't seen for almost 20 years and meet her husband and baby daughter as well as meeting up on the same day with some university friends Krish and Miriam and their growing family who I hadn't seen for about 10 years.

Bethlehem

Dominus Flevit, Jerusalem

July to September (Nicaragua, UK, Malaysia)

Leaving dinner with friends in Managua

• Made it back to the UK twice, once for my niece's 2nd birthday and the second time for my nephew to start school - this time I was in transition to Asia.
• Sadness at leaving Nicaragua but lots of great goodbyes and I was finally worn down into joining Facebook which has turned out to be a good way of keeping in touch over long distances with friends in different countries.
• Moved to Malaysia but within two weeks had agreed to move another three and a half hours flying time more eastwards to the Philippines, but managed to see the Petronas Towers and the Indian night market in KL before I left as well as finding a church I would have liked to be part of.

Colleagues from Nicaragua

Birthday celebration with friends from work, Managua

Petronas Towers, KL

Photos from market, Little India

Masjid Jamek, KL

October to December (Philippines, Hong Kong)

• Moved to Manila, Philippines for about 6 months to finish a new water treatment plant. Moved from a hurricane and earthquake zone to a typhoon and earthquake zone, but nice to be able to manage in English as the working language in almost every encounter.
• Weekend trip to Hong Kong for visa renewal purposes. Found flying over the South China Sea seems to involve more turbulence than I would like.
• Made it home on Christmas Eve to spend Christmas with the family.

Trying to partake in one of Filipinos favourite pastimes - karaoke

Taal volcano

Tagaytay boat trip, Philippines

 

Cable car in Hong Kong

Hong Kong

Faith

Looking through this years photos today trying to pull some together for an end of year summary my eye was caught by the following that I took on the shores of the Sea of Galilee earlier this year.

Migration Economics Filipino Style

Yesterday's newspaper heralded that in October the Philippines received a record high in terms of remittances sent back to the country by Overseas Filipino Workers. In one month is was US$1.78 billion so about US$20 for each man, woman and child in the Philippines. The destinations for the more than half a million Filipinos who have decided to try their luck overseas responding to formal jobs are mainly the Middle East, Taiwan and Hong Kong.

However the scale of how the Philippines is impacted by this exodus of its people (9 million work overseas as OFW) isn't really so remarkable in the headlines in the Business section of the newspaper but more by the everyday conversations that you have. Every family seems to have a relative that works overseas that it is almost unremarkable. Driving with 3 Filipinos that I work with the other day. The first spent 25 years working in Saudi Arabia as an engineer and manager, only returning to visit his family once a year, now his daughter in turn is in the USA and they have been unable to see her for the last five years. The second is a 28 year old electrical engineer who is planning to work "over" (local terms for overseas) sometime soon before he marries. Two of his sisters graduated in Business Administration but then discovered it was hard to earn enough money in the Philippines so they work on the production line in a car parts factory in Korea. The third who is also an electrical engineer but a bit older has just returned with his family to the Philippines after a few years working in Brunei, we spoke of his sister coming in the country for Christmas from her job in Singapore. I doubt anyone I work with here has all of their family based in the Philippines.

In the UK it saddens me that we have a tendency to vilify immigrants but for most it is simply a chance to work hard for more reasonable money so that they can support their family back home despite the hardships of separation.

Christmas Carols: O Little Town of Bethlehem

Every shopping experience in Manila since mid-November has involved Christmas carols and to my surprise most of them have been carols as opposed to Christmas songs like Jingle Bells and Frosty the Snowman. Joy to the World and Hark the Herald Angels seem to head the charts.

O little town of Bethlehem
How still we see thee lie
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep
The silent stars go by
Yet in thy dark streets shineth
The everlasting Light
The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight

I had the privilege to visit Bethlehem earlier this year to see the town where Christ was born, but to do that I had to pass through military checkpoints since the Israeli's through fear have encircled the town with a 30 foot high wall.

For Christ is born of Mary
And gathered all above
While mortals sleep, the angels keep
Their watch of wondering love
O morning stars together
Proclaim the holy birth
And praises sing to God the King
And Peace to men on earth

Needless to say the experience for tourists is surprising but fairly straightforward, however for the few Palestinians who have a permit to leave Bethlehem the experience is far different, like entering and leaving the "open-air" prison that they are subject to. The young Israeli soldiers who man the checkpoints and towers on the wall do not "watch with wondering love" the people of Christ's birth community.

How silently, how silently
The wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of His heaven.
No ear may hear His coming,
But in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive him still,
The dear Christ enters in.

Palestinian Christians point out that if Jesus were born now the military restrictions would mean that Mary and Joseph could not make the journey from Nazareth (in Israel) to Bethlehem (in the West Bank). Fear is real and injustices many in the Holy Land and yet God is not disconnected from this pain, grief and anger. Jesus entered a world of sin, along with occupation and injustice. He did not enter because he had to, he entered because his love gave him no alternative. He was born in Bethlehem due to the occupying powers decree for a census for taxation. 

O holy Child of Bethlehem
Descend to us, we pray
Cast out our sin and enter in
Be born to us today
We hear the Christmas angels
The great glad tidings tell
O come to us, abide with us
Our Lord Emmanuel  

Pinoy: Happiest People on Earth

In the same way that the term "pinolero" is used in colloquial Nicaraguan Spanish to mean a Nicaraguan, the word "pinoy" is used in day to day Tagalog/Pilipino to describe a Filipino. Both are terms of pride and not derision.

Christmas shopping this afternoon in the huge department store in the local mall and trying to get inspired on only one of the immense five floors for appropriate gifts for my local colleagues I came across the Filipino made section. Among the various mugs, bags, hats and clothes that were emblazoned with "I LOVE MANILA" and the like was a T-shirt that read "PINOY: HAPPIEST PEOPLE ON EARTH."

Although I've only been here a little over two months I suspect this may in fact be true and if it isn't Pinoys must be close to the top of the league and probably sincerely believe they are the happiest. Only yesterday a British friend/colleague and I were sat outside our site office at work feeling fairly fed up by recent work related events and moaning amongst our sarcasm as the British tend to do, when my colleague saw some of the Filipinos laughing and joking together and commented how he wished we were more like them - able to be always cheerful regardless of the circumstances.

As I've mentioned in an earlier post Filipinos know how to be sociable, spending time with other people, sharing food seem to be at the heart of their culture. To a Filipino the idea that I and my other British colleagues actually relish the rest and relaxation that comes with spending some time on our own (individually not as a group) I suspect would seem totally alien, rest and relaxation to a Filipino comes from spending time with others.

It reminded me of a conversation with Mel, the local Project Manager from our construction partner here in Manila about a month ago when he was explaining to us how All Souls and All Saints Day's were spent. Having lived in Central America and acquainted with "Dia de los Muertos" (Day of the Dead) I was not surprised, as I would otherwise have been, that the day involved going to the cemetery and having a picnic under temporary awnings set up at the graveside of loved ones. It is two days of family gatherings and celebrations in cemeteries.

To a British person this is strange to macabre, since death is not something that we really discuss despite the fact that of course it is inevitable. The ease with which death and mourning can be discussed and accepted in some other places that I have lived has really impressed me. It is one of the things that I think other cultures I have been exposed to handle better, although it is worth remembering that the belief in God is still more widespread and talked about too in those places.

However Mel rightly pointed out with pride that Filipinos know how to take something sad and make a celebration out of it, adding that the Philippines has the lowest suicide rate in the world. Whether or not statistically it is actually correct that the Philippines has the lowest suicide rate, it is undoubtedly low and what struck me was the fact whilst there are so many indices that make the Philippines look far less desirable, yet with the sense of optimism and fun that Filipinos have the statistic quoted to us was the one showing their resilience and happiness.

Sanitised Sacrifice

Have been mulling over this blog post for a few weeks now and finally decided to put fingers to the keyboard! As I mentioned in a previous blog last month was the Muslim festival of Eid ul-Fitr and whilst the Philippines is a rare, majority Christian country in Asia in respect to the minority Muslim population Eid ul-Fitr was declared a national holiday. Needless to say none of the non-Muslims were unhappy about getting an extra day off work, myself included!

Whilst I learnt the basics about the "Five Pillars of Islam" in religious education classes in secondary school I had heard nothing about Eid until I lived in Guyana, where due to the diversity of the population Hindu, Christian and Muslim festivals were celebrated as national holidays.I have learnt there are two Eids - Eid ul-Fitr and Eid al-Adha and was interested to hear a conversation between my Muslim boss and a colleague who has spent a lot of years living in the Middle East about how different countries view one or the other as the Great Eid as opposed to Little Eid.

Eid ul-Fitr is the celebration of the end of Ramadan, the month of fasting and it seems only appropriate to me that that would be celebrated with a great feast and as I watched the regional news from Hong Kong the coverage was about the trade at livestock markets in the days running up to Eid. It is also the start of the Haaj, the pilgrimage to Mecca (Ramadan and the Haaj being two of the five pillars of Islam if my memory from all those years ago still serves me well enough).

In Guyana I was surprised to discover the basis of Eid al-Adha, which is the celebration of Abraham being willing to take his son Ishmael up the mountain to sacrifice him in obedience to Allah. At the last moment Allah instructs him not to sacrifice Ishmael and instead provides a goat. I remember being stunned how closely this matches the Biblical story, only that as Christians we believe that it was Isaac the second son of Abraham but the son of the promise of God who was taken to be sacrificed. Until then I had viewed Islam as an alien faith so dissimilar to Christianity. After that I found I could feel much more comfortable in Muslim celebrations, unlike the Hindu ones. Allah is simply the Arabic word for God, used even before the birth of Mohammed.

At Eid al-Adha a Muslim family buys a cow, sheep or goat according to their means. It is then slaughtered remembering the sacrificial goat that God provided to Abraham, the meat is then divided into thirds - a third for family, a third for friends and a third for the poor (giving to the poor being the third of the five pillars).

Having just finished reading of all the sacrifices required of the Israelites in Leviticus and Numbers in the Bible and how important the blood was I am struck by how as Christians we have forgotten what a bloody system of sacrifice we have been saved from. The week before Eid and the TV coverage of livestock markets I had almost seen a sacrifice at a work site not far from where I work in Manila. It was strange to see a tied up goat being dragged out onto the construction, I even glimpsed the knife in the hand of one of the workers, but it wasn't until an Asian colleague explained to me the goat was to be slaughtered for good luck in the work that it really dawned on me. I'm pleased to say the process was delayed once the guys caught sight of me, deciding for whatever reason that it would be better not to have an outsider for a spectator.

When as Christians we talk of Christ coming as a baby at Christmas and the purpose of his life being to be sacrificed as an offering to pay the price of justice for our wrong doing, it seems just like words, it seems sanitised not the bloody mess that it really was. Both those of faith and those of no-faith have a tendency to talk of sacrifice in a very understated way, instead of a "small inconvenience" it is a "sacrifice" that we are making - very rarely are our sacrifices, even our living sacrifices much of a sacrifice at all.

Christmas Lights

Many of us who live outside our "home" countries comment that it's hard to feel like Christmas is coming in our new country since all the things we associate with the build up to the Christmas festivities are different. The temperature is one of the biggest obstacles to those of us from the cold northern climes. I remember how strange it felt the first Christmas away from the UK in Guyana eating ice cream in Demico's with the air conditioning turned on full as a contrast to the the heat and very out of place snowmen stuck on the windows.

Christmas is a big deal in the Philippines and I have already had Christmas carols blaring out of shops and public areas for more than a month. I've only been here 2 months but even as a newbie I know Christmas is a BIG DEAL. Traffic is always bad in Manila but now it is worse than ever, today I spent over three and a half hours in the car going to 15km each way to work and back so we never went above 10km/h average! In some sections there is no doubt it would have been much faster to walk. If I ask why the traffic is SO bad I get told that now it's December it will be even worse than normal.

However what has really impressed me in a positive way are the beautiful Christmas lights that go up, in people's homes, shopping malls, residential areas and most impressive of all is the free public entry light display at the electricity company's, Meralco, premises about 15 minutes walk from my hotel. Manila may have only been ranked 128 out of a survey of around 200 cities on which were the best to live in, but it has managed to do something no other place I have lived in out of the UK has achieved, it has given me an excited anticipation for Christmas - and not simply to reduce the amount of traffic! On Wednesday night I walked through the Meralco display with a colleague commenting how much my dad and niece and nephew would enjoy it. My photos don't really do it justice but they are the best I can manage.