Family news

 Aside from rain, (causing floods in Manila) the typhoons missed us. 

Never mind: two more aiming at Luzon in the near future.

Lots of family stuff going on.

Ruby has a teaching job in Thailand, but was stopped from going there by the government, who needed to investigate her for health problems (e.g. tuberculosis) and check that the job offer is for a real job. There is a lot of human trafficking to Thailand so they are being safe.

However, lots of bureaucratic overkill: After she submitted the completed papers twice, she was told they had to be checked two more times, plus an interview in Manila (three hour drive from here) before approval, and this would take a week or two.

So Joy got on the phone to someone she knew, and the paperwork was expedited. No money changed hands (she is a Christian and unlike Lolo refuses to give gifts to speed things along). 

Voila, approved.

So they left today. Joy went with her to help her settle into her apartment and check out the school, which is an international school using American teaching methods and standards.

Ruby has been teaching the classes on line for the last three weeks while waiting for this so she has sort of met her pupils (middle school level).

In other news, Joy got an award from the government of Bulacan for her work building up the agricultural sector. They had a big celebration giving awards to people who are leaders working to improve the area. 

She does training and marketing for a local organic rice and vegetable coop there. Organic food is more expensive to grow, and must be certified, but does bring a bigger profit to the farmers. And since this is a coop, they get more profit without a middle man..

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She was running our farm when she was chosen to get trained by the Goldman Sachs 10000 women project to get advanced training in business and marketing; and now that Kuya instead of Lolo is running our own farm business, she started working nearby in the next province where her family has a farm, and got involved teaching locals how to grow rice organically and with government funding, helped them start a business (essentially a coop) to market the product,   and now ten years later, it is thriving.