One Week Down

I've been in Manila almost a week, and as fast as time seemed to go living in Micronesia, that's how slow it seems to be passing right now.

There's not too much to report about work. I wake up at 5:40 in order to make the 6:40 van from the hotel to the office. They always wait until 6:45 in case anyone else gets in, but no one ever does. Despite the early wake up, the morning van is a huge perk of staying at Tropicana. I walk home, even though the driver said if I called the hotel they would send a car for me, and it takes about a half hour in the blistering heat and depressingly heavy humidity. Once I'm home I can stand in my underwear in front of the blasting AC and then take a shower, but at work I would just have to sit and stew in a sweaty suit. So it's better to get there early and not have to smell like a sidewalk heating grate.

I get there at 7am which is earlier than most people. So my first day I went to the cafeteria for a coffee, which costs me 30php or about 29 cents. I was still bitter that I had to pay until I remembered that back home I usually go to Starbucks or some other coffee shop once a day which costs me about $5 UNTIL I ALSO remembered that my same Starbucks drink here only costs me $3, and is worlds better than the cafeteria coffee. But it's in the opposite direction from the office, and somehow as amenable as my van driver is, I'm not sure he would be up for a coffee run every morning.

That first day, I had my coffee with two Filipino admin workers who were very friendly and showed me down to my unit where I discovered that I had my own office. And by office, I mean a cubicle  that has my nameplate on it which still sadly makes me feel more professional than ever before. Inside my cubicle there is a computer and a desk and a swivel chair with a broken arm and a task list left by my supervisor and not much else. There were two pens but no paper or staplers or clips or folders. I got the impression somehow that all those things are probably in short supply and high demand, so I bought some for myself this weekend.
So far the one thing I really like about work is the coffee and snack cart that comes by my cubicle twice a day. The guy who rolls it out knows by now that all I will get is the coffee for 15php, but still tries to get me to buy a sandwich. It seems typical for people in the office to eat small meals or snacks throughout the day, and maybe it appears odd or even sad that all I get is a plastic cup of coffee. "Are you sureeeee you don't want a sandwich ma'am?" Everyone calls me ma'am here and it makes me feel really old and important, which I'm not.
My task list includes things like report writing and literature reviews, things I did at uni but not really so much yet in my professional career. I still maintain that my best skills involve working with people - as un-me as that sounds - and I'm going to try and push to get some fieldwork or some kind of outside experience since that's what my inner anthropologist demands whenever I am somewhere new. But, I haven't even met my supervisor yet, and I have this dreaded feeling that it's going to be like that Seinfeld episode where George does nothing all week at his new job but transfer the contents of a file into an accordion-style folder.

Because I start work at 7:30, I leave at 3:30 which is also nice. The walk home always offers me some new and interesting experience. I can't even begin to describe the streets of Malate, which are crowded, dirty and full of all kinds of people. The smell, which is a mixture of sweat, street food, diesel and sewage is taking some getting used to, and I feel like I will leave here with a shriveled, blackened pulmonary system. I have never seen another westerner while walking home, and with my giant black purse and intern badge I am the sorest of thumbs. Everyone stares at me. And I can't even stare back lest I be mowed down by a jeepney or motorcyclist, something I feel is almost inevitable whenever I leave my hotel. I am trying to get over my instinctual reaction to stop and wait for cars but rather, as everyone else around me does, run for dear life with complete abandon to the other side while honking vehicles barrel down the road. My strategy involves waiting for someone else to have to cross the street so I can follow their path and try to learn the best ways of not being roadkill.
The poverty on the streets is more striking to me than in Micronesia, but I don't know enough about the lifestyle here to make any kinds of judgments. There are lots of people begging for money, lots of shoeless, very thin looking children in dark corners. The other day I saw a very old man, very crippled, crawling across the sidewalk with a can for money. Yesterday a boy, maybe 14 years old, was sleeping across the sidewalk. He was covered in dirt and was only wearing a pair of torn, short pants and a huge smile. It's difficult to reconcile this poverty, and the street life of Malate in general, with the photos I see of Makati, a different part of Manila. I haven't been there yet, but the photos make it look upscale, clean and fancy. Apparently, I've heard, it's where most of the ex-pats live.

But, I don't have to go to Makati to escape Malate. While outside shirtless children are eating rice out of dixie cups with dirty fingers, inside the Robinson's Mall there is a Jamba Juice and a Steve Madden. I've become enamored with this mall, mostly because its so huge and interesting, and also because it's something to do that doesn't involve figuring out public transport. Here is where all the white people seem crawl out of the woodwork. Mostly I see older men with Filipino wives. Whereas the Filipinos bend over backwards to be nice to me, explaining the best ways to eat dragon fruit and pricing all my produce for me, the westerners frown at me or look confused when I try to smile at them - an effort to try and make some kind of connection with people I feel must be in the same boat as me. In Pohnpei all us mehnwai did yoga, hikes, halloween parties and boat trips together. It seems here that life among the ex-pats is a little more disconnected. Either that, or I haven't properly broken into the group. Not that I am exclusively trying to hang out with Americans whenever I'm abroad, but it's always comforting to find people with whom you share some common thread.

After smiling like an idiot at all the old white men in the supermarket, and getting accosted by a worker dressed up like a giant orange M&M, I convinced myself that it was ok for me to buy some imported chocolate. Then I convinced myself it was ok to try some fruits and vegetables, even though I've been told this is risky. I've been here a week, and haven't been sick at all, so I figured it's time to take the next step in food because I can't continue to survive on snack packs and slightly off soy milk. I headed to the American-imported pomegranates before spotting the more interesting, and much cheaper, local fruits. I bought dragon fruit, mangosteen and ponkan. If I survive this round, I'll go back for durian and guava. There are plenty interesting products at the supermarket - in the beauty aisle, I can't seem to find any self-tanner, but there IS a plethora of skin-lightening products which boggles the mind, even though I'm totally aware of the cultural desire in many places to be light-skinned. Some are made by US companies that back home make it their business telling us we are all too pasty. There are lots of "island favorites" - dried mango, spam, tinned mackerel - which remind me of life in Chuuk and Pohnpei, and plenty of Australian brands, so I can get the best of all my worlds. Buying food here gives me a good perspective of cost. As I was walking though the midway section of the mall which has shops like Aldo, Esprit and Lacoste, a woman from a makeup stand came over to me and gave me a little blue bar. I thought it was a soap sample, but evidently taking the little bar meant I agreed to come see all of her products, called Aqua. she scrubbed my nails and hands with sea salt and oils and then sat me down and took off the makeup on one side of my face to show me a moisturizer. This was before I got groceries, so I was immediately reminded of that movie the Other Sister when Juliette Lewis agrees to a makeover and the saleswoman only does half her face. Except unlike Juliette Lewis I don't have a learning disability, just really poor sales resistance. I stopped her before she could do anymore damage and said I didn't have enough cash to pay for anything she was selling. The package of things she wanted me to buy would have cost 6,000php, around $135. My groceries cost $27. The manicure that I booked for tomorrow will be $30, but I feel I deserve it.