It’s not often that I get out of the cold confines of the Dev Room where I work. Last time I was out was to Cotabato, teaching the staff of an NGO how to use their high tech computer gear. That was in 2006.

This time it’s not going to be as far as Mindanao, but never the less adventurous. I’m heading off to Masbate for the introductory meetings leading to the two-week teaching stint that will start on the last week of November and will run into the first week of December.

I am going as Project Manager and Trainer for the Corporate Social Responsibility program of one of our clients at work. The startup project involves 13 computer systems to be spread out to four schools in the city of Masbate, and Municipalities of Baleno, Milagros and Balud. The packages each include a Lenovo K300 desktop system, an HP 5610 printer, an APC BackUPS E500 and a SmartBro USB Internet kit, complete with computer table and chair.

The package also includes Ate Vikki to teach the teachers how to use the system, and how to milk the internet for all its worth.

My first trip will consist of a plane ride from Manila to Legaspi, hired car from Legaspi to Pilar, a ferry ride from Pilar to Aroroy in Masbate, drive down to Baleno and then Masbate City to meet the two nearby schools representatives, determine who the training participants will be, and to help decide on the best places to position the computer sets. On the second day we will be heading off to the Municipalities of Milagros and Baleno to meet the representatives there, and then back to base in Aroroy, for the trip back home the next day.

On the 25th of November I will be back there with one of our tech guys to put in all 12 computers in the respective schools, and start the round of 2-day training sessions on the use of Windows Vista and basic MS Office.

Wednesdays are always a bummer. Wednesdays are sloooow. Especially around Baclaran on Roxas Boulevard, City of Pasay, Metro Manila, Philippines. This is because Wednesday is Baclaran day, when all the faithful go to the weekly novena at the Redemptorist church. It’s where all northbound, southbound, eastbound and westbound vehicles converge and traffic is expected to be at a virtual standstill.

Wednesdays are when bus drivers choose to linger at bus stops even if there is no one on the sidewalk wanting a ride. Bus dispatchers and conductors shout their destinations, apparently in the hope that if they should loudly and long enough, people would miraculously appear on the sidewalk and get on the bus. Or people who are headed for destinations other than the bus’s signboards will change their minds and follow the dispatchers voice like mice to the Pied Piper.

Wednesdays in the office are sloooow. It’s the day when clients go out of their way to be painstakingly picky. It’s the day when suppliers twiddle their thumbs while they gaze blankly at purchase orders. Wednesday is always unbearably hot. Not even Typhoon Frank made it to Wednesday. Wednesdays is when counter personnel at any fast food joint choose to take their time fulfilling your order, and that’s because there’s hardly any customers either.

Wednesday is the purgatory we have to go through after the death of weekend life.

Last I used Microsoft Outlook was in my last year with Ng Khai Development Corp. in Cebu. Back then it was Outlook 97.

Ten years later it is now MS Outlook 2007, and I had all but forgotten how powerful it can be for companies running on an Exchange Server. I had all but forgotten my Exchange stuff as well, because the company I moved to in 1999 and still work for now runs on a Domino Server and Lotus Notes.

But we do have clients for whom we set up and configure Exchange servers, and we support hundreds of users on Microsoft Outlook. The changing times demanded that someone know how to use it, and well enough to each other people to use it as well.

And that’s why I, little green person in red cap and pants, am here at MISNet on Valero St. Makati, learning the rudiments of this much updated version of Microsoft’s email client. The seminar goes on for two days (been here since yesterday) and is arming me with enough information to pass on to our clients in a few days.

I don’t want to ask Ron, my instructor, how old he is. I just might find out he’s my eldest son’s age. But he appears expert in his field, MOS Certified and he happens to be a lomography buff as well.