Uncle George Wants You

The pull/push to other countries is strong here. I’ve read that about 10% of the Filipino population lives abroad and that those people fuel a huge part of the national economy with the money they send back to their families. It is said that if that income is ever severed the economy would collapse.

Many people I’ve met here are waiting for their papers to come through to go to Canada or the US. How long they’ll have to wait no one seems to know. There are many schools here that train people to become caregivers in only a few months, and then help the graduates to go through the process of getting their papers to work in North America (although I’ve heard that unfortunately many of these “colleges” are money-grabbing hoaxes preying on dreams and desperation).

Nursing students, in their pink-shirted uniforms, are everywhere in my neighbourhood. Nursing students wear pink and medical students wear white, and all of the shirts button at the back. How do they get dressed in the morning? Well, it's rare for anyone to live alone here, so I imagine there’s someone there to help them get in and out of their uniforms everyday. (Well that was a random aside...)

The funny thing about the photo above (taken in downtown Cebu City) is that I didn’t notice the enourmous George Bush image hovering overhead, seeking nurses, care-givers and IT professionals; I only saw his looming face once I looked at the photo on my computer. I don’t have any philosophical waxing to come up with about that, but it’s interesting nonetheless. Maybe I’m just too used to seeing his face; I do get CNN on my television after all.