roma roma ma Naga ooh la la

Staring out the window as the plane descended, I felt another wave of culture shock. Naga City is in the jungle! Vibrant, tropical jungle! My Tita Ann and Tito Zandro picked me up at the airport. We stopped at the world renowned CWC- Camsur Watersports Complex, a waterpark for wakeboarding and other water sports. It is also a host of the Iron Man competition. Next stop: Naga College Foundation! Driving into the parking lot of the school founded by my grand lolo was completely surreal. I've been told about it my whole life and now I am actually here. Tita Ann gave me a tour of the school (the main building was designed by our family architect, my Grandpa Mel!) and I was introduced to more of my family! The president of the school is my Tita Mitzi and I am staying at her house with her parents, my Lola Emi and Lolo Juni, her husband, Tito Paul (who is Australian), and brother, Tito Michael, for all of this week. Tito Michael is the typhoon expert in the Bicol region. He has been passionate about weather since he was five years old. Every day, he would record the weather report while he was at school and then review it and type it out. Today, those typed reports are being used by scientists to study weather in the Philippines chronologically from the 80s. A few years ago, a typhoon was forming in the Pacific heading toward China, but Tito Michael was tracking the typhoon from home and could see that it was turning back toward Naga. He called the local typhoon station, but they refused to put out an alert, because a typhoon had never made a turn like that before. However the mayor believed him and the city prepared for a deadly typhoon. Just as he predicted, the typhoon changed direction and devastated the Bicol region as one of the worst typhoons ever recorded. While the damage was substantial, hundreds of lives were saved due to Tito Michael's forecast. Today, he has his own website for local typhoon information and the radio stations call him for the weather report. He is known as "Mr. Typhoon". ...I think they need to make a movie about him. The day after my arrival in Naga was the graduation of NCF's kindergarten, elementary, and high school. In the Philippines there is no jr. high, so students graduate at fifteen or sixteen and then start college. My twelve-year-old cousin, Gillian, graduated elementary school as valedictorian! She gave a wonderfully written and articulate speech (all in english, so I understood every word!). I cannot even express how gracious and loving all of my family has been. I've never met any of them and yet I feel like I have known them my whole life. I am in a foreign country, but they have made me feel at home.

Gillian!