BY JAY CHUA
TWO hundred nurses and caregivers left for
Japan early morning yesterday, the first batch of health workers
benefiting from the Japan-Philippine Economic Partnership
Agreement.
Seventy more workers followed in the
afternoon to pursue a training program, including language
training for six months, in preparation for deployment in their
hiring institutions.
The workers applied through the Japan
International Corporation of Welfare Services, the counterpart
body of the Philippine Overseas Workers Administration.
The workers are classified as candidate
nurses and caregivers until they pass licensure examinations.
The first licensure examination for nurses is
scheduled in February 2010. The test will be administered every
year after that.
Candidate caregivers need at least three
years of work experience before they can take the national
certification examination.
The health workers’ contracts are initially
for three years. After passing licensing examinations, they will
be allowed to stay indefinitely.
They will receive an average salary of
170,000 yen a month. This is equivalent to P75,000 per month,
but after board and lodging expenses are deducted, the net comes
to P60,000.
Up to 1,000 workers are expected to leave for
Japan in the next three years.
In yesterday’s batch was Sheillane Reyes, a
nursing graduate who first went to Japan to work in an
electronics factory as an inspector of touch panels for
computers.
She went home four years ago after her
contract expired.
"No, I don’t want to marry a Japanese," Reyes
said when asked about the possibility of marrying a Japanese.
"They are not sweet, all they know is work,"
she said.
Although Japanese are kind and courteous, she
said, their work ethic makes them too tired to look after their
wife when they come home.
"That’s why husband and wife in Japan live in
separate bedrooms, so that he would not be bothered while
sleeping," she said.
Nicole Tornis Alcuaz, a 33-year-old nurse
from Quezon City, said a Japanese husband is not a bad
proposition.
"Wish ko lang!" she said.
Of the 273 health workers, only three are
male.
Rey Bryan Pica, 25, said the reason is there
is a rule in Japan pegging the ratio of caregivers at 7 males to
30-40 females.
