Philippine Travel Notes

Culture-education and the ultimate test of my patience! Yep, this was the bus ride! In my mind I was cursing why we were seated on this bus. A mini-bus actually. I was seated on the right side of the bus, window side of course. I couldn’t let this trip pass without seeing the countryside as we rode along! My seat was a two-seater but on departure, no one sat beside me. My companions were on the left side just across me. They were on a three-seater but it looked to me that the seat was just enough to fit the two of them. No one also sat beside them when the bus departed from the pier. The distance between my back-rest to that one in front of me was less than two feet. How did I know this? I have already measured long ago that when seated, the length from my lower-back to my knees is exactly 22.5 inches. But on this seat, I could not sit erect facing front! Without a choice, my legs had to be at an angle from my body – which is probably the reason why no one opted to sit beside me! This

The skies were just showing hints of light. The moon was still up. We could already see the horizon. The hills and the trees were still generally shadows. But we could already make out of what they were. This was very early morning at the Abra De Ilog Pier. The breeze was cozy and we could smell a new kind of freshness in the wafts. It was quite a sensation actually. We excitedly watched our boat try to position itself correctly on its docking assignment. A crew member (probably the captain of the ship) was moving around and barking at a handheld radio for instructions. One time he even stood right beside me, watching the movements of the RORO and very seriously giving out instructions through his radio. Finally the plank was lowered to the pier’s pavement. Oh this was the rear of our boat! And chaos descended upon earth again! With the plank not even fully laid on the pavement, a group of fifty men or so jumped into the boat running as fast as they could towards its inner parts. As we

Boarding time Boarding call came at exactly 2:42AM! Upon the boarding announcement via a low-grade P.A. System – which was even hard to understand, people in various levels of sleepiness rushed to the gate like bees to a hive – or even like dogs in a mad scramble for a piece of meat! We wondered why, but just as well, we joined in that mad scramble, shoving and pushing our way to be able to present our tickets to the gate steward like everyone else! Here was an orderly boarding sequence where there were probably nine lines that approached the gate-keeper! Oh gracious! Emerging from the gate – which actually means being out of the building and on to the pier’s pavement, we excitedly took pictures here and there, took video shoots in the dark and just enjoyed the leisurely walk towards the boat. It was about a hundred meter or so walk. Probably even more! As we approached the boat (and another steward of Montenegro Shipping Lines who checked our tickets) an old lady came up to me to ask

Not wont to ruin our trip, we tried to find things to amuse us as we waited for the next boat to Abra De Ilog – scheduled at 3AM! Yes, 3:00 o’clock in the morning. And we were standing at this godforsaken pier about 3-hours too early because of... this ! After buying our tickets for the 3AM ride, we went out of the pier to grab something to eat. And we saw that many of the little eateries (carinderias) lined outside the pier were open. Some had their karaoke machines blaring voices from drivers, pier employees, hawkers and vendors in varying degrees of “acceptability” and/or “abhorability”! We picked a small carinderia fronting the main path that leads to the pier’s building which fortunately was at least some distance to the karaoke singers lest we puke at the din torturing our ears. We tried “dinner” with longsilog, sinigang and dasilog. We capped the meal with three each of bananas and I couldn’t make all the momentous events from the past 5 hours without grabbing a can of SanMigLig

Together with the friend who introduced me to the idea of going to Pandan Island, and another of our common friends, we took an 8pm bus from that devil-infested bus company with a station in EDSA (between Timog and Kamuning) that is the JAM/Tritran bus liner. Now my blood is starting to boil upon writing that sentence! [New Edit: If you have not yet done so, check-out my other story here and you will know the reason why.] Anyway, we wanted to catch the 1AM midnight ferry from the noisy-hot Batangas Pier to Abra De Ilog (a port town in northern Occidental Mindoro). This would have allowed us a 4AM “less-dusty” dawn-time bus ride to Sablayan where we could have caught the fresh sea produce at the market by 7AM. No thanks to the JAM/Tritran bus, this did not happen. We arrived at the Batangas pier about 30 minutes before 1AM (almost a 5-hour ride from EDSA). We ran as fast as we could to the check-in counter for the midnight boat to Abra De Ilog wondering as we breezed through why the us

The most interesting thing about setting out to Pandan Island is that there are too many discoveries that await the visitor on the way there and coming back! This is the truest “adventure” where all your senses and emotions will be put to work at one time or another! Where on earth is that? Pandan Island, Sablayan, Occidental Mindoro. That is the exact address! Well, not too many Filipinos, therefore even foreigners, are quite familiar with this paradise amongst this 7,107 islands. Not that it is yet to be discovered; in fact many a foreigner has had a great time in this place. Call it greedy, but I do wish it will remain the way it is today - unassuming, unnoticed, un-hyped-up, un-crazy heaven on earth! Of course it will fizzle out of the vacation/resort market if loads of foreigners don't get to visit the island! That's precisely why I said... I wish it will remain unnoticed… Anyway, to exist, Pandan Island has to be noticed. So, while not too many yet are noticing the charm