The Problem of Development in Diaspora

By Marivir R. Montebon
New York City

Under the sweltering heat of July’s summer sun, I was singing to myself the ironic song of Evita while walking towards the UN headquarters which is facing the East River. “…the answer is (not) here all the time, I love you and hope you love me…” I know too well the answer isn’t in that huge space allotted for the community of nations to blah-blah and brandish their rhetoric. The answer to all human issues around the world is in every person and in every concerned government state.

But then, there I was again, in another one of those huge conferences which the UN had gathered, this time by the Economic and Social Council, to talk on a “high level” manner issues on Diaspora and Development.

The theme already is bothersome.

My home country bleeds off its people to distant shores all the time, since the 1500s. And that is not a sign of development. That social bleeding is a symptom of an economic disease, and a twisted notion of development.

I remember six years ago, Melanie and three of her co-teachers had to rebook their flight to the following day that they were supposed to be scheduled to fly to New York. There wasn’t something ominous about it. It’s just that the 747 was already in maximum capacity of 355 teachers ready for work in the states of New York, Maryland, and New Jersey in 2007. All on board were Filipino teachers, mentally preparing themselves to face what was to become one of toughest jobs on earth, teaching teenagers in America.

In a similar case, one travel agent once opined to me that flights to Saudi Arabia, from Manila or Hong Kong could easily be filled by Filipino expatriates every day. The Philippines has the biggest traffic of passengers to the Middle East, especially Saudi Arabia, and booking for a flight could get so tough. You don’t want to miss a flight, she said.

The Philippines is one of the world’s biggest exporters of workers, easily 40,000 each day, destined to eke a living even in some unknown places in Africa and the Antarctica. In the process, these workers become voiceless and in the margins of their work places, and have to maximize digital technology to be able to link with their loved ones left in the Philippines.

Philippine diaspora traces its history way back in the Spanish galleon trade in the Philippines in the 1500s. Filipino seafarers escaped the wrath of their Spanish masters when they landed in old America. Their first early settlements were in Louisiana and then later in California.

Towards the early 1900s, Filipino workers were labored in the asparagus plantations in Hawaii and California.

Massive migration patterns towards the US and the Middle East began after WWII, up to this date. Dreadfully called brain drain, the Philippines is a top sending country of its very own teachers, doctors, nurses, and other professionals to foreign shores. Who are left behind are the young and inexperienced entrants to the labor force.

It is easy to see that the diaspora is motivated by economic reasons. The Philippines continues to be a country with lesser or no economic opportunities, hence people are enticed to boldly venture new lives somewhere else.

The cost is outrightly the breaking apart of families and the uncertainty of the dream of luxury and stability. Here in the US, the once popular American dream is fast becoming a nightmare for most new immigrants.

Melanie, for instance, is a living example of a teacher living by the payday, with six children to raise in the US, and all the bills to pay for. At the end of each month, a measly amount of dollars, if at all, is left in her pocket.

“It is wrong for people to think that we are living a luxurious life in the US. Life here is harder, I would say,” she said. Melanie was not petitioned for a Green Card by the school she has worked for the past five years. Towards the last year of her contract, sensing that the school district does not intend to fulfill its promise of seeking for her permanent resident status, she was in a mad scramble for another petitioner.

She was one of the lucky ones who got a new one. The others who did not had to pack up and go back home while the others gambled to overstay.

Inside the massive hall of the UN, social development organizations gathered at the conference on diaspora and development emphasized on their government’s accountability for the protection of the rights of its citizens in diaspora.

At the 2013 UN High Level Dialogue (HLD) on Migration and Development, some 200 participants discussed wide-ranging concerns of global migration and its subsequent issues on wages, welfare, safety, and stability of the migrant population.
The Philippine government showcased itself as having one of the best practices as a sending country, with four agencies set up to ensure the expatriation of its people.

It’s not something to be proud of. Although the Philippine government never admits that it is very well into its labor export policy as a way to earn dollars for its economy, by institutionalizing four agencies for labor migration, it does not need to say it.

In fact, the presence of these agencies to traffic expats for labor has subconsciously created a mindset among Filipinos that development begins somewhere else outside my home. Ironically however, in many cases, the Philippine government has not efficiently stood by and protected Filipinos abroad when they needed to be, when they were trafficked and abused.

Two days prior to the July 15 HLD meeting, the same attending groups engaged in impassioned and exhaustive discussions on what their governments must do in order to respond to problems faced by immigrants all over the world.

To my mind, I asked why ever not have the facilitators thrown the question, for the sake of leveling off, on looking at development from three vantage points: the sending country, the migrant people, and the receiving county. It would have saved a lot of time and it would have immediately hit the heart of the issue.

Sending countries stand to lose their people in diaspora. They lose the talented, dedicated, skilled ones who had to separate from the families, in the hope that work abroad would make them economically stable, which is not always the case.

Migrant people do not necessarily win their dreams abroad. The immediate cost would be their nostalgia and the immediate risk would be their health and at worst deaths in the work place. Many, of course, because of hard work and talent, are able to succeed and shine in their fields.

The receiving countries stand to benefit from the diaspora. In concrete, these countries are the US and Saudi Arabia, the two most popular destinations for Filipinos, who hire the best of the people for its industries.

The Global Coalition on Migration, a world-wide non-profit organization, has underscored the priority of regulating the recruitment industry, using the ‘rights-based bilateral agreements of sending and receiving countries’ for migrant labor recruitment.

To institutionalize the protection of migrant populations is incumbent in each government state. But social organizations have to push for this, otherwise, state governments will be lame and lazy. The community of nations can only agree to write and unite on protocols. But then those are teethless without the corresponding government and civic action in each country and locality.

Unless groups and individuals consciously stand for what they deserve, everything is all but high level rhetoric. The answer and action, once again, is within us all the time.

(Photo by Velma Adlawan)

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SILVANA HERMOSA: Mentor Par Excellence

BY BISAI YA

After clocking in over 30 years of teaching in university and high school in Cebu, she embarked on a much-needed sabbatical leave only to find out that her soul-searching journey has taken her right back to the work she dearly loved.

Silvana Lauron-Hermosa is one of those who we can call an excellent mentor. But greatness could be exasperating too, especially by all frustration brought by the system in the workplace. She thought her leave might unlock her loss of teaching appetite and reboot her back to her academe senses.

Silvana went on to Indonesia to enjoy the company of her teaching friends and former students. And as they say old habits die hard, one day she was enticed back to teach English as a second language to secondary students in Indonesia. And here she found herself teaching again, not one but to two leading high schools, whilst serving as a Coordinator for UK's prestigious Cambridge University Qualifying Exam.

Back to her old self, Silvana practices her profession with passion, and what she describes as her greatest accomplishment.

In Cebu, she brought her dynamic attitude and caring ways to many classrooms in Philippines for 25 years. Her hardwork, enthusiasm and generosity have been an inspiration to the thousands of students in the two countries she has served.

Looking back, the likable and good-humored Hermosa started as a mentor to her siblings, before landing a job as an English and Literature teacher. Here she shared her love for writing and the arts, often acting as patron to her fine arts students who could not afford the cost of an exhibit.

Hermosa continues to share her time in helping students prepare for qualifying exams to enter Cambridge University in the US, and in mentoring Filipino teachers in preparation for their teaching jobs abroad.

The 52-year-old mother of three talks to OSM about being a mentor, a friend and a working mother who had chosen to work away from her family in the Philippines.

You have achieved so much. What has been your inspiration?

During my days as a student, poverty was my inspiration. I had my own youthful understanding that if we go to school it will make us rich someday. Reason enough why I wanted my younger siblings to have a good education. On the contrary, my father had wanted me to drop out after finishing high school and encouraged me to work as a salesperson at a store in the city. I needed to prove him wrong and so I pursued college education through a scholarship. I vowed to myself that I would never allow him to achieve his plan for me to work as a salesperson, and instead I worked hard at becoming a teacher.

Tell us about your work.

I teach English in two international high schools in Jakarta. I have been in this job for six years. I am also the coordinator and exam officer for International General Certificate of Secondary Education, a qualification from the University of Cambridge International examinations, where I am an accredited examiner for English as a second language. Being a Cambridge Center Coordinator is both challenging and inspirational for an expat like me who comes from a country where English is only a second language.

Is it difficult to be away from your family?

Coming here was a personal choice I insisted on doing. Thankfully, my family also supported me on this decision. Teaching in Jakarta is fulfilling; aside from being in a new environment, it also allowed me to recharge. Coming here was a fulfillment of a long time dream to teach abroad while earning an experience in an international set up, and being well compensated for it.

How has teaching changed your life and the lives of people around you?

I was part of a team that trained teachers to teach in America and I was happy to see that some did an overnight improvement of the tools they need to survive in an American school. In UP-Cebu, I was a member of the English trainer’s group for the Gurong Pahinungod, a volunteer arm of the university, where I was the coordinator for two years. That role enriched my realization on the value of education in our country, particularly in Cebu where students value education above hunger, poverty and the like.

What was your aspiration?

When I was student, my aspiration was to graduate from university, find work and help send my younger siblings to college. My family did not quite understand the value of education back then so I vowed to myself that I would motivate my siblings to graduate one day.

When I became a teacher, my aspiration was to teach not only English but also human values we need to survive in this world such as perseverance, patience, assertiveness, and positive thinking/optimism to make my students understand the true value of hardwork.

You are passionate about art.

Being an art enthusiast, I serve as a mentor to friends, my students in Fine Arts or other artists. I would extend sponsorship however little it may be and just try my best to help because I know it means a lot to them.

What talents you do believe you possess?

You might say I’m perfect in dealing with people from different walks of life, my sense of humor, my talents in singing and in playing the guitar and piano. These have made me an instant entertainer at small parties. I also scribble some Cebuano short love poems.

What are your plans?

When I feel I have had enough of teaching and my time is up, I would go home for good. Home is where my heart is. I would like to watch my grandsons grow. I am sure it will be a delightful pastime for me.

Is there anything you can do about teachers going out of the country to work elsewhere? This has downgraded the quality of education in the Philippines, because the experienced ones have left the schools, perhaps it is detrimental too to the families that they live behind. What is your take on this?

Teaching anywhere abroad entails better remuneration, newer and more challenging experiences, a different taste of life in exchange of nostalgia, oftentimes broken heartedness being away from the people we value and hold dear in our hearts, in our country, and honestly I can't do anything about this phenomenon of leaving the country "for greener pasture, "braindrain" as it is popularly termed.

I can only share the real-life, bitter-sweet experiences about working abroad and make these teachers who have plans to teach abroad, be made aware that their plan is being packaged with these advantages and disadvantages.

I also agree that most of the teachers who left our country are our best teachers or else adjustment to the new set-up or curriculum would be very difficult to adjust. It takes some amount of intellectual capacity and intelligence to absorb and adapt you know. It takes some good brains, a very good psychological and mental preparation and eventually emotional readiness when all the other requirements have been addressed to. Call me one of the best teachers , that's why am also teaching using an international curriculum, that of Cambridge and the Singaporean curricula.

Teaching outside the country may not have been all associated with success stories but whatever outcome that is detrimental to all we have been used to live with and the challenge of family break up, every Filipino teacher abroad has already learned to embrace and accepted with open hearts and open minds. It is our label, we survive in all adversities abroad, we survive because we are Filipinos. Every Filipino teacher working abroad would wind up saying. I am doing this for the betterment of my family's life back home.

What more positive motivation can challenge this to make these teachers hang on, stay abroad and teach for better salaries and benefits than stay in our country whose educational budget corruption ranks first in the past years among the other types of corruptions our country seems to have been phenomenally popular of. I am a teacher, and I continue to be a teacher wherever I am in this world we live in.