God Reminds Me

I was in Davao for a meeting last year and got into a conversation with a cab driver. That's my usual way, I start a conversation with a cab driver just to check what is up in the world outside. That is not a scientifically-proven yardstick, but I still like to talk to people who do not confine thelmselves within the four walls of their airconditioned offices for work. My barometer for what is going on in the real world are our office drivers, really. Believe me, they know all, and most of the time, what they do want to tell me is true. 

I recall that conversation with that cab driver in Davao very well, because, for one, he spoke to me in Bisaya even if I was replying to him in Tagalog. I told him I was not a local, an Ilocano, yet he went on and on about our topic in their dialect. Which was fine with me, not that I understand Bisaya fully, but I did get what he was talking about, in the context of it. 

He asked where I was from, and told him, Ilocos Sur. He said, 'aaahhh, Chavit!'. Yes, I replied. Then he told me his story:  that he was once a farmworker of an Ilocano landowner somewhere in the Visayas, there are many Ilocanos in the Visayas, and they started most of the businesses in the area which are now flourishing; that the Ilocanos are thrifty bosses but are considerate. He told me that Ilocanos are so 'masipag' and 'matiyaga' (diligent and conscientious) that he was fired by his boss as he was caught sleeping mid-day. He was surprised, he told me, that he still had to work as hard as usual because he knew that the 'camarin' was already full of the harvest, and assumed his work was done, hence it was all right to take a nap mid-day. But, no, he told me, with Ilocanos, even if the 'camarin' was already full of the harvest, they woke up early each day and worked and worked and worked in their farms. He further said, if an Ilocano is given only a small piece of land,  he would survive because he will find a way to plant whatever, and make that thrive. So, he said, I was fired. My boss did not tolerate 'tamad' (lazy) workers. 

I was amused, not only at the way he told his story in full Bisaya, but he was throwing compliments at an Ilocano, and he was unaware. For the record, yes, I am 'masipag' and 'matiyaga' (diligent and conscientious), I can safely say that. But I absolutely dread waking up at wee hours of the morning. Those close to me well know that 7 o'clock in the morning is still the  middle of the night for me. I am a considerate boss, too, but I am definitely not thrifty. 

Yesterday, that cab-driver-and-me exchange came to mind. Our farmers here, about two hundred of them, endured a yearlong annoyance and irritation from DAR as they were requested to attend courses for enhancing and adapting technologies to improve productivity, and the like. I know for a fact that an hour or so away from their farms was way too much to lose, their minutes here are so precious that I make it a point to apologize always before we start any of the meetings we have with them. Yet there they were, yesterday, clad in their green tshirts bearing the project name from DAR and our private partners, to receive their certificates of completion. They beamed at me when some recognized me as 'ma'am', while the rest were smiling sheepishly in some corner, too shy to be acknowledged. They prepared an intermission number, not the usual song-and-dance routine, but a 'mock' micro-teaching session about fertilizers, pesticides and coping with changing farming systems. All of them were eagerly watching the performance, saying their remarks of agreement and not, aloud, about the technologies. I was speechless. Oh my goodness, I told myself, they learned. All of them did, despite all, they learned something. With our help. 

When it was my turn to say something, (our private partner had me on a videoclip earlier in the program already; the farmers watched the video, looked at my way, then back at the screen, then at me again), I started by telling them: yes, that was me on the video. My first statement made them all laugh. I felt the tears starting to well at the base of my throat, though, when I said, thank you, to all of them. I told them in straight Ilocano (my boss gave me the look because I was speaking too fast in Ilocano and he could not understand a thing I was saying) how overwhelmed I was with happiness and pride that they were 'graduating' that day. I told them that sometimes, when I am about to give up on my work, what with all the trash talk about government, (and me, in particular) God finds a way to remind me how privileged I am to be of service to the Ilocano farmer. Today, I told them, I was reminded.