What Now?

Aside from coming here to accompany Lola, meet my family, and discover where my mom came from, I came with the purpose to volunteer. I had made contact with a few organizations here focused on working with women prior to leaving. I figured that as long as I was staying within Metro Manila there would be no problem. Holy mother of all goodness was I wrong. If you would just take a second to Google "traffic in Manila" I need not say more. Bumper-to-bumper, motorcyclists weaving in and out of crevices, constant honking, zero lanes, regularly almost killing people...I'm talking what should be a ten minute drive taking closer to 45 minutes to an hour. Insane, I know. So that changes things.

I was talking to the Women's Crisis Center in Quezon City but now that I'm here I realize that may not be such a realistic commute. I'm waiting to hear back from Girl Matter about their location and hope that that can work out. I talked to someone involved there and she told me I would definitely have a place there. I'd love to work with them and would be able to do so as an English teacher- woop woop!

My Tita Josie, another one of Lola's nieces, is trying to get me in with a project that does medical missions on the weekends in different places around the Philippines. I'd be assisting doctors (handing out medicine, for example) in various locations with them. It would be something different than what I've ever done and I'd have the opportunity to see more of the Philippines than just Manila. Hopefully that works out. She told me she should be hearing back from them by next week. I think I'm getting ready to start being busy.