Bohol

I am in Bohol. It is a part of the Philippines that seems to be getting greener and more prosperous every time I visit. I am staying with the Calope family. They all call me Lolo Zeus here. And when the nieces and nephews return from school, they go out running with me. The runners among them range from 3 to 9 years old, and we soon set out on a grass path to my favorite hill where we race up and down a hill that takes me forty five seconds to ascend. They work in groups, some eating guavas while the others run.

After half an hour of running I return to juggle with the kids and play my flute. BJ, who is the oldest at nine years, has listened to my songs and can hum along on several of them. They are all great kids! I give some recorder lessons to BJ. As much as Filipinos love to sing, there seem to be very few musical instruments here outside of what I saw in Dalaguete. There are also very few books so I bought one book for each one of the nieces and nephews--who is about twelve kids.

Baliilihan which is the town where the Calopes live is doing very well, and one of the barangay officials is Sterling's sister Belit--who by the way is wearing a Toni Preckwinkle 4th Ward Alderman shirt, today. Belit is one of ten barangay elected officials. Each barangay is made up of puroks. This barangay has six puroks, and Belit is in charge of Purok 3 which has 25 households and 111 people. Each month they meet on the first Sunday. There are a number of committees which I will discuss in a later blog. Each purok has a meeting place, and Belit's has a garden including herbal plants. Nearby there is a newly developed park that commemorates the Balilihan Belfry that was built in 1844. Bohol has many great tourists attractions, and they really do seem to involve activities that relate to the environment. There are beautiful white sand beaches, The Chocolate Hills, the tarsiers, great waterfalls, and caves. I think it is no coincidence that this part of the country is doing so well.

Got to go.