Exploring Palawan

In beautiful Palawan today, arrived March 23 (Tuesday) at Puerto Princesa city, its capital. Refreshing to smell the sea breeze and to witness a really perky sun. The first night found us eating affordable Chao Long (Vietnamese noodle soup) at semi-al fresco Bonas restaurant along Manalo extension. The city was known to be a former haven for Vietnamese refugees.

Considered the largest province in the Philippines (Palawan, from the Chinese word "Pa-Lao-Yu" meaning Land of Beautiful Harbours) is remarkably sparse in population, around 750,000 people dispersed in 23 municipalities (from Busuanga/Coron in the north to Balabac island in the south). The largest baranggay in Metro Manila, Bagong Silang in Caloocan city, is actually more dense with over 1 million residents (and that is just one area in Manila).

The sense of community here can be deeply felt. On our first night, we went to the wake of the late Judge Filomeno Vergara and felt like the whole town was present! or were aware that he passed away. The Philippine flags around the city were at half-mast. We then slept at the Holy Trinity University retreat house and today at the home of kind CFC members Tito Raffy and Tita Tess.

I am currently in this beautiful island preparing for the Gawad Kalinga Bayani Challenge 2010.

About 50 teams (approximately 750 participants from all over the Philippines, US, Australia and Singapore) are headed to Palawan from March 29 to April 4 to build homes for the neglected Pala'wans, one of the island's indigenous peoples (IP).

Sharing their time, resources and sweat, they will work side by side with the indigenous tribe in building their homes.

The Pala'wans belong to the large Manobo-based linguistic groups of the southern Philippines. Being nomadic, the tribe do not legally own the lands they till, have no permanent homes and are unable to go to schools.

Residing in the forests, the Pala'wan's are the usual victims of injustice, often neglected and considered as second-class residents of the community. Basic services provided by the government can barely reach their temporary places, and they suffer from hunger due to extreme poverty and children cannot read nor write and deprived of basic life skills.

Concerned about the plight of the indigenous tribe, Palawan-based companies Rio Tuba Nickel Mining Corporation (RTNMC) and Coral Bay Nickel Corporation (CBNC) partnered with Gawad Kalinga in 2006 to provide holistic GK communities for them, committing P10 million for 10 years to help the Pala'wan tribe to endure in this age, as part of their corporate social responsibility to the community here.

RTNMC and CBNC made all their mining machineries available for land development and committed to finance the construction of GK houses, multi-purpose building, productivity and educational facilities.

So far, six villages have been built serving approcimately 300 families; about 80 homes are on target to be built by next week by GK volunteers who are coming from all over the country to serve their fellow Filipinos in Palawan.

Seventy-five men from the Philippine Navy will be coming by ship to lend their strength while volunteers from the United States, Singapore and Australia are also flying in to help build in the two sites: Culimbawang and Bohoy GK villages at Baranggay Rio Tuba in the municipality of Bataraza, in the southern part of beautiful Palawan.