2010 UNION : Philippines

This year's HOPE UNION Study Tour took the team to the city of Davao on the island of Mindanao in the southern Philippines. Mindanao has a history of religious violence, and kidnappings by radical Islamic rebel groups were, until recently, not uncommon.

 

The city of Davao is considered a safe haven - being located on the eastern part of the island, far from the less stable western peninsula. In order to foster development in Mindanao, HOPE's partner organization, the Assisi Foundation, established a university for the indigenous peoples of the Philippines, groups that have historically been marginalized and who now suffer considerably higher rates of poverty than mainstream Filipinos.

 

The approximately 90 students at Pamulaan University all receive full scholarships to attend the school from various sponsoring organizations from all around the world. The students themselves come mostly from situations of extreme poverty and without the full scholarship would have no other opportunity for a university education. As university educations generally lead to better jobs, the students see their education at Pamulaan as a ticket out of poverty. 

 

This year's HOPE UNION team was comprised of short termers, who went for 7 days, and a long term team that stayed at Pamulaan for a total of 17days. Team members were welcomed to the university on opening night with a blur of singing and dancing that displayed the colors and traditions of the various tribes represented at Pamulaan, and jolted us out of our journey-induced fog. Team members slept in dormitories on campus learning to live like the students do, eating lots of rice and fruit, and showering with cold water from a pail.

 

At one point part of the team was invited to travel to mountain village - the home of one of the students. We thought it would be a two hour journey by van but were surprised to find out that the last half hour was a dirt-bike ride deep into the mountains on a back road that was challenging even for the dirt bikes.
We piled on, two to a bike and clutching our luggage, and ended up in a setting that made us feel like the half-hour ride had taken us a hundred years back in time. The people of the village went to bed around 6 and rose at 5, living lives in tune with the sun. We met kids who sang constantly, and saw the school that Assisi had built for them.

 

Back at the university, the team worked on a medical clinic that is being built at Pamulaan, carrying cinder blocks and plastering them together. All these activities took a back seat, however, to time spent with the students. Hearing the stories of their struggles and triumphs are the portions of the trip that will burn brightest in everyone's memory.