Resourceful

As I slowly get to know the culture here in the Philippines I have noticed that there are several traits and characteristics that can generally describe most Filipinos.  Of course with all generalizations these traits won't and can't apply to everybody in every situation.  (And as a good American I was taught it is not nice to make generalizations about other cultures.)  But as a whole these characteristics have stood out to me because they are characteristics I admire.  Characteristics that I hope affect me as I person the longer I live here among them.  So I thought I would start doing a series of posts on my blog describing the Filipino traits I admired.

Resourceful - (adv.)

Able to act effectively or imaginatively,  

especially in difficult situations.

Something I noticed almost immediately after arriving here is that back home I had an abundance and was quite wasteful a lot of the time.  One morning shortly after our arrival, we were served pancakes.  There were 4 of us eating and 4 pancakes were served.  My immediate thought was, "what only 4?".  But it was enough and we were all satisfied.  See back home I liked to make enough pancakes to have extras, put them in the ref (aka "fridge") and let them sit for two weeks, where I would then throw them away because they were no longer good to eat. ha ha.... there was some sort of security in knowing I had more than enough.  Back home, like most moms, I spent time trying to cut coupons and save money in the grocery area of our budget.  I read blogs and collected tips.  But in the end I realized my biggest problem in this area was my wastefulness, I needed to be more resourceful with my ingredients.

The more I observed the people here the more it became obvious to me that they are very resourceful people.  So I started looking for ways to capture their resourcefulness in pictures.  In the kitchen is just one area which reflects their resourcefulness.  Let's look at a few of their popular dishes.

One dish is garlic fried rice.  Breakfast is a common meal to have this dish.  Why?  Because they had steamed rice the night before with dinner and they need to use up the leftover rice.  The leftover rice is drier now since it sat out all night, which is perfect consistency for making fried rice!  

  

Another common dish is adobo. It is a sauce that consists of vinegar and soy sauce.  Vinegar helps preserve food longer.  The other week when the power went out and we had to eat up the food in our ref before it all went bad.... our friend said "let's make adobo with the chicken because the vinegar will help preserve the chicken since we don't have power." Brilliant idea!

 

I have noticed that there are several vegetable dishes that have meat in them.  It struck me as odd because I always thought meat was the main dish and veggies were, well just veggies.  At first it seemed more labor intensive and wasteful to cook up just a little meat to go with your veggie dish.  But then I realized the meat for the dish is often the leftover meat from a previous meal.  You have to use it up so it doesn't go to waste.  So what do you do with a little leftover meat?  Toss it in your veggies! Gives the veggies good flavor too!

When going out to eat should an over abundance of napkins be placed on every table?  How about give each customer just one each and then provide an sink in the back corner as the washing station so customers can simply just wash their hands afterwards instead?

 And when they realized that plastic grocery bags were clogging the drain during floods, what alternative did they imagine up?  Reusing the packing boxes they receive shipment in as packing for the customers!

They are even resourceful and thoughtful in the way they packed my soda.  Look a helpful carrying handle.

And what about those paper bags that might rip because the items inside are too heavy?  Double bag it?  Hindi ho. No, instead let's use a piece of cardboard as reinforcement on the bottom.

I even noticed their resourcefulness in their driving.  ha ha... Driving in the Philippines is another post completely.  But for now I just want to point out the resourcefulness aspect.  With heavy traffic that is almost always congested, they took out most of the left turns and instead put in a lot of "U-turn slots" in their place to help keep traffic flowing.

And this intersection is one of Allan and my favorites.  It is hard to capture in pictures.  But on one side you have three lanes.  On the other side you have two lanes.  Which of those three lanes is missing on the other side?  The middle lane.  So if you are driving in the middle lane you must be "resourceful" and imaginative in your driving.  We actually like picking the middle lane because it gives us more choices.

And if you are driving a motorcycle in the tight congested traffic, where weaving in and out of traffic is not even possible, what do you do?  Just get a little imaginative and drive on the sidewalk!

Portion size is another noticeable difference.  When we needed to buy some motion sickness meds how many do you think they gave us?  Just enough because you can buy most medicine here by the pill, not by the jar.  Why buy and extra large size jar when you only need a couple pills?  Only to have the jar go unused or even go bad from possible damage from the high humidity.

Lets see how well you have been paying attention so far.  Which of the following picture are from American and which are local bought here in the Philippines?

Need a job?  Looking for a captive audience?  How about selling drinks and snacks to people stuck in traffic?

Or how about setting up a table on the outside fence to a golf course?  That way in the middle of the game if the golfer needs more balls he can send his caddy just a few yards to buy some through the fence.

It isn't the clearest picture but I think you get the idea.  Instead of using electricity, which costs money and often can go out because of the weather, why not be creative in gated communities maned by an arm guard 24 hours a day?  This gate is raised and lowed with a rope tied onto the left side of the bar and a box of rocks attached to the right side of the bar.  How imaginative!

The last picture on resourcefulness has to be in reference to the palm tree.  They call the palm tree the tree of life here.  I did a quick google search on all the ways they use a palm tree and some claimed up to 100 ways! (Google for yourself to learn more)  From fruit itself to the leaves of the tree and even the truck.  Every part has some use.  Even old coconut shell husks used to be used to help scrub floors.  The household brooms are made from the coconut tree.

Even Jakob has picked up on the resourcefulness trait.  He has gotten quite imaginative in his nap time.  He naps in the car, while stuck in traffic, on the way to school each day.  Brilliant idea my son.