Reach the poor

more →

This morning I took Toni Rose and two of her neighbors to Baguio City to eat lunch in a Jollibee restaurant and ride rental tricycles and boats in Burnham Park. I have wondered in previous outings if a pedaled boat would be preferable to a rowed boat, so today we went to the concessionaire who had royal blue-and-yellow pedal boats and row boats. I picked an open-top boat. more →

I walked down to Baguio Gold to see the family and take the girls back uphill so that we could get a jeepney ride to Baguio City. On Thursday, the sisters had expressed in riding tricycles in Burnham Park, so I said that I’d take them today.

more →

Today Mack walked upstairs to Mail And More in SM City Baguio to retrieve a copy of his birth certificate mailed from National Statistics Office. We ate lunch in Vizco’s beside Session Road (4-stars) then walked downhill to a UnionBank branch to open a EON Cyber Account for Mack. Afterward, Dominic and I paid our PLDT bill and I tried in vain to find a parcel sent via registered mail from Quezon City on Monday or Tuesday. PhilPost advised me that it may arrive tomorrow. I’ll be riding a bus toward Sagada tomorrow morning, so I suppose that I’ll see the package on Monday. I hate PhilPost. I had thought that the U.S. Postal Service in Bay County was lackadaisical. Philippine Postal Service makes U.S.P.S. in Cedar Grove look like FedEx. I’ve heard that Filipinos prefer courier services to PhilPost. But Mail And More/Air 21 hadn’t wanted to deliver to Mack, and 2Go, a U.P.S. contractor, didn’t want to deliver a parcel to my home.

Well, one small step in the intended direction: one of the two sidewalk vendors in Baguio City whom I had recruited to sell The Jeepney magazine has sold her initial, free allotment and has bought additional copies to sell, along with men’s, women’s and children’s hosiery. Our other ambulatory vendor partner, Jeffrey, hasn’t been heard from. Perhaps he tired of trying to sell a new, relatively unknown magazine to passersby on Baguio City’s sidewalks. The corner vendors of newspapers and magazines haven’t asked me for additional inventory, and I’ve seen the first three issues awaiting buyers on their newspaper/magazine racks. The only thing they’ve asked me for is another magazine title, something that people are familiar with, such as OK! or Star Studio.

Saturday- I feel as if I’m covered with a layer of fine dust after hiking four hours then riding a jeepney back to Baguio City downtown. I’d really like to take a shower, but while I’m in the big city, I thought that I’d use an internet cafe to check my e-mail and my weblog. Late this morning I took recyclables to the mall (”trash to cash”), then trudged downhill to Vizco’s for a beverage and a scan of the national newspapers. After slaking my thirst, I began walking without aim toward Burnham Park. I had no destination nor photographic subjects in mind. I just wanted to walk in the glorious autumn weather, and if I tired of walking, I’d take lunch and resume reading a book about spiritual healing. more →

Yesterday Mack and I went to a new member briefing at Benguet Electrical Cooperative as a prelude for getting a new BENECO membership and an electrical connection to the shack that his family resides in. Afterward, I had a horrible headache, as if I’d been shot in the head. So we went to a pharmacy, and I bought ibuprofen. One has to take ibuprofen with food or milk, so we took tea and a snack in Vizco’s restaurant beside Session Road. more →

Dominic and I returned from another brief sojourn to Sagada in Mountain Province on Sunday night so that Dominic could begin working on his computer for a new client in the U.S.A. My computer’s hard drive has been mailed to Xyon in Quezon City.  So while I’m dependent on lousy internet cafes in Baguio City to access the internet, I’m disinclined to write about sunny Sagada. I had a wonderful time, and I could write so much, but I just hate using a grungy keyboard with many letters rubbed-off the keys and horrible, old monitor under fluorescent light in “Got Hub?” in the Porta Vaga building. Maybe later. more →

My forehead got sunburned last week and this week while walking miles on the streets of Baguio City and La Trinidad with my friend Mack, The Jeepney magazine staffers, missionaries from U.S.A. and Pastor Roberto. Mack has been very helpful in talking with poor people on the sidewalks, overpasses and parks of Baguio City, as he speaks Tagalog and Ilocano, and I don’t. more →

I’ve found that many web surfers find this weblog when they search for “beggar,” “poor in the philippines,” “pictures of poverty in baguio city,” “photos of poor weary burdened,” “poor kids photos,” “poor beggar,” “baguio poverty,” “reaching the poor,” “begger” (sic), “beggar kids,” “jamaica pictures of poverty,” “pictures of poor people,” “philippines’ beggar,” “poor and reach people,” “the poor” and such terms in Google and Yahoo search engines.

more →

We haven’t had internet access in home for two days until now. We still don’t have a working home phone. PLDT is horrible. Yesterday upon return from Baguio City, where I didn’t visit an internet café, I took down to Baguio Gold some grocery odds and ends, student supplies and money. Today Mack came up to this apartment, then he an I went into the city for lunch, a ten-minute visit to an internet café and grocery shopping. We returned home before rainfall. Dominic took Nikko and Dennis into the city for a meal and haircuts. Tomorrow Dom will go with Mack to a dentist office after he leaves school.