The Trailblazer
My sister once told me that I am the trailblazer of our family. I was thirteen then, I did not really understand what it meant.
After finishing grade school, and at age twelve, I decided to study in Cavite for my high school education. This meant that I will live away from my family based in Mindanao.
And so, I embarked on a journey, trying out the feeling of independence early on in life. Along the way, I learned many realities in life. The trade-off of being independent was the realization that it is not easy to be alone, and away from your comfort zone.
A few years after I left home, my family decided to transfer residence to Cavite. My sister saw this development as a result of my being the trailblazer of the family.
After high school, I decided to get my college education at Silliman University in Dumaguete City. Silliman is the premier protestant school in the country. My parents used to work for and taught at Silliman. Not only that, I was made and born Dumaguete City. So it was a homecoming for me of some sort.
Silliman University offered me a new perspective in life. I got to manage all my affairs, including my finances, social life, and others. I had to get scholarships, and signed up as a working student to help my parents defray the cost of schooling. Getting quality Christian education comes with a big price tag nowadays.
When at the University, I involved myself with various community service activities. One of which is my involvement with the Children’s Outreach Ministry of the Silliman University Church.
This story will somehow make my sister’s claim of me being a trailblazer true.
Upon entering Silliman, I enlisted as a student volunteer with Silliman Church’s Sunday School Outreach Program. Year afterwards, I was already tasked to head a group of seven student volunteers teaching in the program.
On Sunday afternoons, we would go to the slum and depressed areas of Dumaguete City. Places where children don’t have much chance, like the others, of going to schools. These made them look forward to our Sunday afternoon visits.
Our Christian Education pastor, who heads the program, told me that student volunteers are very hard to find. I enlisted help from my friends, inviting even those who are from other church denominations, believing that church affiliation is not a prerequisite in serving others, most especially the children.
Three of my friends signed up, two of whom thanked me no end for they were able to ‘rediscover’ their selves. I told them I should be the one thankful, for responding to my invitation.
Soon enough, our crew of ten grew to fourteen. The trail that I started blazing caught fire with others. Our pastor was so happy to inform us that our Outreach Centers increased to nine, catering now to almost a hundred children.
I remember the last time I visited the children after I have already left a group of volunteers to continue blazing the fire I started.
I saw the children happy and cheerful together with their new teachers. I owe them the inspiration of serving others. That, in spite of their poor economic condition, they were still able to smile and be like normal children. I felt very blessed I was able to contribute something to their lives.
Tourism for development
Before I had my Bachelors degree, I already had my marriage degree. I married a woman from northern Mindanao.
Our union brought me to the province of Misamis Occidental. Now I am based in this beautiful Northern Mindanao province. I am now working for the government, as an Information Officer for the Philippine Information Agency (PIA) assigned to the provincial governor’s office. I am in-charge of the information dissemination and press releases for the provincial government. However, the promotion of the province as new tourist destination was added to my workload as the Tourism Officer-designate of the province.
Working in and for the government brought me more realization, and firsthand exposure to how an institution created to serve the people operates. In my case, I am involved with the Provincial Governor’s Office’s staff in particular and the whole Misamis Occidental community in general.
One of the realizations that I learned from work is that the government’s bureaucratic red tape processes are really tiring and more often than not, just wasting the constituents’ time, tax money, and government resources. This slows the process of delivering the needed services to the people.
This exposure has brought my resolve to do more to help my country, even in my small and little ways. There is so much to do with our government system, but I have already acknowledged the fact that I can’t change much of the established ways how our government works.
One of these little ways is my contribution to the promotion of our province as new destination for tourists. It has been years that the tourism promotion of the province has been stagnant.
The Provincial Governor’s Office Promotions and Creative team is already making headway in the promotion of the province as a new and alternative tourism destination in the northern Mindanao region. The team, directly under the Governor, have been entrusted the task of upgrading the tourism promotional tools and methods of the province.
We are now promoting the Misamis Occidental Aquamarine Park, a park complete with facilities for functions, seminars, eco-tourism tour, a mini-zoo, hotel accommodation, and a Marine Rescue and Recreation Center in an atoll locate a few kilometers from the park.
So far, we have produced a documentary film for the province’s history, underscoring the partnership with a stalwart in the development of the province in its 75 years of existence – the Misamis University.
We have revived the province’s tourism potentials by producing a new promotional video. Set in an MTV-format, it has a unique and catchy jingle, ANG SAYA, which aims to captivate prospective tourists and visitors to the province. With the promotion of local tourism, I am optimistic that we have contributed greatly in the socio-economic development of the country.
I have always hoped that this trail that I have blazed will inspire others to do the same: doing small and simple things in their own and special ways in helping our country.
Dream Realization
I always believed in the teaching vocation. Being born to a family of teachers, and having grown up in an academic setting, I have always dreamed of becoming a teacher also.
This coming November, at the start of the second semester, will be a big realization of this dream. Sharing what I know, and what I have learned over the years, particularly in Philippine History, will definitely be a fulfillment on my part. I admit that we Filipinos have so little grasp on our history. It is my contribution to nation building the continuing study of Philippine history so that I can impart these learned things to my students.
This is my dream, and I will do everything to realize this dream, and more.
Karl Imanoel O. Aoanan Silliman University