I first heard about the Mindanao Peace Games directly from its convener – Noli Ayo – at the Lispher Inn hotel in Davao City’s Juna subdivision. It was 8:30 AM on Saturday January 13th, 2018. I had been invited to join a forum meeting for coaches of Ateneo de Davao University to learn about the…
Category: Expat in Davao
Dutch in Davao
Not too long ago I belonged to the majority of people in this world who had never heard of Davao City, the third largest city in the Philippines. End of 2017 I emigrated there to join my partner Sophie who found employment there with an international NGO. Blogging as an expat in Davao, I wrote about the people I met and my extraordinary experiences going around the Philippines until I returned to the Netherlands in August of 2019. I captured these stories from the inside out, but with an outsider’s perspective.
2nd MPG Leaders’ Summit in Singapore: “A network that works”
It’s a biennial highlight on the calendar of the Mindanao Peace Games: the MPG Leaders’ Summit in Singapore. From July 17 to 22 a group of 11 MPG leaders immersed themselves in arguably one of the finest (school) sports cultures in Asia. The theme of this second edition of the Leaders’ Summit was “See Wide,…
Two rounds of peacebuilders' talks
A month ago I had the opportunity to moderate two round table conversations with small groups of international peacebuilders. They had all come to Davao in the southern Philippines to participate in the annual training program of the Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute (MPI). One group consisted of first timers to the MPI training, whereas the other…
The power of human connection
Over the past five years, thousands of student-athletes, coaches, and sports leaders from Mindanao in the southern Philippines have been exposed to the “MPG effect” — and thousands more will follow. MPG, short for Mindanao Peace Games, is a movement built around the simple assumption that sports facilitates human connection in its purest form, and…
How to love my blog again?
It’s been a while since my last blog about Davao. As a bona fide ‘Dutch in Davao’ blogger my writing should stay on-brand, but the reality is that it’s been all over the place. Maybe I’m running out of things to talk about. Or maybe I’m tired of framing myself as the foreigner going from…
Hong Kong democracy on slippery slope
I knew very little about Hong Kong before Sophie and I visited last week. I didn’t know the British stayed there until 1997. I didn’t know Hong Kong for 70 percent consists of national parks. I didn’t know the ‘1 country, 2 systems’ policy agreed upon with China expires in 2047. And, finally, I didn’t…
Poems of Appreciation: Joy
Living as a Dutch expat in the Philippines, I’ve found renewed appreciation for all things larger than life. In this Poem of Appreciation I pay tribute to: joy. Joy What makes you glad, when do you rejoice? Are you even aware, does it feel like a choice? The emotion hits you like a tidal wave,…
To profit or not, is that the question?
Some of you who are following me might know that I’ve been exploring the question whether having a for-profit background is an advantage or disadvantage for someone looking to transition into a job in the non-profit sector. I recently posted a poll on Facebook with that same question and all respondents indicated that it’s an…