So yesterday we went to mass at the hospital with Lawrence and his family. Lawrence has been charged with looking after us for the last five days and he’s been wonderful. We took a tour of the hospital where he worked and talked to Brother Rob from the US who has been doing some amazing things around training, feeding programs and micro loans for the past 40 years.
As we were leaving Gensan that day, we’d already had to say goodbye to some of the amazing people we’d already met on this trip. Anita, John, Lawrence, Dervin, Ray, Elvie, Henry, Lucia, Noel, Pitok and Rene are only a few of the people who have made us feel like we were totally at home. Only knowing them for a week felt like a lifetime. We also said goodbye to our new and great friends from the UK GSE team. Who also felt like they’d been friends for years.
So off we went to the new town of Digos where we were welcomed by a wonderful group of fun loving rotarians. Again, another goodbye and Lawrence passed us over to Pearl’s welcoming hands. This is when the culture began. We went and saw an outdoor manual pottery factory – incredible. And we took a boat trip to a small island. This is where the rotary had initiated a re-forestation project of Mangroves. The scene was like it was out of a postcard!
That evening we were presented with traditional music and danc in the Pearl Convention Centre. Kids from a local highschool were dressed in traditional outfits playing all sorts of instruments. They were so talented and then tried to teach us rather unsusessfully how to do some of their dances. That was at least goof dor a laugh on all of our parts. And of course, the way to both start and end the day – a bit of Kareoke!
Today we’ll be heading to to Davao for a full 5 days of learning, exploring and ‘fellowship’. We’re getting better at thinking ‘it’s not goodbye, it’s see you later…
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