Yesterday we arrived two days ago in Davao City, the place where we will be doing most of our training to the Philippines Scouts, and so far it has been an absolute blast. The days leading up to arriving in Davao was jam packed with activities. We met many city officials who have provided most of the funding and services to make our trip possible. Our home stay experience was a true exchange of cultures that brought along many tears and heartfelt goodbyes as we left. Through countless interactions with the people here, we have come to realized Scouting wields another level of service, in terms of social and community needs. Personally, I am looking forward to using this new perspective to benefit our program back in Canada.
Although our first couple days have been full of surprise schedule changes, sleep deprivations, a variety of maladies, make shift presentation, ceremonies and overall life style differences, the day we had with our new hosts yesterday was beyond words. Before the day began, our moral was pretty low considering how we had to sleep on a tour bus and we have not had any free time to ourselves as of yet. Health has been quite a concern as we have gone gone from winter weather to hot and humid summer weather. Our first real time and experience together as a team involved hopping to many of the Philippines exotic islands. We got to swim in the ocean, see some coral reefs, get sun burnt in December, and so much more. Not exactly white sandy beaches, but having our own boat to eat, talk and tan with good friends has had many of us expressing the day as “One of the best days of my life.”
Paul Leung