For a sprawling seven-hectare property with a school, a children's home, a staff house, and a small farm, being one of the two sole janitors in CCFT is no mean feat. Yet "Tito Arvin" Vinluan does it, and does it with a smile. Five days a week, he shows up at CCFT Coron International School before anyone else does (barring English teacher Fresca Estima, who is there at sunup - just because she can) and breezes through the hallways with a broom, a mop, and a whistled happy tune. Then it's the Children's Home, the staff house, and everywhere there's a mess to clean up. Tito Arvin is also around for odd jobs - like shimmying up the school flagpole when the flag gets stuck halfway or installing Christmas lanterns or lifting five-gallon water containers into the drink dispensers.
It's been three years and four months since Tito Arvin first came aboard CCFT as a construction worker when the warehouse and nipa huts were the only buildings standing. It was November of 2005, and he was working on his grandfather's fishing boat, trawling the coast of Coron. CCFT employed more than three hundred workers during the construction, and Tito Arvin was drafted to haul equipment and building materials, and dig channels for the underground electrical wires.
"So far it was the largest construction project in Coron. I wondered at the man they called 'Sir Pete'. Why, if he had that much money to build all this, why a foundation? Why not just start a business?" Tito Arvin recalls. "At least, that's what I would do. I wanted to see him in person. I wanted to know how real it all was."
And see the founder he did, in 2006. William "Sir Pete" Baldwin III came to visit the construction site, and the workers were rounded up for some pep talk by the man himself.
"He talked about how he was happy about the progress of the work, and how he wanted all of us to do our best because we were doing it for the children," says Tito Arvin. "I felt proud of Sir Pete, for choosing Coron for the children, for giving us all jobs. In a place where work was scarce, he built a blessing. I knew that in my own way, I also wanted to help the kids that he wanted to help."
Noble words, yes. But when the rubber hit the road in 2007 with the arrival of thirty-three children, Tito Arvin put on his janitor shoes and it was not pleasant at all - at first. He gives something halfway between a shudder and a laugh as he describes his daily ordeal at the boys' toddler room: "They weren't toilet-trained yet, and the walls and floor would be smeared with you-know-what. There would be soiled underwear in the trash bins. You could smell it from the hallway, and no matter how many times I scrubbed and mopped and disinfected, it would still stink the next time I came around."
"But you learn to help them help themselves. There was this one kid I was always chasing around because he was always forgetting his dirty clothes in the bathroom. One day I promised him he could wear my cap at lunchtime in school if he remembers to bring his clothes with him and put them in the laundry basket. And now" - Tito Arvin grins happily - "now everyday at lunchtime, you see him in my cap. He doesn't forget anymore. They've all grown up a lot, even if you do have to remind yourself that sometimes, kids are meant to be messy."
What with all the dirty jobs, Tito Arvin rarely has time to be with the children. So it is no wonder that he remembers with fondness one afternoon in the summer of 2007 when all the house parents had to attend a meeting, and he was put on temporary babysitting duty with Facility Engineer Joann Aday. "We stayed at the back porch of the Children's Home and spent the day drawing pictures and talking with the kids. Some of them were easy to talk to, some of them were quieter, but it was fun and something different for me, being dad for an afternoon."
Arvin also recalls clearly International Day 2008, where he assisted the intern students at the Philippine float along with their house parents and got to meet Miss Earth candidates at the end of the day. It was tiring, he says, but looking back it was a lot of fun and the children enjoyed being stars for a day.
"I'd like to see them grow up, and I'd like to be there for them, even if all I do is clean up after them. Oh, and yes," he chuckles, "of course I'd also like to see them learn to be self-reliant and clean up after themselves. I'd be the best teacher for that, wouldn't I?"
Definitely, and he'll be needing a few more caps for lunchtime.
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