Iloilo

Last week was exam week for the kids.  I gave my exams on Wednesday, and I was so happy to see that the kids overall did pretty well.  We had our staff meeting after school that day and had a guest come do team-building exercises with us.  It was fun!

Activity one: we formed ourselves into a human knot, holding hands all twisted up, and we had to untangle ourselves to form ourselves into a circle.  I'm in the back of the picture and was unaware that the picture was taking place :)

I don't have a picture of our second activity.  In the third activity, we had a row of boxes drawn on the ground and half of us each stood in a box facing in, and the other half stood in their boxes facing us (also inward).  There was one empty square in the middle.  The objective was to get everyone moved across to the other side.  You were only allowed to move forward, and could only step forward one box or pass around one person at a time who had started on the other side.  We were happy when we finally figured it out!

Dan and Tori were here last week and Dan told us Wednesday that there was supposed to be a fairly strong typhoon passing right over Boracay at noon on Thursday.  Shannon decided to cancel school Thursday, which I'm sure was the right choice but inconvenient timing since the kids were supposed to have exams Thursday as well.  Friday and all of this week is fall break, so the kids will have to go a week and a half before taking their exam.  And guess what, the weather ended up being clear.  That's the Philippines for you!

Friday, Carla, Lauren, Russ, Anderson, two of the Russell boys, and another MK that lives near the Russells, and I headed to Iloilo, which is a city on Panay Island.  After taking the ferry to Panay, we had a van driver take us to Iloilo.  It was such a weird sensation to ride in a vehicle for four hours when I've only been in a van maybe five times for no more than ten minutes since I've been here.  Other than having the AC blasting right in front of me (but I had to keep it turned up for the sake of everyone behind me) and my nose freezing off and running, it was a smooth ride.

First thing we did after we got there and got checked into our hotel was head to the mall and eat McDonald's.  So funny that McDonald's probably isn't my favorite choice of fast food at home, but it was EXCITING to get to go here!  And the mall was nice too!  I couldn't stop smiling while I indulged myself in possibly the most unhealthy fast food chain in the world :)

The Russell boys and Gaant (MK's)

We then headed upstairs to the movie theater and saw Taken 2.  It was a short movie but pretty good.  We don't have a theater on Boracay, so that was fun.

Lauren, Josh, Carla, and Adam holding up their tickets into the movie.

After the movie, we headed to a coffee shop run by some young Americans about my age and got there at about 9:00pm.  Russ and Carla had met them on a visit last year, and the coffee shop is geared towards high schoolers and is a great witnessing tool.  It is Christian based and this week was social justice week.  They had an art exhibit night, music night, dance night, and I think another night of some sort to bring awareness to the large amount of slavery and sex trafficking that exists today.  A couple of years ago I went to a Passion conference and learned that slavery is more prominent today than it has been at any time in history.  Friday was dance night, and there were some really cool dances performed by amazing dancers that told stories of abuse.  There were also a couple of songs where a couple of high schoolers read what they had written to go with some background music.  It was deep, Christian-based, and very inspiring!  After all of the choreographed performances were done, the floor was open for break-dancing and we got to see some Filipino kids do some amazing tricks!

Sorry it's dark, but I didn't want the flash going off!  Wish I'd caught them spinning around on the ground :)

At the very end, they had everyone in the shop stand up and learn some dance moves.  We practiced them a few times and then they said there would be a dance competition!  They asked for three volunteers, and Anderson and Lauren both volunteered.  Pretty funny considering we were surrounded by people who knew what they were doing a lot better than any of us did, but no one else was stepping up, so they did!  The other "volunteer" was one of the coffee shop workers that they dragged out to the floor.  I loved seeing Lauren getting out there because she's really shy, but apparently she loves dancing!  Technically, the coffee shop worker probably should have won but that wouldn't have really been fair, so that left Anderson and Lauren.  They were all supposed to do the dance that we learned, first together, then individually, and then freestyle by themselves for 16 seconds.  The worker did all of that.  Anderson did the choreographed part with the group but didn't do it by himself and just freestyled.  Lauren did the choreographed part with the others and then by herself but basically skipped the freestyling part.  In the end, it was pretty much a tie based on everyone's cheering but they gave the award (a free snowcone) to Anderson.

For the first part, doing the choreography together, the leader helped them out.  Pretty funny they're going the opposite direction from her :)

Saturday morning, Carla, Lauren, and I ordered breakfast in bed!  I got a combo meal including French Toast, sausage, scrambled eggs, papaya, and juice brought to my room for 160 pesos...$4!  We headed to the mall for lunch, and of course ate McDonald's before going to see another movie.  By the way, the medium meal deal for a quarter pounder with cheese here is $4.  Movies are $3.25.  We saw Argo which was really good.

After the movie, we walked around the mall for a while and I bought the book The Hobbit.  We headed back to the hotel then, played games for about an hour, and then headed out to eat at a Greek restaurant.  My meal was $4.50.

Sorry, the waiter covered up the flash!

Then we went duck pin bowling.  It like bowling, but the pins are smaller, the bowling ball is also much smaller, and you get three turns to roll the ball each turn instead of two.  There's a worker that waits by the pins to reset them after every third roll and he also rolls the balls back.  It's pretty funny because the gutters were shallow enough that sometimes the ball would hop around enough to still knock down a pin.  Also, if the balls aren't rolled back just right by the worker, they lose momentum and won't make it all the way.

 

That was fun, and then we went back to the hotel.  I was so tired and my nose was still running and my throat hurting just a little bit from drainage...but we brought high schoolers with us, so bed was not an option.  Especially when Carla, Lauren, and my room seemed to be the hang out place.  I was half asleep, but still had fun playing charades for about four hours, and then sardines (backwards hide-and-seek where one person hides and you look for them and join them once you find them) for about an hour.  I finally got to bed at around 4:00am.  I'll admit us 20+ year olds have stayed up almost that late playing games a couple of times, but that's when I wasn't already feeling tired beforehand!  It was fun, though.

Sunday we woke up and got ready to go.  Of course we stopped at McDonald's to grab lunch to-go as we headed out.  It was a great trip, but I'm happy to be back.  Especially when I received a greeting like this (and the picture doesn't do justice):

I also loved seeing all the kids around the Barn when I got back, and I was even happy to run my errands today, walking around the island in the heat dropping off laundry and grocery shopping.  I needed to work up that sweat after eating at McDonald's three times :)