KL OFW Life

Welcome back to my blogsite...'hope I did not keep you waiting so long for my second posting. Anyway, I was telling you before that the feeling of homesickness slowly came unto me as I passed six months without going back to Manila..Christmas '96 was coming and I was excited to go back and and experience being a balikbayan for the first time . Everybody was very happy especially I coz seeing your family again after a long time and being able to bring them shopping was really great. After three weeks of celebration now comes the hardest part. Its time to go back to KL and it's hard especially seeing my wife and my mom weeping and my two year old son Mico (see his passport pic) asking me not to go and leave them again. My heart was breaking into two butI have to go and continue my quest. So weeks passed and again I cannot do anything but pour my heart in my job. I was thinking a lot at night why I have to make too much sacrifice. Is it really worth it to be away from my loved ones just to earn three times my salary back home? There must be a way to optimize the situation. I have to sacrifice some of my earnings in order to ease the problem of loneliness. Nope, I did not hire any part time people to take care of me here...I saved money to bring Hazel and Mico here. That's the solution that I was looking for! It was hard at first, incurring more expenses and doing more chores but every effort is worth doing. A new family life is starting, new stories, new adventures in my next post...

KL OFW Life ...

I first came to KL in May 1996 to work in my cousin's company as a Civil Engineer. It was a good time for me to be called by him to come here because I was starting my family and expenses were getting bigger and bigger in the Philippines. Actually, I was supposed to come two years before but that was the year when I got married and had my first baby (see pic of my wife and kid to explain why i cannot leave them). So after waiting two years for my chance to go abroad and ride the plane for the first time, it happened. It was more than 12 yrs. ago today but I can still remember the mixture of sadness and joy that I and my family felt. It was not just the thought of earning more but the excitement of having the chance to see other places, meet new people, do a new job that made me have mixed emotions. That day I admit that happiness overpowers the feeling of sadness of leaving my family. The reason may be because I had no idea then what is the real feeling of loneliness and homesickness. I have not tried to be away from my family for even one week. It was not the same with my wife..her father used to work in Saudi and she knows how to be left behind for 2 yrs. so I can feel the sadness in her. I arrived in KL with no clue of their lifestyle. I am an adventurous person so seeing new places always excites me. After one week of work (actually more of a familiarity with the job only), I already tried going to places like Genting and KL town. There was not much to see in KL that time because KLCC was still under construction s well as most of the malls. Loneliness and homesickness slowly crawled their way thru me despite the fact that my cousin and my brother was also here. During those days there was no internet cafes, no internet connection in the office, no emails and no text. The only way to communicate is overseas call which was quite expensive. Indulging in my work was the only way to fight homesickness, I guess until today it is one of the best ways. I started to learn to communicate with our Creator more often to ask for guidance. Next time I will talk about what I did to solve my problem....