social workers are paper makers - bloody yet, fun.

The accomplishment report of ACCESS has been keeping me busy for a while now. Somehow, I wanted to get out of that mud-pit and I want to finish it as soon as I can. However, it has given me an interesting feeling for it makes me look back to memories and reminisce what happened inside and out of ACCESS-Philippines for the whole year. It made me remember persons (who joined study tours, who facilitated trainings, who attended activities) and walk through places again (Perez, Pampanga, Smoky Mountain) through fragments of memories stored in the back-up file of my brain.

It is also my first time to write such kind of report, and almost everyday, worry throbs inside me on how the DSWD would find my report. Would it be amusing? Would it be informative? Would it be a report qualified for their standards? But, at those moments, I brush the anxieties away with "there are so many NGOs that they need to worry about and ours, is just one of the thousands in the Philippines".
 

[The picture in the cover page of the Accomplishment Report.

Yes. I am teasing you to read it.]

Today until tomorrow, I'll be working on the section about Secretariat and it is the most difficult. Because, to paint what the Secretariat does in everyday business in ACCESS is a hard thing to do. The Secretariat is the heart and the mind of the institution (and I'm proud to be part of it), but I'm at a loss of words when trying to describe how Secretariat staff supports beneficiaries and the staff from project sites. Probably, it is difficult to lift one's own chair. www 

 

And here I am, talking about work after a day's work. "Everyone really likes to talk about work", Ame-chan said last Tuesday. 

[When I get too tired, or brain is not working anymore, I look at photographs and get energy from them. I took this while I was walking in Mariposa St., going to office from Redemptorist seminary.]

In my 4th year in the university, I stumbled upon a social worker who said "I am social worker, not a paper-maker." through the internt. The person was agonizing with the pains of writing reports. I realized that reporting and documentation is part of the everyday life of a social worker. One might hate it at first, but if one does it creatively and regularly, it's a piece of cake which one would enjoy biting amidst everyday hard-work. So, from now, I promise to write more about experiences and keep my journal-writing. www

 

On other news, Noriel (the SSDN-youth leader) has been staying in office for a special piano lessons and music class with our intern staff. It's so nice to hear Noriel practicing the piano everyday. It made me want to get back to practicing the guitar again and trying-out playing the piano. But from tomorrow, he'll be back to his work of organizing fellow youth members. 

 

[Noriel writing for the newsletter of SSDN-youth. He asked me to edit it, and I was pushed in tears. He wrote about the youth being the hope not just of the future but of the present. But, how can the youth be the hope of the present, if they are nourished with their needs for development, at their present youth. ノリエル、おつかれさまでした！]

Today, アクセス日本 (ACCESS-Japan) opened it's blog for public reading. Please visit:

http://blog.goo.ne.jp/access_japan

Also, here's the link for アクセス日本 (ACCESS-Japan)'s effort to help disaster victims in Japan. 
http://www.page.sannet.ne.jp/acce/earthquake.html

New post up in ACCESS-Philippines VOA's blog. Click!
http://ameblo.jp/acce-philippines/