“By the grace of God, my family and I are doing okay although there were trials along the way. I wish the same for you and the kind souls at LOGODI, but without the trials.

When our president, Rodrigo Roa Duterte, declared an Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ) in the National Capital Region (NCR) in the middle of March, our governor also did the same in our province of Southern Leyte. In the first week of ECQ, we were required to work normally although government offices in the NCR were already suspended. I lobbied successfully with our provincial administrator that if we could not do the same, at least we should have shortened work days and alternate reporting of staff to offices so we could follow physical distancing protocols. Thus, in the last days of March until the end of April, we were only required to report for 2 days a week, alternating with other office staff so there were only half inside the office at any given day.

The same arrangement however cannot be said for my wife. She is a pharmacist at a government hospital and is consequently required to be at work 5 days a week and even perform overtime service if required. Because of the eruption of Taal Volcano early in the year, a face mask is very hard to come by, let alone an N95 mask. I had to buy it for her online where the price has increased tenfold. The worry of getting infected and bringing it home was always evident in her face when she comes home from duty but she persevered and thankfully, our province has no confirmed case up to present.

When the ECQ in our province was lifted in the last day of April, our governor solicited project proposals to assist “displaced workers” – residents of our place who worked outside our province and even outside our country who, because of the pandemic, has decided to return home and stay for good. It is expected that there will be a massive influx of these displaced workers when the ECQ in the NCR is lifted.

Maybe the governor was convinced by my project proposal, New Skills in the New Normal, because it was approved right after I presented it. The proposal aims to “re-engineer” the displaced workers by teaching them new skills that are locally employable such as computer servicing or agri-entrepreneurship. We will be partnering with the local offices of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) and the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) in establishing training centers in every town in our province (a variation of Saemaul Undong) using their online course modules, which removes the need for face-to-face training thus still following physical distancing protocols. The provincial government will be providing these centers with computer equipment while the DICT will be providing the internet connectivity.

We hope to be producing new skilled workers employed by local industries and businesses, or self-employed, by the end of this year.”