Feyma Martin

Yesterday I was talking to our laundry lady (her name is Inday). She just came back on working with us again. She worked for us before like 2 years ago. The kids really liked her and she liked our kids too especially our youngest one. Before she left 2 years ago, she asked me if she could take off for 2 weeks because her and her hubby will be going to Zamboanga to visit the her husband’s parents. Then the next day she came back to get her paycheck, at that time I was not home but my niece (the one that has baby now) was here at the house. My niece told her that I’m not home but she gave the money for Inday’s pay. Inday stayed for awhile and chatted to some of my workers. She’s kind to 2 of them. After awhile of talking she went downstairs and started talking to my niece. My niece just then told her that if you are waiting for for Aunt Feyma, she won’t be here until later. She’s really busy taking care of a lot of orders. So Inday told my niece its okay I will wait I just wanted to talk to her. Right there and then my niece just told Inday to not worry on coming back because her services on being the laundry lady is already terminated and to not come here and be near here again.

Well, I didn’t know that our laundry lady was being terminated. I’ve been waiting for her to comeback. My niece didn’t tell me anything that she’s firing somebody without my approval. My niece told me a different story that our laundry lady quit working here because she’s tired and she wanted to stay and live for good in Zamboanga. I believed my niece’s story at that time. All along when Inday was gone she’s thinking that I was the one who wanted her terminated. Since then we didn’t see her, but Chris our oldest saw the husband of Inday like last year. They just said hi to each other.

A few days ago one of my nieces saw Inday’s sister at the public market here. My niece (different niece) asked her where’s Inday? The sister told my niece that Inday is in her house , that it was her day off that day. The next day I was so shocked that Inday showed up at our house and came to visit. It was really nice seeing her. The kids were really asking her if she could come back and do laundry here for us again. She told me that really she likes working here because she felt that she was treated really good and the kids are really nice to her. So I told her that if she is available and can do laundry for us that I would be interested for her to work for us again. She told me that “Yes Ate Feyma” I would like to work here again.

So Inday has been here now for almost a week. A few days ago we were just talking about the past and she was asking about some of our employees who were close to her, what are they doing now? She then asked me where’s my niece the one that terminated her 2 years ago. I told her what happened to her. She then said that I am not shocked that she had baby now because she’s been causing lots of trouble with you guys before I left. Inday then told me that there were instances before that my niece would even tell her that she’s (laundry lady) stupid because Inday didn’t prepare her uniform. My niece has lots of bad days before because she’s always called up to see us a lot in our room. We would talk to her for a long time. After talking to us my niece then has a bad attitude and she will take it out on our people. I know she treated our helpers like that before, she’s calling them bad names. It’s so embarrassing because all of them would say we are nice but the niece had bad attitudes. Honestly, even now she had baby she didn’t change. She even called Bob bad names too. Come to think of it Bob was the person supporting her even before she started grade school. Bob was even trying to help her after she had the baby. But she’s lazy and just wants hand outs. Bob and I NEVER RECEIVED ANY THANK YOU from her. None what so ever. But we received bad mouthing from her.

Anyway, I’m glad that Inday believed me when I told her that I didn’t know about her termination until later. And some of my nieces and my workers told her too that I didn’t have any idea of what my niece did to her. I told her from now on to tell me if my nieces or nephews would say something bad to her. She must have like us because she would not come back here to work if she didn’t.

Mabuhay!

Wow I can’t believed it, that its already 8 years ago that Me and Bob decided to bring the whole family here to the Philippines to live for good. It was really a challenge at first. I really thought I can’t make it here. It was really hard for me and our second child Aaron at first. I felt so alone and I didn’t feel I know everybody. Even my whole family were strangers to me. I’m pretty sure they felt the same about me. I thought I was going insane here. Like I’m used to going places all by myself. Here I am in the mercy of the taxi driver or tricycle driver. I’m okay on that now I let my nephew drive for me now.

My past time used to be crafting or painting birdhouses. Here I can’t find anything like that in a store. I saw some ceramics store here in Davao, where you can buy an unfinished one and do it yourself kind of thing. Or they can even give you lesson on how to do it. Its kind of cool too.

Really when it comes to adjusting the lifestyle here I think me and my family are already used to it here. We liked it here a lot now. Our kids like their school a lot now too. Really the turning point for me to stay here was seeing our oldest son Chris (If you guys can recall on our early post here about our son Chris, he has special needs) got adjusted here so quickly. He loves it here. He likes to go to my mom and my sister’s house to hang out and play with his cousin. He learned to speak in Bisaya fluently in just 6 months. It’s really amazing for him to learn that quickly. We really are proud of him for that.

I think all of us, me and Bob and kids will stay here for the rest of our lives. This is our home now. We asked the kids sometimes if they would want to go back to the States to live? Their answers would be “NO”. They  will say that, maybe just visit Granny when time that she can’t travel anymore. Hopefully it would still a long time from now.

Hey, there is still some stuff here that we are still adjusting, but its not that bad though. I think people that live here ahead of us can tell you that too. It’s really nice to live here, its just that you really have to have a lot of patience, trust with your partner and open mind to survived at first. It’s a tough and hard work for all of us to go through this far. Honestly its not easy especially for the first year or so. If you don’t trust your partner, your marriage will be done in just a few months. I am not scaring anybody I am just saying what we went through so that some of you would be aware already. That its just normal to go through all that stuff though. Maybe some of you had an easy adjustment living here. You can share with the group. I know some friends that are scared to move back here because of fear of a lifestyle adjustments here. I understand that too, we’ve been there.

Mabuhay!

I met Bob for the first time in Cebu. I was there to study college. I never thought he will be visiting there that soon. We were corresponding for 6 months and he decided to come here for a visit. We talked regularly almost the time for his visit. My family in Cebu just didn’t have a phone at their house, so I had to go to the neighbors house to use their phone. I was not that close to those people, really they don’t know me that well even though I stayed with my aunt and uncle for a long time. I just didn’t socialize that much with other people. I just stayed home and be with my aunt, uncle, cousins and their kids.

When Bob went to see my family’s house in Cebu a lot of my family and neighbors were shocked. Not that many of them knew that I had been corresponding with somebody from abroad. Its just not worth talking to my family that didn’t know me that well. Only my close relatives knew about Bob.

When Bob and I decided to fly to GenSan to see my parents my aunt and uncle in Cebu went with us. It was the first time for them to be on an airplane. It was really amazing and nice seeing them go somewhere with our help. Honestly that was the first and last ride of my uncle. He died over 4 years ago. Anyway, my family from Cebu had a good time in GenSan at that time.

My parents and my siblings, they knew that I was corresponding with Bob. I told them when I came home to GenSan during my semester break. My parents were okay with it. When we got to GenSan, Bob asked my dad’s approval for us to be married? My dad said “NO”. His reasons was he is very ill and old. HE told Bob, “I really like you. It’s just that America is too far and its hard for me.” Wow, that was hard for Bob to handle what he just heard. He was so worried then. The next day my aunt and my sisters talked to my dad and told him that if Bob and I would be married and I will be in the States that we will come here to take vacation to visit him anyway. So then my dad talked to Bob again and asked him if we could visit here quite often since he is sickly. Bob said yes. We got married after 10 days. After 5 months off I went to the States and we came back here for a visit after just less than 2 years. My dad was so happy seeing us. We had our first child then. After visiting him here my dad passed away 5 months later. It was really hard. I love him so much.

Before Bob and I went to GenSan I had to get 3 weeks off from my school. I am lucky that my teachers allowed me to be absent that long. They gave me lots of my lessons to be studied and projects to do. I was like 2 months shy of our graduation. I got a little bit of a special treatment because I was the only girl of my course and they know that I can catch up with my classmates.

Wow thats already over 18 years ago now. I can’t believe time flies by so quickly. It was really a good 18 years for us.

I was just going through all our pictures that we have taken all the years that were hidden in a box. I came across this picture of mine with some of my family with me. If I remember it was taken in the early 80’s. I must be like 13 or 14 years old. With me on this photos are my siblings and cousins and nephews. This is our route from our house to the main road where we would catch a jeepney to go to GenSan. In those days there was no motorcycle yet to take us.

Ever since I can remember my parents had this kariton (cart pulled by the carabao). It really is used a lot on our land, especially during harvest time. We put a lot of coconuts in it that just were being harvested from the tree and be brought to our Tapahan (a place to process the coconut to dry). That’s the place that Bob has a video when he was working in our farm a few months back. Nowadays a lot of the kariton, they use a truck tire instead of a spoked wooden wheel. It is easier I think for the carabao to handle when its dry season. During rainy days this tire in the picture is much more helpful. It won’t get stuck easily in the mud. That’s how I remember my dad said. It is also good when passing through a river.

During the mid 90’s our Barangay Captain was lucky enough to get the budget for a nice bridge. They built it. It was really nice. I saw it when I took a day to visit at our farm. I was impressed and some jeepney that are en route to other municipalities would even swing by at our barangay to get some passengers. It was really nice then because the people can transport their product easily to the city. Somehow the bridge just lasted for a few years. The budget was really for a good bridge and I think a lot of the money it went to the pocket of somebody. Sad to say some part of the bridge was wash out by the flood. The farmers now really had a hard time bringing their products to the city. Not much vehicle would go there because the road that’s not passing through the river is bad too. I wish and pray that the Barangay Captain now will do something to rebuild the bridge. It is really important to all the people there to have that bridge done again. I think that hill behind us on the photo was now washed away slowly by the flood too. My family are trying to talk to the Barangay Captain to really asked the Mayor or the Governor of the Sarangani Province for another budget and have the bridge fixed properly and let the money go to the proper use instead of someone’s pocket.

When I was growing up one of our neighbor had a buying and selling business, they buy corn, copra and other products. They also had a mini super market and convenience store. At least with them the people in the farm will sell products to them and they are the one that will transport the product to GenSan or somewhere else. It was good to the people at our farm.

In the early 80’s their was rumor that NPA is around the area. And it happened that the wife of our neighbor that had money was kidnapped. She was held for a few weeks. After her releas the family decided that they will move out in the farm and they lived in the next barrio that they felt they are safer. Our farm was like a ghost for a few years. Even my parents moved to GenSan until my dad died. I know that it was dangerous to live in the farm, my dad know a lot of the local people and even the muslims. Even them they told my dad to get out of there and stay somewhere that’s safe. Thank God that after a few years of being hostile now our place my beloved farmland is safe again. I hope it stays like that for our lifetime.

It really is good to see my old photo again and think back of my childhood. It brought back a lot of joy and some sad memories.

Mabuhay!

I was eavesdropping and heard this problem. A lady’s cousin let somebody borrow her name to a friend. She must have trusted this friend so much that she let her use it. I guess the friend wanted to go abroad, she couldn’t go abroad with her last name because the sister had a bad record. She felt that if she will go to the NBI (National Bureau of Investigation) office to get a clearance she can’t get it. Maybe the sister also had the same problem using other peoples name. Just a thought.

So when she got the name already borrowed from the owner she will then have the birth certificate. Nowadays to have a birth certificate and can be use you have to go to the NSO (National Statistics Office) office to have it authenticated so that it can be accepted. Also you can get more copies of your birth certificate there and it’s already authenticated too. You just show the original one and you can request some more copies then. Anyway, I guess the friend had all that and started her paperwork to work abroad. I had a feeling while listening to them that the friend must have promised a lot of cash for her to agree to it. The lady finally got a visa to work abroad. She had a contract to work there (I didn’t hear what country she went to) for 2 years. That was the contract she agreed upon with her employer. After 2 years of working abroad the lady went home to the Philippines. While the lady was in the Philippines, the owner of the name told her that she doesn’t want her name to be used anymore and she wants for her to return all the papers and stuff. The lady that is using the identity just didn’t mind the owner. Two months after her vacation the lady that used the identity went abroad again without the knowledge of the owner’s name. She was mad then. She wants the lady now to be deported. So with the owner of the name’s reaction I doubt if the lady gave her money for using her name because why she wants her name back? I was gonna join with their conversation,  but I refrain myself I don’t want them to misinterpret what I say to them.

So that got me thinking it must be a lot of case here in the Philippines for that. Now how would a person get back her own identity? Gosh, why on earth would somebody loan their identity to someone else? Is it desperation to get some money for their name? Lots of thought played my head after I heard this. To be honest I don’t think the owner can really get it. Unless maybe she will go to the police and report it. Or maybe she can report to the employment office.

What do you think guys? Do you know of somebody too that happen like this?