Dolly Kristel Rae P. Chaves

 Pandan Products

These bags are made from pandan and pinya leaves which grow abundantly in Brgy. Calaya. The products made from pandan have become the primary source of income. Calaya's residents express their creativity through colorful hand bags, coin purses, wallets, and other fanciful items.

            In making the pandan products, the people collect the pandan leaves from plants. Only the young leaves are cut so the plant will naturally renew. The young leaves are sliced in fine strips and sorted for further processing. Workers produce various pandan products of different sizes and designs. This is followed by a coloring process, in which pandan products are painted with water-based colors. Then, the colored products are dried.  A shiny liquid is applied to assure a product of high quality.

AN UNFORGETTABLE LEARNING EXPERIENCE

            On January 6, 2013, I eagerly woke up to see the early morning sun, and felt the rush of excitement as I started the day ahead. I arrived at the Ortiz port at exactly 8:30 AM to meet my groupmates. After the 15 minutes ride in a pumpboat to Guimaras, we finally reached the stones of the beautiful island. I wanted it to be an unforgettable experience because it is my first time to be in the island of Guimaras.

            For our preparations, we were informed to bring all the necessary materials such as clothes, teaching materials, kitchen utensils, and food. The day before the community immersion, our group went to the supermarket to buy the things that we will be using for activities in the next day. 

I perceived the island of Guimaras as a very peaceful place to live in. I saw the welcoming faces of the elders as well as the heart-warming smiles of the children that first greeted us. The people in Calaya were approachable and hospitable to all of us, they treated and accommodated us like tourists but more likely as a part of their own family. At first, we were shy but eventually we got well along with them. Even if we did not have a foster family like the rest of the other groups have, we were happy to be taken care of by nanay Linda, the caretaker of the house we stayed in. We felt the love and kindness that nanay Linda showed to all of us. She was so generous, she even allowed us to use her cooking utensils.

Not all the residents in Calaya, Nueva Valencia, Guimaras came from well-off families, poverty is another face in their community. Most of the people’s source of livelihood is through making native bags. The raw materials for these colourful and beautiful bags are pandan and pinya leaves. The people’s lifestyle was just simple, for them to eat at least three times a day was just enough. I have realized how lucky I am to belong to a middle-class family and to be provided with all the things that I needed. I have also realized that I should be thankful and more contented for what I have, even for the little things. I am lucky that my parents have sent me to the best school in order to develop myself. Aside from that, I have also understood that there are chances and opportunities that I should never take for granted. I have come to think that I should strive more and work harder so that the efforts of those I loved would not be wasted at all.

In my experience, I believe that the community immersion is the best way for us to know ourselves more as well as to knit stronger ties with each other. Even though it was just a short period of time, we discovered more of our own strength and weaknesses. I learned how important it is to communicate with the rest of my group members. It is also an effective way for us to learn on how to suit ourselves and our different personalities with the people in the community. We tried our best to cooperate and build friendly relations not only to the people but also to the teachers and committee members. Furthermore, the community immersion was a tool for us to develop and practice acceptance, patience, understanding, thoughtfulness, and thriftiness; it really helped me to balance my time in doing my school works and doing my household chores. However, there are times that we have a misunderstanding among our group members but we learned how to fix them. I believe that no one is perfect that is why we need to accept the faults of others.

Living under the same roof and being together with all of my groupmates is very fun. I am surely going to miss them and the moments that we have shared together. We have created a strong bond that cannot be replaced. As a group, we often talked about the things that we should accomplish within a week, and most of our group members shared their own opinions and suggestions. The people in Calaya were also very supportive in our day-to-day activities, especially the principal, and the barangay officials.