“My mother is no longer going to buy DOLE or Del Monte pineapples.” Lisa tells when we met again after our exposure program in the Philippines. Lisa is one of the twelve students who came to the Philippines for four weeks from 11 March to 8 April.
The Belgian university of applied sciences Odisee gave its nursing and animal care students the opportunity to get to know projects in the Cordillera concerning health care, agriculture and community development. The Flemish NGO Solidagro, with operations in the Philippines and CDPC, was responsible for the program and the supervision in the Philippines.
Although the Cordillera was the main purpose of the trip, we first spent a week in Manila, says Koen Van de Merckt. He was together with Kitty Weyn one of the two Flemish supervisors.
The office of the Citizens’ Disaster Response Center (CDRC), an NGO that supports and organizes community-based disaster management, was our home base during our first few days in the Philippines. We slept there and got to know their operation including other NGO’s. Jhana Tejome, project officer of synergy for sustainable development, was our caring hostess. While in Manila, and therefore we too, were hit by water scarcity, we learned more about climate issues, food supply and health care and about the functioning of a number of NGO’s:
Anya Mendoza, executive director of the Climate Change Network of Community-Based Initiatives (CCNCI) testified shockingly about the current unpredictability of the weather system, its consequences and how they help farmers by organizing themselves and establishing alternative schools. For the first time we also heard about the great influence of the United States. This partly due to the presence of large American multinationals in mining and agriculture. The way in which the Lumad schools are put under pressure, the presence of large haciendas and the poverty among many farmers remind us of the stories we knew from our colony. Anya confirms: “We still seem like a half-colony of the US.”
Renmin Vizconde, executive director of the Philippine Network of Food Security Programs (PNFSP), introduces us even more to the contradictions in the Philippines. We remember that the Philippines are a rich tropical country with great biodiversity and soil richness, but it is also deals with hunger and is the third most vulnerable country in terms of climate change. That the Philippines have one of the highest degrees of literacy (97.5%), but that of every ten students who start in grade 1, only one gets a higher education diploma. That the Philippines is a democracy, but that nearly 200 human rights and environmental defenders were killed during the Duterte administration.
A number of courageous witnesses from Karapatan (Alliance For The Advancement of People’s Rights) shared their story about how they themselves were imprisoned, about their wives in captivity and about their children being killed. The room where we stayed together was boiling hot, but we all felt cold. Our own worries about water shortage and strange food seemed trivial.
Our penultimate day in Manila we visited the Jose R. Reyes Memorial Medical Center. Here, our nursing students saw the reality of a Filipino public hospital for the first time. Even without taking pictures, we still remember the images of several people in one bed, beds in the corridors and visitors who bring food for the patients. However, we also remember the perseverance of the nurses who work there for up to 16 hours a day and won’t give up. In our last day in Manila, we visited a number of tourist highlights—Intramuros, Fort Santiago, Rizal Park and the National Museum. Impressive! What a contrast with the past few days.
After the bustle and heat, Baguio felt pleasant, cooler, less pollution and greener. We met Blessy and Charm, our fantastic facilitators during the further exposure program. From them, and a number of other CDPC staff, we learned much more about the Cordillera and indigenous peoples. During visits to our partner universities (Saint Louis University and Benguet State University) we became thoroughly acquainted with the way healthcare and education are organize. A staff from the Community Health Education, Services and Training in the Cordillera Region (CHESTCORE), the health unit of CDPC, shared how they train health workers, later we would see some of them at work in Lamag and Tanglag. Enthusiastic staff of the Cordillera Youth Center (CYC) taught us how to play traditional instruments in the Cordillera, the gangsa (gong) and tongatong (bamboo). They also shared about the problems that students and younger generation have. We heard the word “red-tagging” for the first time, a term that came very close a few days later when we saw on Facebook a photo of a note nailed onto the door of CYC.
A visit to barangay Ucab in Itogon Benguet opened our eyes to the devastating effects of a landslide. The visit to a nearby barangay where we saw cracked houses and visited the evacuation center made a deep impression in the group. Our own wealth, our options for traveling, our willingness to buy cheap products without considering their origins, it was all discussed during a conversation. Such moments made the exposure program valuable. Everyone of us since became aware of the real price paid for cheap gold.
After fourteen days, halfway through our exposure program, we left for our first community: Lamag. The entire Barangay (about 139 families) just sat together for a community meeting when we arrived, so we could introduce ourselves. After the meeting we met our host families. We immediately felt at home here. In addition to living with our host families in the coming days, we also became acquainted with the health workers and animal carers and their work.
We helped with weighing babies, administering first aid and vaccinating and castrating animals. Not as we are used to in the West, often much more primitive and with limited resources. But always by driven and motivated health workers and animal keepers. Their dedication, inventiveness and perseverance deserves our respect and admiration. 
We ended the stay in Lamag with a memorable Solidarity Night where we sang and danced together. We are grateful that we could share a piece of the rich indigenous culture of the people of Lamag.
From Lamag (Ilocos Sur) we went, with a stopover in Tabuk (Kalinga) to Tanglag (Lubuagan).
After a long bus ride, a brisk walk (with impressive crossing of the Chico River) awaited us to reach this barangay. Again a warm welcome and nice introduction to our new host families. Due to its remote location, we were even more part of the community in Tanglag. Cooking together, preparing coffee, learning to make medicines, working in the field, many fascinating conversations occurred. Members of the (Tanglag Community Organization for Unity and Development (TACOUD) and all residents of Tanglag made sure we really felt at home here.
After Tanglag we returned to Baguio for a few days. Here we did a thorough evaluation of our journey, together with a number of CDPC staff. We asked our students what they learned from their visit. They didn’t have to think long to answer this: they learned to push their limits, live together in a group, be flexible, appreciate small things, realize how privileged they are, realized how serious a number of problems are in the Philippines, but especially how brave the people were. We got to know, how positively they continue to believe in and fight for a better future and the importance of international solidarity.
Thanks to the efforts of CDPC and all the others who received us hospitably, it was an impressive and unforgettable experience.
~Odisee students from the exposure program, their supervisors-Kitty and Koen