Davao Davao - What is there to do?

Heya Friendfolk,

So I am now working in Davao City, Philippines. It is on Mindanao Island, the most southern part of the Philippines. Davao City is a very large city but it does not feel that way. There are no tall buildings and not a lot to do here. It is a quiet place to be living and working. I live in "My Studio", an apartment building with about 30 other interns working here. I have two Chinese room mates- One speaks great English and the other speaks very minimally.

So what am I doing here? Well I am doing a 2 month CEED for an organization called AIESEC. CEED stands for Cultural Envoy for Exchange Development. I am working with the local AIESEC here in Philippines. My intended job was to be a market consultant and contact companies and raise management/business related internships here in Davao. Since arriving my job as developed more into a marketing consultant for the local members since I will be taking time to train the members on HOW to market to companies since currently the AIESEC has only raised un-paid development internships. Am I ok with this change - yes - it is good practice for me - does this take more time to get started - yes - the locals plan everything which means it goes on Filipino time and not my time. Thats alright! Cultural adjustments! :)

My actual job is a very SLOW process. Since Filipino Time is equally as slow as Thai Time.....things take way longer than they should to get moving. Hopefully things will pick up soon cause I want to learn and I want to teach.

Since I had that little fiasco in the Jakarta Airport with the requirement of having a booked onward ticket OUT of the Philippines....I booked a ticket home for September 2nd. But I am now feeling I should go home earlier so that I can spend more time with friends and family and have more time to relax at home prior to returning to Ottawa for a busy semester of University. We'll see if I can make these changes.

So far, 2.5 weeks in, I have gone out for dinner ALOT....and Filipino food is very un-vegetarian friendly.....there are NO vegetables here. ANYWHERE. haha So there is basically ONLY bbq dinners....EVERYNIGHT! but hey....atleast its still cheap....about $2-$3 a meal. But all I crave is a greek salad! Because of this lack of vegetarian options I have now adopted Chicken into my diet - MAN CHICKEN IS DELICIOUS AFTER SO MANY YEARS NOT EATING IT!!

I've also been wakeboarding and on an island hopping tour. Both were great fun except on the overnight of the island hopping where the roof above ONLY my bed leaked and I got soaking wet and thus the slight cold I had turned into a full on sickness after spending the night sleeping on wet blankets. Ugh.

Now I am working to complete my National Support Team -Exchange role for AIESEC Canada which I hold from June 2010-May 2011 - for Thursday Night, while trying to figure out when my training schedule for the locals will be here for my CEED placement.

Cheers