pwede ko hambal sa ilonggo maayo gid subong!!!!!

so for the past week i have been in cebu city for a conference on HIV/AIDS awareness in the philippines. it was a really productive week, i learned alot, met some really active people in my community, and made a project plan. so been feeling pretty good this week. well, i can't say the starbucks and bagels hurt my week either -- cebu is great!!!!! so the trip back home is an overnight boat ride, about 14 hours. so nicole and i hung out and sang videoke and chatted up some local guys -- who really couldn't speak english. so as we sat there talking, i realized, holy crap, i'm speaking and understanding ilonggo -- and doing it fairly well. see, on my island most people speak understandable english, so when i get confused with ilonggo, they just switch to english and we go from there. it was a great feeling to see that i was totally able to use the language and have a native ilonggo speaker tell me that i was "maayo gid" (very good). so it was a good ending to a good week, until i got back to my island -- and went to the trike stand to catch a trike to my house, and everyone was laughing at me. i have no idea why-- there were no holes in my clothes, nothing on my face, but something about me was terribly funny. so now i am back on my island where the only othere white person is erin, unlike cebu. cebu is filled with foriegners -- i found myself starring at them, like wow, they are tall and white like me. amazing.