Signal for Connection
This is an unedited story of signal searching for wifi connection and what signal, the absence or presence of it — the search for it, say about a place, a person and what it reveals about the connection between the two and those who were/are not there. It weaves a story of movement, of going to places one would not necessarily go unless the promise of a signal or connection is possibly waiting.
Judith: “O Kuya Rey, nawala ka. Asan kana?” [Brother Rey, you’re gone. Where are you?]
Rey: “Sandali, mahina ang signal dito. Ayun! Ayan, nakikita mo na ko? Ate Judith… ay nawala ulit…” [Wait, weak signal here. There! Can you see me now? Sister Judith… oh no, she’s gone again…]
I (Judith) was in Liverpool, UK. Kuya Rey (in the photo) was in Alapasco when Sari-sari Education started as a literacy project through an immersive storytelling programme led by Kuya Rey. To keep me posted, Kuya Rey was always searching for a strong enough signal to call me. He found it just where he’s standing in his photo here. I have been there on my first ever visit to Alapasco in July 2022. It’s not particularly easy to get to. One has to climb an uneven incline through cornfields. Well, this is the shortcut, so Kuya Rey told me. You would want to get up there quite early too, before the sun rises to its scorching July temperature.
The photo tells a story of a man standing on some mountain ground with enough signal to connect. It is the same spot that took me there many times before I climbed the same mountainside and stood on the same ground that allowed me to connect with Kuya Rey and hear news about Sari-sari Education. I should have been there. It’s my project too and yet if I was there, Sari-sari Education would have not come to Alapasco. My absence brought it there. I did not travel to the Philippines in 2020 due to the restrictions the Covid-19 pandemic had imposed on international travel. If I did travel, I would not have been heading to Alapasco, Batad, Iloilo. I would have taken Sari-sari Education elsewhere without Kuya Rey and the Alapascians. Now, that’s a disconnection and absence I would not wish for. Sari-sari Education belongs to Alapasco and Kuya Rey had to tell stories to make it happen. The signal for this was clear and it is getting stronger with the stories and the things the community has done with it and because of it. I had to be absent to give presence to something greater than my proposed objectives in a funding application supported by my institution, Liverpool John Moores University.
The photo also tells the story of those who were not there with Kuya Rey — his wife, Grace, and his two children, Likha and Hiraya. It speaks of the days he was not at home with them. It is a photo of traveling by sea accompanied by multiple checks and re-checks for negative Covid-19 tests, social distancing, and face-mask wearing.
Sari-sari Education’s signal for connection is made permanent and strong with the work Kuya Rey had done (mostly looking up, at his phone screen :D) and the stories he made with the children and youth of the Alapasco community.
