All Around Cebu

Today's site visits were hosted by members of RC Cebu Gloria Maris (an all female club). To start, we visited the LAW (Legal Alternatives for Women) Center. This non-stock, non-profit, non-government organization started as a group of 5 women in 1996, but now has twenty-three members that work to help empower women against discrimination, harassment, abuse and exploitation in the home and workplace. The group aids in raising the level of awareness of urban and rural women of their rights, such as being able to go to work, school or even socialize outside the home. The center provides free legal and psychosocial services for the women, including individual and group counseling.  In some cases the man its also asked to attend counseling sessions through the center. LAW assists women with obtaining Barangay Protection Orders (like our PFOs) that are good for 15 days, and Permanent Protection Orders (PPOs).  Though these often don't seem to work in the US, they are taken very seriously by men in the Philippines because jail is so feared. In many cases the women lack skills to make a living, so the LAW members teach them trades such as sewing, cooking or basketry. They are then able to sell their goods with the help of LAW to earn money. The LAW Center also has the StepUP program in which people (especially young women) are trained to help eliminate human trafficking, and cyber exploitation. So far they have had 200 graduates from the program, 54 of them just recently.

L to r. Tita A. Caballes, member Rotary Club of Cebu Gloria Maris (RCCGM), Dolores Alino, Executive Director, Legal Alternatives for Women, Inc, Marybeth Chan, president RCCGM, Stacey, John, Nicole, Lilu Alino, PR Chair District 3860 and past president RCCGM,  and Fe Cabatingen, consultant to Legal Alternatives for Women.

Filemon Yongco is the husband of Attorney Arbet Sta. Ana Yongco, who was assassinated in 2004 for her advocacy for women's rights. Filemon has offered the house where she was murdered for use as the offices for Law, Inc. to further the work that she championed and for which she gave her life.  He presented John with a copy of a book about the murder and the failure (thus far) of the Philippines justice system to bring the offenders to justice.

Next was a stop at the Sun Star newspaper building. The Sun Star is one of 6 local papers and 1 of the 3 that are English-language; the others are in Cebuano. The Sun was started in 1982 and currently has a staff of 24 reporters and 16 editors.  Journalism is a dangerous profession in the Philippines and we learn that physical attacks on journalists are the second highest in the Philippines, mainly in the Mindanao region. Luckily for Cebu reporters, most common attacks they face are verbal or written complaints. The visit was quite informative. We are able to meet with Isolde Amante, editor-in-chief, and the Sun Star president, Gina Garcia-Atienza. Both women graciously gave of their time and were able to provide us with much information regarding their paper and also Philippine newspapers in general. We greatly enjoyed our visit.

With Isolde D. Amante, editor-in-​chief, Sun Star Cebu newspaper, the largest circulatio​n English Language daily in Cebu.

Team leader pinning Rotary theme pin (Reach Within to Embrace Humanity) on Gina Garcia-Ati​enza, president of Sun-Star Management​, the publisher of the Sun Star Cebu and other newspapers​.

Lunch Time! We ate at a native restaurant where rice was served from barrels onto our banana leaf covered trays --- yes trays not plates. We ate a variety of foods including sweet sour soup, chicken wrapped in banana leaves, and tuna belly -- all were delicious. From there was a trip across the hall of the mall to a small chocolate cafe where we had the most decadent sweet treats.

After some fellowship with the ladies of Gloria Maris, we headed off to the Barangay Calamba Nursery School. This school is one of RC Cebu Gloria Maris' project sites. They helped in building this daycare and also help to monitor and better the childrens' health. They have physicians come in and provide yearly screenings of their general health, dental and vision checks, and have also had circumcision dates scheduled. While the children are getting screenings, the parents are attending seminars to learn how to best take care of their children's health. When we arrived the kids were all sitting in their seats and greeted us with the most loving, "Good afternoon visitors!" A few even got up to show their sign of respect and placed the backs of our hands to their forehead. The kids all sang songs with their teacher including the hand movements that go along with them, one of which demonstrated their left and right hands. We gave out some stickers that promoted healthy eating of vegetables and they all loved them.

We next visited another RC Cebu Gloria Maris project site, the Labangon Bliss Elementary School. Upon our arrival, the principal announced overhead to the students that they had visitors from the United States and everyone started yelling in joy. We spent a few minutes talking with principal, Norman Gabales, M. Ed. then moved on to see the biggest part of the clubs project, the feeding program, which we were able to help with on this day. Students in first and second grades are weighed at the beginning of each school year. Those that are considered to be malnourished are admitted into a feeding program where they are to meet at the end of school to have a porridge called Lugaw prepared for them to help aid in their nutrition. This porridge consists of rice, squash, a meat, and a green called malunggay. The kids are then reevaluated at the end of the year. In most cases their body weight increases about 20%, quite a success for the RC.

 We were only there a few minutes before the school day had ended and the kids were running about. Some parents were there to pick up there kids but others were doing everything they could to get our attention. They loved to pose for the camera and overall loved the attention. They seemed like a great group of children.

Before we left the school though we were given some porridge for us to try, to get the full affect of what we were feeding the children. It wasn't just healthy but tasted good too! Unfortunately we had to leave all the cheerful kids for the day but we left with smiles on our faces.

The last stop before our host came to pick us up was an attempt at seeing the view from "Tops", the outlook over the entire city and mountains of Cebu City. Though we could see some beautiful views from the ride up, once we reached the top their was too much fog to get the view we'd hoped for. It was a good attempt, but maybe we will have better luck the next time we visit the Philippines :) Overall, a good day!