So, what have I been doing with that other 2% of my time? With the help of my co-conspirator George, I managed to take my first Jeepney ride. George is one of the employees I’ve been working with since I arrived in Manila. He had been encouraging both Paul and I to take a quick Jeepney ride – just so we could say we’d had the experience. His wife, Tin, wasn’t as thrilled with his suggestion as we were. Paul left before he was able to take his first ride, so George and I struck a deal. If he’d accompany me on the ride, I was game to go. Everyone who knows me knows I have a horrible sense of direction. Without a guide, I’d likely end up in Cebu (ok, maybe not that far away. I know now that Jeepney’s travel in 7km circuits and eventually will end up back where you got on.)

Jeepney’s run pretty much on the honour system. You crawl into the front of back of the vehicle and pass forward your 7 peso’s and 50 centavos (approx. 15 cents CDN) to the driver. If you’re sitting in the back, you pass your money forward through the chain of other riders. Change is passed back in the same manner. There are no conductors or anyone checking to see if you’ve paid. No tickets are passed out. The driver just patiently waits for the money to be handed over – while driving of course.

We learned from one of our taxi drivers that Jeepneys cost approximately 360,000 pesos (8000$ CAD, $6923 USD) to purchase. Most of the Jeepneys are privately owned and run as taxis, although a few run the streets as private vehicles (those often say “private vehicle, not for hire” on the sides or back door of the vehicles) as we’ve seen some used as transport vehicles for loads of coconuts!

George took pics of the two of us on the Jeepney with his cell phone, but I haven’t received them in email yet. Until then, you’ll have to content yourselves with this picture of a Jeepney taken by Paul.

I know Canada is a huge sparsely populated country with lots of open space. As such, I suspect we create zones wherein others don’t intrude when we’re out in public. People give each other some breathing room when passing them or walking in front or behind them. In Manila, where space is at a premium, everyone bumps and bangs into each other. Pushing and shoving to get where you want to go is the norm, and people bump into each other so often that no one even acknowledges it – they just continue on their merry little way. I didn’t realize how much I valued my personal space until I went shopping in Green Hills on Christmas Eve.

One of the strangest things I’ve had to get used to is the lack of knives in restaurants. Aside from the hotel, I’ve not seen a single knife in any eating establishment. Instead, everyone eats with forks and spoons. While I fumble about and make a mess trying to cut food with a spoon, the locals slice through beef with their spoons as if they’re the sharpest knives in the drawer. If it weren’t for their adept use of spoons in all eating situations, I’d think this was an elaborate joke they play on foreigners. After all, the giggles we hear when we attempt to cut something and it goes scooting across the plate and across the table or onto the floor do sound mighty suspicious.

This week was mostly uneventful. I spent 98% of my time working on sleeping. Since I do have a policy of not discussing work in my journal, this directly translates to having no news to pass on to anyone else. Obviously someone is reading this, since the number of emails I’ve received in the past week asking when I’m going to update the journal has passed the double digits. I wasn’t aware that that many people were reading this!

If there’s one thing that I’ve learned studying adult and continuing education theory, it’s that adults really hate being patronized and don’t have any tolerance for those presenting themselves as ‘experts’ who aren’t walking the talk.

My most recent class is designing manuals has been a huge challenge for me. Putting aside the fact that I’m an instructional designer who probably didn’t have the best motives when I registered for the class – I was hoping it would be a bird course, easily fill one of my electives, and be a quick and easy way to increase my GPA – I did expect to learn some new tips and tricks in the class. However, I’ve been sadly disappointed. The course pack presented (and designed *shudder*) by the Facilitator was a mess. Typos, formatting issues, referencing issues (90% of items that should have been referenced weren’t), layout, and inaccurate content top the top of the list of items wrong with it. Personally, I would have been mortified to consider a document in this state a first draft.

I think I could have managed to survive my disappointment if I hadn’t had to pass in a final project that included the design and development of a short 1-2 hour training program. I just can’t imagine how anyone who considers her materials to be acceptable could possibly be qualified to evaluate and judge anything I do. While my package may not be perfect, it’s certainly miles ahead of anything presented by the Facilitator of that class. I was so peeved at the concept of being assigned a grade by someone I’d lost any possible professional respect for that I just couldn’t motivate myself to work on my assignment for the first week. I did manage to get my butt in gear (my GPA can’t afford an incomplete in any class), but now that the deadline has arrived and I’ve submitted the project, I still can’t get over my sense of irritation at the situation.

Don’t get me wrong, the course wasn’t a total waste of time and money. It did re-infoce a key point for me. Sometimes all you have is your credibillity. Doing a half-assed job or presenting yourself as an expert but not passing a “baloney test” is a quick way to destroy your credibility and lose the respect of your peers.

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