Trainings for New Wheelchair Assessors

One of our responsibilities is to organize training for new Basic Wheelchair assessors with our various partners. We have so far conducted 3 such trainings. Our first experience was in Bataan, where we trained 11 new people.

 The woman you see here is Dra. Garcia. Along with Dr. Jeffrey Montes and Wennah Marquez they were trained as our new "trainers" for the Basic Wheelchair Training.  The Docs are Orthopedic Specialists. These are folks we have worked with for some time and really love.

One of the important things the assessor must do is teach the recipient new skills such as going up and down stairs, obviously that takes the help of someone else. . .

. . .going up and down a ramp and turning, stopping, and getting in and out of the chair, among many other skills. Most fun of all, and sorry there is no picture, we teach them to jump up the front wheels (commonly know as "pop a wheelie"). They use that trick to do things such as cross a threshold. I am really good at it!

In this picture you can see Dr. Montes explaining that just Elder Bautista's small shoes made walking painful and problematic for his large feet. . . giving someone the wrong wheelchair can be painful and problematic.

We were in Bataan for Monday through Wednesday and then came back to the APO (area presidency's office)(also know as the Welfare Office)(also know as our home) for another training. We had people from several partners in attendance.

 One of the projects for the students was to learn how to put the Rough Rider wheelchair together. This is not so easy as Bruce and I discovered.  One evening a recipient waited at the office for over an hour as we worked to try and put one together. We found a piece in the box that we didn't know what to do with. We sent pictures to all the area service missionaries to no avail. Well during this session we learned it was a spoke wrench.

There were more stairs here for practice. By the way this is not so easy. The person assisting counts and on "3" he pulls up and the WC user pushes hard on the push rim.

The days got long and so did the week. That is our Technical Specialist in the foreground. . .asleep. That is me in the background. . .asleep.

Finally, a graduation. Each person receives a certificate with his LDSC Certified Assessor Number. Only those with this number can access LDSC chairs. 

The Bataan and APO trainings were the first week in April. The 3rd training was held the last week in May and in Vigan! I love Vigan. It is an old Spanish town in the north of Luzon. It is quiet and smog free.

 The class spends the three days sitting in a wheelchair. 

 Basic part of an assessment are taking a basic history, checking sitting balance and sensation aong with measuring (which sounds easy but needs to be done very carefully)..

So now Bruce and I will come home prepared to fit all of you into a wheelchair!

DEL PILAR OUT REACH MISSION

It is always fun to get away from Manila and into the Province. This was one of those memorable times. Our Partner in University of the Northern Philippines invited us to go with them on an outreach mission to Del Pilar, a city up in the mountains to the south and east of Vigan.

We left Quezon City and drove to Vigan on Monday, April 20, arriving in the late evening. It is about a 9 hour drive. There is a stretch of tollway for about half of the way, and then it is all driving through the cities. When you factor in the people who park in the lane (they put on their flashers, so that makes it okay), the rice drying in your lane, the tarp awning that is spread out into your lane and the narrow street and the scary driving, and it takes quite a while. We left the office later than we planned, things kept popping up, and it was dark when we arrived. I tried a new hotel. It was very nice with lots of atmosphere. 

The thing is, you can just barely see the stair but it was this long and very steep stair case to get into the hotel and then. . . .

. . .another steep stair case up to the room. But at least we were getting our exercise.

  We joined the University staff the next morning at 4:30, and headed out. This was a medical mission so there were lots of nurses, a couple of dentists and a doctor. They even took a supply of medicines. We took our own van as far as Candon, so we could head home from there on our return. We drove south to Candon city, met the drivers from Del Pilar and transferred into their trucks. Why didn't we drive to Del Pilar?

And that is why we didn't take the van!

But jeepneys took the run. I saw a jeepney unload that was even packed on top. Little kids came peeling off the top. My mom's heart almost stopped

We made it!

But the city was surprising. How did they get all this building material so far up in the hills? Then I found there is another much longer route but easier route coming up from the south. 

I did mention that the Spanish influence is very strong here. Every small city, called a Barangay has one of these wonder covered pavilions. They play sports. Lots of basketball and women's volleyball. They also host lots of community programs, and in this case wheelchairs assessment and distribution.

This was a medical mission so lots of people came for lots of reasons. We even saw three teeth pulled. The preferred method for a filling a cavity.

 But our part on the program was the fitting of wheelchairs.

Sadly, on the bumpy ride home my ipad fell out of my bag. Now I have to figure out how to put my programs, audio books and the like, onto a new ipad. 

CORREGADOR

We visited on the island of Corregador with the other Senior Missionaries. I did not realize the extent of the WWII battle for the Pacific that occurred here.

We left Manila harbor and traveled by ferry. It was nice, with comfortable seats, like a nice bus. It takes a little over an hour to get to the island. The spot on right in the horizon is Corregador.

                          

They take you around on the island in trams. You can see here ruins of the military quarters.

 You get to see the remains of a lot a big guns. One of the reasons that it was difficult to fight in the Philippines is that all they military equipment was completely out of date.

And there is the remains of all the old buildings This was a theater.

And even the officers table ware if you are interested.

And the view from the top is wonderful.

It took a whole day and now the days are blazing hot. I am glad I saw it and felt the history up close but it is one of those things just once is enough.

A Tale of Two Tales(Tails)

The First Tale

Palawan is a beautiful island just to the west of our island of Luzon. I imagine it is much the same as all of the Philippines would be if there were not so many of us living here. We were headed to Palawan to sign our working agreement, called a MOA.  We planned the trip to give us some extra days to visit on the island. Pres. Mosquera is the District President in Puerto Princessa and with his wife has a travel agency. They planned our time there and it was great fun - mostly. 

We began on the first day by visiting some places right in Puerto Princssa. The first was an Alligator Farm

Doesn't this look like great living?!

There were some pretty big alligators in the pond. They raised these guys to breeding age and let them go.

This is the picture of the Island from a hill top

We visited on Baker's Hill, a beautiful garden and aviary

Beautiful birds

I found some projects Dad can do with our rocks

In the afternoon we had our meeting with our wheelchair partner, Bahatala. We really like these people. We met a muslim couple there with their small son. The son had just had the last of his casts removed for club feet correction. He will be in a shoe brace for a few years and then he will be perfect. His life will be a completely different one that it would have been. Anyway, here is a picture of the signing and Cecil Socrates, who runs the organization

Then the fun started. We headed north to Sabang beach. We checked into our wonderful hotel and then dressed for the Underground River tour. From Sabang Beach, you take a Banca boat over to a beach, about a 15 minute ride away, then a short hike and your are at the small lake leading into the Underground River..

I have to admit I was a little underwhelmed, not because the cave you travel through is not fantastic, but because you can only see what is illuminated by a 4" flashlight powered by a car battery. My eyes are just no longer very good to see well in low light.  When I came home I put the pictures in Picassa and added fill light and thought, "Wow, is that what we were seeing". It was a complete new trip through the cave.

Best part for me is that I got to get dressed appropriately for a water activity. Bruce to is dressed for such an activity. He hates shorts.

We walked down the beach in the evening. It was just wonderful. The Sheridan was a beautiful hotel and we sat at dinner and I could see the ocean and the hills at the shore and the temperature and humidity were perfect. It was just one of those magic moments. There are very few tourists, the water is just on the cool side of a bathtub. And the beach was pristine beautiful, absolutely no trash.

The following day we left Sabang beach at 7am so we could make it down to Honda Bay to do some Island hopping. (The Mosquesr’s driver had stayed up in Sabang to drive us. Where he slept I do not know.) We traveled around to 3 islands by banca boat. The first was for snorkeling, Starfish Island. It truly had an area covered with starfish. It was just so much fun. Again, the water is just warm enough to be pleasant. I do not do well in cold oceans, I can only manage for a short time, but this water is all day water. Anyway, they have an area marked off because the corals are so shallow and you can just lay on your stomach and kick your feet and see all kinds of absolutely wonderful fish.  We were anxious to see how great the fish were on the next island and were disappoint that the next two islands were good for swimming but not fish watching. I hesitate to say we went snorkeling as we just lay on our stomachs and look at fish. We wished we had spent the whole time on Starfish Island. But by the time we got back to Honda Bay, about 3 in the afternoon, the water and sun had worn us out and we were ready to be finished. We washed up in a salt water shower, changed clothes and got ready to catch an evening plane for home.

I love to snorkel. I had to rent a mask and I had a really hard time keeping water out. But is was shallow enough you could stand down, unfortunately, on the coral. I guess that is why that have roped off a small area for swimming.

The Second Tale

Unfortunately, the story now turns into a different kind of a memory. We got to the airport (it is a very, very small airport) early. The Mosquera’s driver had been with us all this time and we didn’t have anything for him to do so we had him take us to an early dinner and then drop us at the airport at about 5pm. The plane was scheduled for 8:30. It is always at least an hour late and so we waited, and waited and waited. Then at about 10pm they told us that because of “wind” they were canceling the flight. There actually was no wind but we find that the lights often go out or something mechanical goes wrong. Didn’t really matter, there was no flight. We took a tricycle, our first ride on one, back over to our favorite hotel on the island, got a bed and set the alarm for 4 because they told us to be back at the airport at 5. So we arrived at the airport before 5 and the room is already packed with the people waiting to be re-ticketed. Philippine Air was going to bring in a plane big enough to take all the passengers from the night flight and the morning flight. So they need to get all the canceled flight people ticketed before the morning flight people show up. But we stood in the building and waited til 6am before they started re-ticketing. By now all the morning people are there and it is this giant mob of people. We stood in line for over an hour, waited to board for another hour and they did not finish re ticketing and getting people on the plane til 9:30. It was just too absurd!!!!

When we finally got back to the Manila airport, we ran into Sister Ostler just before we left the restricted area. She is the Mission Pres.Wife in the Manila mission.   She was waiting for Brother and Sister Hiatt. They are full time seniors on Palawan and Sister Hiatt had to have an emergency appendectomy on the island. It hadn’t gone well (the best part of the Philippines is NOT their hospitals!!!!!!!!!) and the Hiatts were on the plane with us coming back to Manila. I hadn't noticed them amongst the mob. I headed back in to find them and help. We stayed with them until Sister Ostler could get them into her van. I felt so bad for Sis Hiatt who was obviously in a lot of pain and had had to wait in that incredible mob of people to get on the plane. She spend a week in the St. Lukes in Manila and is still at the mission home.

So, all in all, I guess I can say with Charles Dickens, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”  Truly our "Tale of two Tails". My Grand-kids will have to wait a while to find our the secret of those two "tails".

I took lots of pictures of Palawan. If you are interested in some more I am sharing the web album

HEY, I FORGOT TO PUBLISH MY CHRISTMAS BLOG

When we arrived in October, the Christmas season was already underway. There were carols playing in the airport. We understand the season starts sometime in September. Christmas decorations are everywhere. I especially like the lights they hang from the trees.

Eastwood City (which is really a very giant outdoor mall with lots of tall apartment buildings), is really fun. 

Ever seen the Statue of Liberty with a Philippano face?

And there were fireworks every weekend of the month.

On Christmas eve it has always been Haslem family tradition to have a prime rib dinner. Well my family carried on without us, but we managed. Our office is next to a gated community of the rich folks, so close by are some small stores that cater to them. We bought two steaks and though it was an expensive meal, it made us feel like it was really Christmas eve.

Baggio green beans are almost like the ones in my garden. The potato was special, it was a regular size potato.. And one thing that you can only have here: that is pomelo on the salad, it's like a very large grapefruit but sweeter and  so good!

We enjoyed Christmas Day dinner with our friends the Royos. They are serving as area service missionaries in our office. 

That is Brother and Sister Royo behind Bruce.

Starting at the top we had:Lumpia (egg  roll) shrimp, don't know the next, rice (of course, it's not a meal if there is no rice). sticky rice (a sweet treat, red rice with coconut milk), ham (a special Christmas only treat), stuffed baked fish and my great love, Pancit which is just a noodle in broth with veggies.

The missionaries were there. There are three pair in the Royo's branch. 

Here are the Sisters, Two of them are Samoan

Here are the Elders.

I made cookies. The missionaries were happy to take home the leftovers. Making cookies in my oven is a trick indeed. It is a gas oven with no thermostat of temp control.

And best of all, on Friday we were in the temple acting as the witness couple for two missionary sessions. 

So, all in all, except for missing my family, it was a terrific Christmas