People here eat tofu by first deep-frying it, then drenching it with soya sauce and scallion topping.. which is just the way I love it.. yum!
That aside, yesterday we began work in an area that was previously one of the worst slums with a notorious reputation - the Manila people love to say that in the past when you ask taxi drivers to take you to Baseco they would refuse wholeheartedly, since it was filled with criminals. However, after a devastating fire, a Philippines charity group called Gawad Kalinga (will write more about them. My utmost respect for them.) has been working to convert the slum area into a community village, and it does work. The whole place is very lively, especially in the evening, that it felt great just walking along the streets and looking at people chatting, eating, kids playing all kinds of games, running, rooster and dogs around... It illustrates perfectly well the Jane Jacobs mantra: "Eyes on the street", since almost everyone knows everyone else, and as the result the street feels like someone's living room instead of just a strip for vehicles to pass by.
Work has been quite fun, though for the most part I spent my time drawing cartoon characters for the kids instead of doing fieldwork huhuhu... I love it when they come to me, say words in Tagalog, like "Paruparo!" (butterfly) or "Itik!" (chick), then I would refer to my little Filipino-English dictionary, check out the word, exclaim an enlightened "Ah! ok.." and proceed to draw on pieces of paper or their hands hahaha.. After some time, some of the kids called me "Ateh drawing" huhu.. "Ateh" means big sister in Tagalog. To be honest,I learned basic level of Tagalog, like asking what's your name, where's your school, how many siblings you have,without even realizing it.. thanks to talking to the kids.. I must've looked like an idiotic foreigner trying to chat with 5 kids at once while consulting a mini phrasebook at the same time, but hey it pays off! ;p
That aside.. working the whole day in an area where people are just blatantly poor, then coming back to a comfortable hostel and eating a nice dinner.. I don't know exactly how to behave or what to think.. Selfishly, I'm coping by telling myself that at least during the day I'm working to try and see what we as designers can do for people..but who am I kidding.. That's why I respect the Gawad Kalinga people so much.. I can really see the difference between the living conditions inside the GK villages compared to some of the nearby areas that are still slums, and it's at least comforting to know one can really make a difference with the right model, the right management, and a lot of money. (This last bit is really important.)
About the slums.. Walked through slums around Baseco and it's my first time really going into a slum area.. A slummed-up slum where the ground is made up of rubbish heaps, not soil, and people's houses are assembled from whatever materials they can find.. As an architecturally-trained student, there's much that can be analysed, admired even, since a slum really is an amalgam of people's determination to build, their creativity, economical thinking, and pure survival instinct.. Multiply that by the hundreds, continue adding layers, and you get a large slum like Baseco, Kibera (Africa) or Dharavi (India). Complex, to say the least. Can't say much, I really think pictures say more for these kind of things.
A clumsy farewell, then, readers.. Cheesy as it sounds, whatever your situation is right now -relationship problems, school stuff, family etc etc - just give thanks, just be grateful... because, if you're like me, people like us can't even comprehend how lucky ourselves are...
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