Reflection of a BLDF Volunteer

While going through my file, I found this reflection from Ms. Claudia Masur, Swiss national, who spent two with BLDF as part of a field team. Let me share with you this piece written 24 June 2011. 

Reflection of two weeks with BLDF

First I want to thank Sir Nes and his team that I could join you for these two weeks. Almost six month ago I came to Asia for the first time. I am fascinated of the beauty of these countries.  The nature, cultures and the people. But it’s not only that. In the time of traveling I was also faced with poverty. It is very hard for me to see how many families don’t even have enough money to satisfy their hunger. As a tourist it’s easy to close the eyes and turn back home only with the memory of a very beautiful country. On my travel I decided to see more then this. That was my way to BLDF.

It was very interesting how you work and what the problems are here and to see how much time and activity that it’s needed to reduce poverty. This situation is hard to compare with the one in Switzerland. Every child there grows up with enough food, proper drink water that comes from the tab and the possibility to go to school. Some have to work more for it, some less, but it’s there own decision and it’s not just a destiny. Of course we also have problems like crime, unemployment and households that are below the income threshold. Crime is a problem in all over the world and can’t be reduced by money I think, but in case of the others our state could help if the people would ask for. Some people don’t and decide to live on the streets and to beg. Instead of giving them money from time to time I will donate it now to countries that really need that money. And I will say to them: “Be happy! You have the possibility to ask the state for money!”  

In the workshops in Talibon, Pilar, Jagna, Tubigon I recognized that one of the   main problem is the disposal of garbage and water. To be honest I was never confronted with a problem like this before. Now I’m interested in how it works in Switzerland and I will try to collect some ideas to propose you.

Even with all this problems it was very nice to see the way you live compare to Swiss people. Almost everybody has a smile on the face, knows how to joke and not to be serious all the time. My question is what really makes the people happy. Is it Christianity and love? In this part we could definitely learn from you and reduce our high rate of suicide. When I go back to my county next week I will be very thankful for things that I took for granted before. I will recommend to every traveler to do some volunteer work. It is one of the best ways to find out more about a country and how to help a country. It’s even important to see this side of the places we are able to visit in case of only go to tourist’s places and enjoy traveling.  

The weeks with BLDF were very impressive for me. I hope I was assistance with the preparation for the workshops. Thanks for kindness Sir Nes, Charisse and Kristine.

Sincerely yours,

Claudia

New Task for an Old Guy to Do

19 Oct 2012. Well, finally, the long road led to this, a blog site, where we can post what we do in our Bohol Local Development Foundation or BLDF, for short. Most of the materials were taken from  files that used to be with the the website www.poverty.cafe.org which we were not able to maintain over the years.

The management staff conveniently forgot the expiration date for the website and so it was gone after around six years in existence. In three of those years, we could not update it; we just kept renewing the fee for the use of the domain. It took us quite a while to decide to have this blog inside.

The problem was how to retrieve the materials from the old website. The former Webmaster, Arnold Seloterio who is based in Singapore, was quite a big help. He remembered he was keeping digital files of articles in the old poverty cafe in his home and requested his brother, Topher, to look for them. In less than a week, Topher was able to send those digital files.

It was Natnat Hinay, the PDMS IT Specialist, who assisted us with technical details about setting up the blog and retrieving articles from the files that Topher Seloterio sent us.

Now it's here, the blog. Hope we can maintain it for a cheaper way to reach out to our trustees, volunteers and project-based staff.

It's probably one way to keep the faith, as Doracie Nantes says, to keep up with what Thelma Cruz refers to as "walang kamatayang development work."

The only downside is that this is another task that an old man will do. But, I guess, the new technologies will make it easier for an old guy like me to reach out.

Another record of our passage to keep. Let's move on.