Cheating the Die (also, Alcohol Brings Clarity)

Day 1, Saturday

• 2:00 AM: I print out the month-end report into its .PDF format. I smile. I run my fingers over the keyboard mindlessly and think, "Let's rock and roll."
• 3:00 AM: (via SMS) Bixie says, "Bohoooooooooooool!"
• 10:00 AM: I watch lovers drink coffee. (Also, I realize I bought batteries for a camera but forgot the memory stick there go dreams of taking that award-winning shot of Panglao.)
• 11:30 AM: Tin & I see Bixie. We rejoice for this day has been long in the coming.
• 12:00 noon: I see the mother and sister of a dear friend who's moved to Dubai. We are at the airport. Everything's expensive. I look for hotdogs, I buy two.
• 1:30 PM: Flight's been delayed; we watch kids and consider hogging the play room. Bixie brought this admissions program thing so we choose careers and also consider going to Hollywood eventually, as an actress (Tin), a scriptwriter (me), and an animator (Bixie).
• 2:30 PM: We arrive. Wala pang inumang naganap pero things get blurry in my head. A happy buzz. We are in a different world.

(oh joy) We meet up with the water at Panglao. Remnants of community life haunts us in the beginning (Moby wrappers, Ariel and Surf wrappers, etc.), convincing me that I have to do my time in helping clean up the seas, but we walk the length of the shore until we get to that place where the water is so fine we last till sunset. I do the one thing I am able to do in the water: float on my back. There is nothing like looking up to an empty sky and realizing there are universes out there, that it speaks to you so sincerely there is no mistaking what you've been sent here to do.


We change into something dry, and eat like there's no tomorrow, and watch a girl do the thing they do with fireballs on the beach. We speculate about the lives and affairs of the people in the other tables. And then we fall asleep without realizing it.

Day 2, Sunday

Bohol in a day: Kumain kami sa sa tabing-dagat. Nalaman namin na may mga salitang tulad ng umami at siphonogamous, salamat sa spelling bee contest sa cable. Pinuntahan namin ang mga tarsier, na tila laging takot. Pinuntahan namin ang mga paru-paro. [Nalaman namin na ang mga tarsier, kung makipagtalik, umaabot ng limang minuto. Ang mga paru-paru, lima hanggang anim na oras. Suicidal ang mga tarsier kaya bawal silang ihiwalay sa mga friends nila.] Pinuntahan namin lahat ng pwedeng puntahan sa Bohol: mga simbahang may lumang pulpito, lumang bahay ng isang sikat na tao sa Bohol, ang ever-famous Chocolate Hills [ang paborito kong alamat tungkol sa Chocolate Hills ay yung tungkol sa higanteng may girlfriend na tinakas niya nang hawak-hawak niya sa kanyang kamay pero dahil sa kaguluhan pagtingin niya sa palad niya napahigpit pala ang hawak niya sa nobya na siya nitong ikinamatay; ang Chocolate Hills daw ang mga luha ng higante], some river kung saan kami nag-lunch at nakikanta sa mga batang sumasayaw ng Itaktak Mo, isang man-made forest thing, at kung saan-saan pa.

All throughout this daytime adventure we wear head gears from Halloween. Big and me play devils, Tin the angel. We get stares from everybody and isn't that just plain fun.

Utterly exhausted, we retire for the day. But we decide to get out instead, for a ride on them habal-habals, aka motorcycles -- the most convenient mode of transportation for Boholanos, I guess, for long, frequent road travels. We think about going to Mass, but it is six by then and so we just stare at the church and try to head on back to the hotel. What happens at the market next is one for the books, and any form of written narration will never ever do it justice. In a nutshell, it is this: Bixie falls off a motorcycle and then the police comes.

Later everything dissolves into laughter and then we drink a bit. This is, of course, the part I will never forget. I realize how simple everything really is. How all this {this being all the things I used to worry about} is just dung in the science of lasting things (to quote my former self). We admit our dreams to each other, like some long-overdue confession. I see mine is to write forever.

Day 3, Monday
We go home. It ends. Bixie gets a massage. We drool at this Michelle Yeoh look-alike. Tin makes me listen to a song that rings true to me. We miss the water.

I've cheated the die I think because all throughout this trip I was wondering to myself what the chances are of me being in Bohol in the middle of November and I realize the beauty of well, I don't even know what to call it, really -- I just know it's something about nice surprises in the middle of the madness and how nice surprises don't necessarily have to be something that happens to you once in a while -- because about two weeks after I was off to Baguio naman for the weekend.

Mood:

Credits: Everything you see in this post are from Biggie and Tin's cameras. You guys rule.