Davao, Where I Am Nicotine-Deprived

I wake up to mornings of light, 'chocnut-y' wisps of air from a veranda overlooking the Samal Island. From the veranda, I watch each morning, men who climb coconut trees to retrieve small 'catch basins' of some sort positioned to save drops of unfiltered coconut juice from the night before, a drink called 'tuba'. Smoking is a problem, I cannot just light a stick anywhere in Davao. They are very serious about the smoking ban. I attempted to several times (wink-wink) in our veranda, but only at night, as one colleague told me they have CCTV cameras all over the place, even atop the coconut trees. I laughed when he told me that, in the hope that he was joking. He said he was, but I do not want to risk getting caught and pay five thousand pesos as fine.

We are in our third major conference this year, and it is just the first quarter. We are working on the lifeblood of our plans and programs for 2016,  this thing we call the budget. Truth be told, I have never really looked at budget preparation as this gruelling, tedious, 'nosebleed'-and-migraine-inducing. Or I have never taken it this serious. So, after preparations for this conference the week prior of the same character (gruelling, etc.), we faced our bosses, and  we fell short of their expectations. Sigh. So much for confidence. We welcomed all the 'notes' from our bosses, lest we would look like idiots explaining some entry in the budget we put there, which we have to admit, is wrong. We sat there quietly, hid our disappointments over ourselves, and the irritation of having to text and call technical staff who really, actually, honestly, seriously, know more than we do.

There are many downsides to these conferences. For one, we travel by land and plane to reach our destinations, with more than 20 kilos of baggage in tow (on a side note, the airline weighed my shoulder bag, my usual stuff, and it weighs six kilos, imagine that?). We wake up on abnormal times to get to the airport on time. We arrive at our destinations too tired to look around, yet we have to if we are bent on shopping for whatever. This is because we are kept on a strict schedule, complete with 'security guards' watching our every move, as our bosses know of our uncanny and polished abilities to vanish in the middle of conferences. It is also the worst time to realize how computer skills come in handy, especially when you are not skilled. We have arguments over 'interpretations' and definitions, which we normally don't have when we are back home in our regions, but we have them over hotel food which is barely edible. I suspect the tension stems from fishballs they use to saute the vegetables here, it is sour to the taste, almost past the expiry date perhaps. Most distressing to me is the thought of waking up at 5 in the morning to give me the  lead time to do my rituals, have breakfast and get dressed. Yes, I need three hours for that. Also, it does not help that when I get to the breakfast area, I am swarmed by my collagues with pumped up adrenaline from walking or running, sweat lining their shirts. Makes me wonder, am I the only one in the world now who is not into exercise? 

However, there are more stuff which make my heart smile. For one, I see good friends. The really old, good friends I grew up with in this organization. I meet my former bosses, Regional Directors whom I have fondness for, whom I look to as second 'mothers' or 'fathers'. I mingle with the officials, old and new, and get to have really insightful conversations with them. I learn a lot through these conversations and I look forward each time I can have them. We eat out to sample the fresh fish and other seafood that Davao boasts of. My two constant companions are obssessed with the dreadful 'durian' fruit which they have each evening at the market downtown, after dinner. I would rather stay cooped up on my bed in the hotel than eat the most foul-smelling fruit I have ever come across: like the marriage of liquid petroleum gas and sweaty armpits. The fruit reeks of the smell and invades your clothes, your hair, and all of your body that a shower after eating it is a necessity. I get pomelos, boxes of them, from colleagues. That, I eat. We are taught to be patient, something that managers like us forget about at times. We are reminded of what we are here for, something that yes, again, managers like us forget about at times. We are enlightened, questions at the backs of our minds answered. Conferences of this sort force one to think. And deeply. 

So despite the singing-while-waiting facilitation, with the annoying, inappropriate remarks of one or two who commands the microphone, trying to be funny  (some think it's funny but it actually isn't, but that's just me), these conferences work because we have bosses who are 'rock-n-roll'; they are passionate in their fields, they are experienced, they are cool and confident, and they are straightforward. The only thing that does not work in the same vein is my brain, moreso because I cannot smoke when I want to. My brain is nicotine-deprived here. If there is one thing that I was forced to do here, which is worth the nicotine deprivation,  it is the understanding of the stories behind the numbers. Because there are stories beyond. Low values do not necessarily connote low performance, and the other way around. Much like the pomelos we were gifted with by our friends from Mindanao: the uneven, darkened, ugly-looking skin of the smaller pomelos reveal the sweeter, juicier, tastier version of the fruit inside. We cannot take things at face value in this job. We seek for stories to afford logic and meaning beyond the numbers. And I am thinking, after twenty decades of building on what works as strategies to further our goals, yeah, we must know the stories, evolving. We remember the stories here in Davao, and for some reason, those bind us together. So no matter how tedious the process is in the budget, we all gladly jump in and get wet. The stories. They tell us about what this organization is about, and who we are in it.