2/23/12 Travel to Bohol via
Gotta go with the flow which sometimes means stopping the writing mid-sentence.
2/26, Dumaguete
It’s 5:30 a.m. That’s two hours past my average sleeping time since we arrived. I’m learning to utilize the opportunities as they come, just as this awake time, allows me to write with little interruption. And if the Internet spirits are cooperating, it allows me to upload photos to the blog. I wait two to five minutes for each picture to upload, only to find that I’ve lost the connection.
11 p.m. turns into 1:30 a.m. 3:30 a.m. turns into 5: 00 a.m. Time flies when you’re having a cyber-good time and pretty soon you find that you’re in the midst of morning prayer because it is Uncle Lari’s birthday and the senior citizens and neighbors have gathered in his dining room to say the rosary and sing hymns to pray for his long healthy life. Auntie Adele – “my full name is Adelia”, she smiles coyly when she discovers I’m already awake and writing—has climbed the steep stairs to invite us to have a small breakfast before our early morning departure. “Oh praise be to God,” she exclaims, as she reaches the top step and makes out my silhouette on the sofa just ten feet in front of the stairwell. I hope I didn’t startle this precious, warm-hearted soul. In my own, sleep-deprived state, I wonder did she mean, “WTF are YOU doing there on the sofa at the crack of dawn?”
[Pause for Real Time. I ‘m self-consciousness of my dependency on electronics. I paused mid-thought to plug in my notebook. Then I decided I should plug-in my spare camera battery to recharge it while I have the chance. After that I groped around in the dark, by the light of my computer screen, running my hand, like a skittering gecko, bet ween my suitcase and the wall, trying to feel for another wall socket. I’ve been up in the middle of the night for several days.
Maybe I need to plug myself in for a little while.]
We arrived in Dumaguete somewhere mid-day yesterday. Honestly I don’t know what time it was. Uncle Lari wanted to take us around before seeing us off at the harbor for our 8: a.m. scheduled boat to Dumaguete. “Scheduled , as in the “Estimated” in the term Estimated Time of Departure is a concept that comes in handy as the newcomer Fil-Am’s bridge word between the lovely flowing nature of the Filipino synergy, and the American linear orientations. He took us to his farm, lush with banana trees, a mango tree. Jelly, the dog, was there to greet us. Selbina, one of the maids whom we had met at the main house, was over here taking care of the garden and grounds today. A little girl, maybe three years old played in the garden. I wondered if she might be Selbina’s daughter. We drove down through the residential streets, passing townspeople gathering twigs and burning combustible trash in small controlled fires, sweeping the walkways. Chickens, goats, and cows grazed in small areas next to the house.
“If you move here to this town, you will soon be given a job,” laughs Uncle Lari. “You will have a goat, or chickens to take care of, or maybe you will learn how to climb the trees to get the coconuts down.” Uncle Lari said he decided to retire here in Bohol because back in the U.S. he felt lonely, with nothing to do. He and Auntie Adele clearly love it in Bohol. Incidentally, our group stayed at their Bed and Breakfast Inn, called the St. Joseph Town Inn. http://st.joseph-inn.com
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