The Philippines Revisited

One Country Down...


We survived the first country of our trip and had an absolute blast. For me this was the perfect way to ease our way into the trip of a lifetime. We were able to meet a lot of amazing people and we were able to be there as one of my best friends was married to a beautiful and amazing woman. There are many great stories and memories from this part of the trip. Some that were shared for everyone to read and others that will just hide inside my head and keep me laughing and smiling every single day.

As far as the Philippines, I highly recommend that anyone goes there to see the country. I personally was not too keen on Manila itself but once outside the city everyone was amazing the places were beautiful and the memories lasting. Keep in mind that the Philippines is not like Thailand and the infrastructure for travel for tourists is not nearly as good but if you know that going in you will be fine.

I definitely will go back to the Philippines to swim with the whale sharks, do some diving, check out the Chocolate Hills of Bohol, check out the surf spot of Cloud 9 and whatever else I can find. Again I want to thank everyone that we met in the Philippines as all of you made it special and exciting and I would do it all again tomorrow.

Next up is Bangkok!

Brian
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Philippines in a Nutshell

Song for this post:

In the Middle by Jimmy Eat World

            When you arrive in Southeast Asia – at least for myself – one of the first things that strikes you is the glaring distinction between the “haves” and the “have nots”.  It occurred to me at some point – possibly right at the beginning of our trip in Banaue when I was showering with freezing cold water from a bucket – that my experience with Southeast Asia prior to this has been – for the most part – first class.  When I lived in Indonesia as a teenager and would travel back to Jakarta from the states or wherever we might have had occasion to go, it usually involved a stop over in Singapore where my family and I would spend a number of hours in the first class lounge and I would get wasted on the free booze.  We’d make the short flight home back to Indo where we’d zip through the diplomat line at the customs counter and our driver would be waiting for us with our big air conditioned car.  Every night before bed I would brush my teeth with the fresh bottled water that my maid would always make sure I had and every day when the driver would bring me home from school, we’d pull into the garage where our servants congregated throughout the day to find our maid, Rani, smiling and waving at me with a pair of my underwear in her hand which she was in the process of ironing.

            I’ve only been back to Southeast Asia a handful of times since moving back to the States about 17 years ago (shit!  Am I really THAT old!?!) and those times it was only to Indonesia, the most recent trip being last year when B and I went to Bali – actually, we arrived a year ago today – and each of those times it was in the usual fashion I was accustomed to, the only difference being that since I no longer drink and last year at this time I was 2 and ½ months pregnant, I was partaking of as much free food as I could in the 1^st class lounge in lieu of liquor.  Oh how times have changed yet again!!!  Aside from our little respite at The Ascott in Manila, this trip has been way more along the lines of the have-nots than I’ve ever known before.  Between the harrowing night buses and vomit-inducing van rides, the pooping in the woods, and having to make sure that Brian remembers to get water for us to brush our teeth at night, I’ve started to see a side of Southeast Asia that I have never quite known before.

            Dear reader, I don’t mention any of this in hopes of garnering any pity from you or to parlay this into some sort of soapbox rant about the atrocities of 3^rd world living, quite the contrary.  It is rather my hope to express what a deep-seeded admiration and affection I have for this part of the world, its people, and its often-misconceived charm.  So, back to the “haves” and “have-nots”…

            Dear reader, it is my recommendation that should you ever choose to travel to this nape of the neck, you will so plan your trip as to arrive here at night.  If you’re coming from the States and traveling for at least 20 hours – if not more – it is too much to take when you first step off that plane or out of that airport and the sun and smell and chaos just bitch slap you in the face.  Should you arrive during the daylight hours I guarantee that you’ll most likely step off the plane and the first words out of your mouth or your internal monologue will be, “What the fuck have I done!?!” and your first inclination will be to run back onto the plane and curl up in the fetal position at your seat, start sucking your thumb, and pull the blanket over your head until the crappy in-flight movie (that is probably some monumental piece of shit blockbuster starring Nicholas Cage but at this point you don’t care, you’re glad for it even) starts playing and you’re on your way back to terra firma.  Save yourself the agony (of the Nicholas Cage movie more so than the long flight back) and plan your arrival for sometime after dusk.  (Round here down by the equator that’s pretty much 6p.m. across the board).

            I’m not saying any of this to freak you out and it may seem contrary to any inclination of affection that I mentioned, but really it’s to do you and Southeast Asia a big favor, lest the two of you should get off on the wrong foot.  Arriving during the day is like a slap, a tickle, a reach around and then before you know it, you’re all squealy on the Sealy before you’ve even exchanged names.  Arrive at night, have a nice long shower, get all did up, let her buy you dinner, get to know each other a bit, get in bed and talk gently and sweetly to each other, start to reveal your secrets to each other, start to build some trust, and then maybe after a little heavy petting – possibly some dry humping if you’re comfortable with that - just spoon each other and drift to sleep with satisfaction in your smile and possibility bursting your heart.  In the morning, wake up refreshed and new, fill your belly with the magnificent fruits of your new love (I meant papaya you perves!), and get to wooing your girl!!!                      

     

            Wow – that was a freakin tangent!!!  I don’t even know how to BEGIN to segue that back into what I really wanted to talk about… I guess I’ll just keep bobbing and weaving and keep you guessing…

            I guess my point is that there are two types of people who travel this way – those who look at Southeast Asia like a phone sex operator – you have no idea who or what is on the other end of the line but you hope to God it’s everything you imagine, dream of, hope for (those are usually the people who are hugely disappointed by this part of the world) and then there are those people who are like teenagers full of longing and loving angst whose hope and fantasies are still possible realities instead of improbable dreams whose potential fruition have come and gone and are now bitter, silly squanderings of the mind.   And somewhere in the middle, is me.

            There are – in this world – the “haves” and the “have-nots” and nowhere is this more palpable than in Southeast Asia.  It is not exclusive just to the Philippines, it’s everywhere, I just use this place as a jumping off point because it is where we started and where I was reminded so vividly of this distinction between what my life is now as compared to what it was a few weeks, months, years ago back home.  For – I imagine – most westerners, it would be horrifying to come here and see the conditions in which most of the people live here.  If we saw anything akin to what appears to be the most abject poverty as the majority of people live in here in the States or whatever western country we might hail from, there would be riots.  There would be protesters and angry letters to editors and congressman and bumper stickers and Bono and Jay-Z would throw a benefit concert for it in a heartbeat.  At first glance, we would be irate and unsettled and disgusted as our senses are assaulted by the sights and smells and sounds that are so uniquely Southeast Asia.

            But look closer dear reader.  This is not fantastical, lustful phone sex, nor is it impulsive, consuming love at first sight.  This is a blind date with a person you’d never in a million years think you would have anything to do with but it was just easier to go on the date and shut your friend up than keep politely insisting you’re not interested.  Be patient, let these places, tucked so far away in the world from us unfold and reveal their true beauty.

            When I was an angry, ungrateful teenager living in Indonesia who knew nothing about myself or life or where it might take me and there was nothing I loved more than indulging in my own melancholy, I remember sitting in my big, air conditioned car, being chauffeured by my driver to my fancy private school or the American Club, or The Hilton Pool, or some such place, I remember sitting at a stoplight.  I remember soak and sulking in my own teenage misery.  I remember being by a kampung (the clusters of shabby shacks that the middle class Indonesians lived in) which was located by one of the many canals that ran throughout the city.  At one point there were women washing clothes in the canal, a few yards down kids were playing it and a few yards beyond that, someone was pissing in it.  At the kampung there was a group of people – mothers, fathers, kids, grandparents, neighbors – all congregated outside someone’s shack, all talking, all laughing, all smiling the biggest, most genuine smiles.  I sat there in my big car and watched them and thought, “They look like what I’m supposed to feel like.”  My insides matched their surroundings and vice versa.  That’s what being in the Philippines was like.

            I mean that it was like that in the sense that I was reminded so strongly of that feeling, that what is the norm for them would seem dismal and unbearable to us.  But being a more mature woman I was able to see a step beyond what I recognized as a teenager and couldn’t make sense of really so it just made me more frustrated and turned off by the world around me.  What I saw was this, that these people who live in conditions and circumstances that we westerners would and do balk at and admonish, have their basic needs met.  They have clothes on their back, a roof over their head, and food in their stomachs.  Sometimes it’s a little less than that and rarely is it much more, but when all is said and done, their basic needs are met and for the rest, they make do.  No frills, not many luxuries, but they are grateful for what they have and the one thing that there seems to have always been present in abundance throughout our travels in the Philippines was pure, genuine, heartfelt joy.  They’re just fucking happy!

            So it was fitting that all of this came right up in my face, considering my mental state at the beginning of our trip.  The entire time we were in the Philippines I was questioning my happiness and what that meant and wondering what the hell we’re doing and what do I want and what do I need to fulfill that want.  The entire time I’ve been hemming and hawing over what I have and what I don’t have when all around me, right in front of my face were all these people…aaaaahhhhh fuck!  I totally lost my train of thought – oh well.

            Anyhoo – on the exciting van ride from El Nido to Puerta Princessa we started talking to the two Filipina girls that we were sharing a shoe box’s worth of space with in the trunk of the van.  One (Rawna) was a news reporter for a Filipino TV station and the other (Kath) was attending university in Australia and was just back for a visit.  We started talking about all sorts of things including our travels and Kath told us how all of her Australian mates were always asking her about the Philippines and that she really enjoyed being able to tell them about her home.  I asked her what one thing she’d like people to know about her country.  She just said that she’d like people to know that Filipinos are very happy people.  And I told her that I’d noticed that pretty much everywhere I went there was usually a Filipino walking down the road or working in a market or standing at a security check point in their guard uniform, observing people as they passed through the metal detectors and they’d be singing.  Just out of the blue, no music around anywhere and they’d be smiling and singing.  I asked the girls why Filipinos were always singing and they just smiled and laughed and said they thought it was just because they’re happy people and that back in the day – and still in some of the tinier villages – that there wasn’t a whole lot of forms of entertainment so, they sang.

            

          This part of our conversation – I would like to emphasize – preceded a discussion we’d had about the recent massacre in the southern part of the country right around Christmas.  It happened to be where the girls had grown up and Kath’s cousin was an innocent victim killed on his way to work.  Brian and I had also been kind of griping that we thought it completely unfair that Americans are very rarely afforded the opportunity to work in other countries in any sort of middle of the road capacity – you pretty much either have to be sponsored by a huge corporation, start your own business, be a teacher, or do some sort of volunteer work.  (I know, self-entitled, whiny Americans.)  Kath – in a very sweet and optimistic, look on the bright side kind of way quickly pointed out that though that may be the case, at least as Americans, we are free to go pretty much anywhere in the world we want without having to jump through lots of hoops like people of many other nationalities in the world.  I wanted to illustrate this point for you because it was all spoken so casually and lightheartedly and the girls then continued – without a single shred of malice – to talk about what happy people they and their fellow countrymen and women are.  That despite political massacres occurring in their backyard and not being easily accepted in many parts of the world, life is good and there’s always a silver lining.  Their basic needs are met, so why despair?

          

         Point is, dear reader, that – all things considered – between my experience in Indonesia and our stay in the Philippines, my ideas of “haves” and “have-nots” is being turned on it’s ass.  Up is down, black is white, have is have-not – which is really what the point of this trip has been for Brian and I anyway.  But it’s a long, painful road from here to there.  They say when one door closes, another one opens but the hallway is a bitch.  If I can explain at all what I’ve been going trough thus far on the trip, it’s that I’m in the hallway.  I don’t know if it’s because of what I’ve been through the past year or if this is indeed the road I’ve always been heading down but I’ve begun to question why it is exactly I want the things that I want.  Is it because I truly want them, or is it because I’ve been taught to want them?  And how do you know which is true?  And how do you let go of the beliefs that have been so strongly bred in you, defined you, been a part of you, when they no longer serve you and start to go against what is in you at the core?

            

           The Philippines has shown me, has reminded me that we are taught to want and with want, with desire, comes expectation and inevitable, with expectation comes disappointment and almost always ensures failure.  These people want nothing; expect nothing, and for that, they seem to have everything – everything that matters anyway.  Southeast Asia is very much like falling love – you’re either running from it or running to it.  You’re either trying to hide or be found.  You’re either trying to escape the most loathsome parts of yourself or bring forth the very best in you.  You are either consumed by ego or revel in abundant selflessness.  You are either holding on for dear life or letting go with joyful surrender.  Somewhere in the middle of all that, standing in the hallway, being pulled by each side, I’m waiting…

xoxoM

Song for going to Bagkok:

Jump Rope by Blue October

El Nido - The Calm After the Storm

Again no pictures until we have a better internet connection which may not be until next Thursday. There are lot's of great pictures from El Nido so check back for the pictures.

I think we're alone now...


Our amazing kayaking and camping trip had just come to an end and half the group got right in a van to make the trip back to Puerto Princessa and then on to Manila to head home. The rest of us were going to be staying in El Nido some for one day and Mitra and I for about five. What we really had to do over the five days was relax, figure out where we were going next and how to get there the easiest and cheapest way possible. It was time for Mitra to get the shock of us being on budget as I new that Manila and El Nido up to this point was going to be over budget.

Over the course of the almost two years that we have been dating I have not been sick one time so leading up to the trip it was Mitra going to every doctor available until the day our health insurance ran out. Turns out the day we get back to El Nido I got a case of Tanduay Tummy for lack of a better term. I'm not sure where it came from but I wanted it to go away and I did not want to take any Cipro to clean out my entire system. I tried to let it run it's course but unfortunately it lasted until we got to Bangkok. I will spare you all the gory details but I am glad that we paid extra to get a private bath because it would not have been fair to anyone using the shared bathroom. I do however highly recommend The Alternative as a place to stay for anyone who makes it to El Nido.

As for what we did while there it was really nothing exciting. We spent a little more time with everyone from the Sabang Gang before they left at different times to head back home or on for more travels. I personally spent an inordinate amount of time trying to book flights from Puerto Princessa to Bangkok. Apparently the airlines don't like to take foreign credit cards and the travel agent there was only able to book flights back to Manila. Finally after four days I was able to book the tickets and had only one worry left...how do I print up a copy of the itinerary? In most countries in SE Asia when you get to the airport you have to show your itinerary to get into the terminal (Mitra and I have forgotten to do this in Bali and Manila). I set off to find a printer and found one at an internet cafe and proceeded to spend 45 minutes trying to print up a single page of the itinerary. Luckily it was taken care of and we wouldn't have to worry about that when we got to Puerto Princessa.

When we were not trying to book flights or get a hostel in Bangkok we spent time reading, walking around the town, laying on the beach, saying Hi to every cute little kid on the street. I was also missing my opportunity to try Balut as I decided it wasn't a good idea with the shape my intestines were at the time. I guess I will have to make it back to the Philippines or try it in Vietnam or Cambodia. All in all it was nice to have a few days to just relax and decompress.

I was able to relax until we had to wake up for our early van ride back to Puerto Princessa. I was not able to eat breakfast as I wasn't feeling well so I popped some Immodium and drank some water and thought I would be able to make it through the ride. Well let's just say I underestimated this ride back to the airport. Mitra and I ended up in the back of the van on a bench facing to Filipina girls on another bench. This is how we were to ride for the 5 - 6 hours it would take to get back to the airport. Adding to my misery was the fact that the AC did not reach us in the back of the van, the window kept opening letting dirt fill the air inside. So we made our first stop on the road to stretch our legs, use the toilet or get some food. I used to time to get sick right next to a goat tied to a fence...insert any joke you would like here. At this point we still had about 4 hours to go so the rest of the trip was very long but I managed to make it to the airport without any other incidents.

We had a few hours to kill and I ate some food finally, Mitra smoked half a pack of cigarettes, we took a few pictures and it was off to Bangkok for the next part of our adventure. I was very excited for the flights as I was ready to get to Thailand as it's one of my favorite places and I was ready to show Mitra some of the city and then get to the beach.

Paalam

Brian


P.S. This was the SONG that was heard all over El Nido with little kids singing and doing the dance...


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El Nido – Part Deux

Song for this post:

Where Is My Mind by The Pixies

            Before we’d left on the kayaking trip in the morning, Brian and I had reserved ourselves a room at a cute little hostel called The Alternative just a few doors down from the Bayview that Brian had read about on a much more informative travel blog than this.  It appealed to me because it boasted all sorts of holistic spa services and organic shakes and food.  After my experience with chronic illness this past year and having seen way more doctors than I’d ever hoped to see in my life and ending up having a colonoscopy about 20 years sooner than expected, I have pretty much given up any sort of faith in Western medicine.  I had never been a hypochondriacal person, maybe to my detriment somewhat.  I was always the girl that would power through almost any sort of malady with the attitude that with a little bit of rest, whatever it was; it would go away on its own. 

            After this past year however, things changed and every day something that I thought could possibly be a new symptom would show up and I’d get on WebMD and diagnose myself with a new, hideous, and hopeless terminal illness.  I don’t mean to make light of the situation when there are so many people out there that I know suffering from some sort of life-threatening disease and I am lucky in the fact that I am actually in pretty perfect physical health.  I would just like to illustrate the mania that can be caused by simply not having any answers and feeling like the people who are supposed to help you, aren’t even listening to you.  But if I say anymore on the subject, I’ll get into a long tirade on exactly why health care in our country sucks more ass than a shop vac in a room full of donkeys so I’ll just say that I have little faith left these days in Western medicine and was therefore very much looking forward to staying at The Alternative.

            We arrived there maybe around 9 or so that morning after seeing everyone else off and Mavis and Summer went off to check into their digs and made plans to come back over and hang out.  Our room wasn’t ready yet so we just headed up to the cute restaurant on the balcony overlooking the ocean and ordered some drinks while I perused the menu of spa services.  Mavis and Summer eventually joined us and we had a nice time together before they went off in search of lunch and a massage for Summer.  Brian and I – I think – went down to the Art Café, the only place in town that had 24 hour electricity which meant 24 hour internet connection.  We e-mailed our families to let them know we were alive and then we set ourselves (our actually Brian did cuz that’s his man job) upon the task of getting plane tickets to what we decided would be our next destination – Bangkok.  (A word to the wise – if you got to Palawan, by all means try and have a definitive departure date and get your tickets ahead of time.  It ultimately took us about 3 or 4 days to book ours because the airlines don’t seem to like to take foreign credit cards in that town for some reason.)

            Later that day, I had made an appointment for a massage.  I can’t remember what it was called but it was some sort of Chinese massage that was supposed to readjust your organs and especially your lower intestine.  Though I hadn’t really had any problems with my stomach after getting out of the hospital, I wanted to be as vigilant about being as loving to my duodenum as I possibly could.  The massage wasn’t quite what I’d hoped, my lower intestine felt like a million pesos, but my back and neck could’ve used a little more work.  Oh well, next time.

            Later that night, Lee had arranged for us stragglers to meet up at Sea Slugs one last time.  Quincy, Kelly, Mavis, Summer, Ian, Melanie, Bobby, Jasmine, Lee, Brian and I sat down to have one last meal before more of our group took off.  As we were sitting there, a few of us noticed that Bobby didn’t look very good – he was sweating profusely (more so than the cool breeze off the ocean should have allowed for) and looked kind of out of it.  We thought it must have been due to all the drinking done on the island as Brian wasn’t feeling so hot either, but soon discovered that the night before on the island, Bobby had gotten up to go to the bathroom and on his way back to whatever tent he was sleeping in that night, had run into a tree and gotten knocked out.  He had confessed to Quincy that that was the last thing he remembered until waking up on the beach at some later time.  We were all convinced that he had a concussion and so urged him to go see a doctor.  Luckily Jasmine’s aunt was one of the doctors in town so her and Lee took Bobby off to see her.  When they returned about a half an hour later, Bobby was already looking and feeling much better.

            Not Brian though.  He didn’t eat that night and excused himself early.  When I was ready to leave, I said good-bye to Summer who had been my girl since the very beginning of this journey and then Mavis walked me down the beach back to my place.  We said our goodbyes and he told me not to stress out too much about the blog and just enjoy.  (At the beginning of this trip there was some tension between Brian and myself about getting the blog up and running.  He wanted to have it going before we even left the states and my wordiness wouldn’t allow for it.  Now as it turns out, we’re about 2 – shit, maybe 3 – weeks behind on blogging.  But don’t tell him I told you that!)

            The next day we took it easy and pretty much spent the entire day in the Art Café catching up on e-mails and trying to get our plane tickets to Bangkok.  Brian still wasn’t feeling great physically and I was pretty beat up emotionally so we were just kind of laying low and trying to regroup.  That night we had dinner at The Alternative and were eventually joined by the rest of the crew – it was their last night.  Quincy fell in love with our little place and especially adored the “nests” that protruded off our balcony over the ocean.  We spent one last quiet night with the remnants of the Gang Sabang, walked them out later that evening, said goodbye and made our promises to keep in touch and then for the first time since the beginning of our trip, Brian and I were really alone.

            The next few days were pretty uneventful – a lot of sleeping in, catching up on e-mails, long, relaxing meals, laying on the beach, walking around town, and generally just detoxing from the fun but frenzied first few weeks of our trip.  As I lay on the beach some of those days I started to really try and process and digest and analyze the shit out of what had been going on with me and how I’d gotten to this frazzled mental state and where I wanted to go from there.  And then at some point, it hit me – I needed to just get the fuck over myself!!!  I needed to start to let go of all these bullshit stories I had playing in my head over and over and over again.  I needed to get free and start living this wonderful life that was right in front of us, waiting for us to just dive right in!

            They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions.  They say the road back is paved with humility and I could have used a big old dose of that right then.  People often mistake humility with humiliation but as a handsome old Irishman told me when I was getting on the plane to leave France a few years prior, humility is simply telling the truth and the truth at that moment was that, my life ain’t so bad!  I had everything I’ve ever wanted – except for maybe straight teeth and full B-cup sized boobs – and the only thing that was stopping me from enjoying it was me!  The lies I was telling myself about who and what I was were the only thing holding me back.  Right then and there, I gained a new resolve – I was just going to chill out for the rest of the time we were in El Nido and then hit the ground running in Bangkok.  The Philippines were to be about landing and gaining my footing, Thailand was going to be about finding my stride, Thailand was going to be about healing.

            The last day we were there, Brian still didn’t feel great – poor thing – and I felt like I could seriously use a lung brush (though I didn’t drink with the rest of the gang on the island, I sure as shit matched them cigarette for cigarette and I was paying the price!) and a good old chakra cleansing to start the next leg of the trip off right, so I booked Brian and I side by side massages.  About 2 hours and ten cigarettes later we walked up for our appointments.  Holy Shiatsu - That was just what I needed!!!  That 

woman worked me like a piece of veal scaloppini – it was awesome! It was the best my carpal tunneled little arms had felt in days!  (Little did I know though, all that fabulous deep tissue rubbing would soon be undone once again by chakra fucking Filippino transportation.)  I’m not sure what we did for dinner that night – we’d planned on returning to a restaurant we’d been the night before at the end of the beach that had the best pizza either of us has ever had in southeast Asia, but for some reason I think we got a late start for dinner and wanted to be back relatively early so we could get to bed for our early morning adventure back to Puerta Princessa to catch our flight and be on our way to Bangkok.

            So we get up at about 6a.m the next morning.  Dear reader, once upon a time I was a morning person.  I used to get up at 5a.m. and go all day rarely stopping to rest and I was fine with it, loved it actually.  I loved getting as much as I possibly could out of a day – school, working out, working, writing, spending time with friends, hanging out with my parents, whatever.  Ever since I started getting sick though, I have become somewhat of a sleeping champion – a world-class, gold medal winner of pillow drooling, REM power.  I developed the habit of sleeping 10-12 hours a night, waking up at around 9 or 10 in the morning, making breakfast, eating it, and then having to take a nap.  Even out of all the people on the kayaking trip who were drinking all day and into the wee hours of the morning, I was usually the last person to wake up.  (It’s not something I’m particularly happy about or comfortable with and actually find it quite upsetting and later in the trip it will prove to cause some tension between Brian and I.)

            Six in the morning and it’s packing up the last odds and ends, having breakfast, and I had to run down to Art Café to change some money to get us to the airport and out of the Philippines.  (Oh yeah, just for your FYI – there are no ATMs in El Nido and we were under the impression that it wasn’t even possible to change money, but we were misinformed.  We’d brought what we thought was exactly enough pesos but forgot to factor in airport tax and a few other things.)  Brian still wasn’t feeling so hot so I really didn’t have any room to complain, even though I would’ve liked to, being up at such an unholy hour and having to take a 5-hour car ride back to the airport.  I made it back with some cash just in time – the van was waiting for us as I got there.  Now, how do I explain this?  In the front seat there was the driver and two passengers, in the next row of seats there were two more passengers, in the third row, two passengers and one of the guys that was helping out the driver (who – by the way – was an alternative energy specialist and tried to sell us some solar paneled water heating systems) and in the very back where the luggage should’ve been was two benches facing each other – Brian and I on one and two Filipina girls on the other.

            Let me just paint the picture – it was about 1 million degrees (that’s Celsius not Fahrenheit) with about 300% humidity, there was no AC reaching us because it wasn’t getting past the big German dude in the first row of seats, Brian was ill, the ride we took was the same bumpy, unpaved, nightmarish road I think I alluded to in the last post, Brian and I and the girls we were sharing the trunk with had about 7 inches of foot space between us, and B and I had our backs against the window that caused it to keep sliding open which would’ve been refreshing in the circumstances had it not been for the fact that we were racing through dirt roads that looked and felt like they’d been carpet bombed by Wily E. Coyote and therefore blankets of red clay were being kicked up and pelting us every time the window got cracked.  Oh yeah, and our backpacks were strapped to the roof of the van and were not covered properly and therefore also coated in dirt when we finally arrived in Puerta Princessa.  Can I just say what a mistake – of all days – it was for me to wear white pants?  Pants!?!  White ones!!!

            We got to Puerta, tried to clean off our bags as best we could and kicked ourselves a bit for not putting our travel duffels over our packs – note to self:  when having your bag strapped to the roof of a dirt churning van of scary, speedy, bejesus, use the protective backpack duffels that you purchased for $32.99 a piece for just such an occasion – we composed ourselves enough to negotiate a Tuk-Tuk to take us to the airport.  We had a few hours to kill before our flight took off – just enough time to get something to eat, for me to smoke a few cigarettes, and for B and I to pose under the tent at the airport that touted the name of one of the government officials of El Nido or Palawan – Mr. Mitra.  (Of course I forgot what his first name is!)  The flight to Manila was pretty uneventful; we got there, which is always nice.  Had a few hours to kill in Manila, grabbed some food, smoked some more cigarettes and then boarded the plane to Bangkok.  Aaaaah Thailand - let the healing begin...

xoxoM

El Nido - Where the Wild Things Are

Note: Pictures will be added later as the internet connection is too slow here to add pictures (so I will apologize in advance for the length of Mitra's post which seems even longer without photos to break it up!)

El Nido is Neato!

After we finished our quick trip in Sabang it was off to El Nido with our gang for a 4-day/3-night camping, kayaking and snorkeling trip. I will not bore you with full details of the 7 hour van ride up there but it was far from boring, from the centipede in the van to which Kate jumped over the seat and landed on Mitra and me to Ian’s discussion of the Bengalese men at a restaurant in NYC where he worked and what part of their bodies they washed in the bathroom sinks (it was not their hands). We made it to El Nido and found a room, again Kate shared a room with us and then we all met for dinner so that Lee could get us all set for leaving in the morning.

We took off the next morning and headed off to our private island for the next four days. It was a pretty quick ride maybe twenty minutes to get there and all you could see were islands scattered all throughout the South China Sea. As we approached the island we could tell this was not your regular camping trip. All the tents were already set up as was the tent for our meals. Each tent had a bed on a frame, there was a shower tent and a toilet tent to which we all got a lesson about poo powder (thanks Ian). Once we all claimed our tents it was off to do some snorkeling! Well we were supposed to kayak and snorkel but since Andy had told Quincy to meet at 10 not 8:30 we got a bit of a late start and didn’t have time for both. Having Lee as our host was fantastic as he runs these trips a few times a year for clients and knows all the best islands/beaches to go to.  Over the course of the few days he took us to amazing spots for snorkeling and kayaking. The snorkeling had tons of great coral and I know this because we had about six marine scientists who completely geeked out on the corals, sponges and fish!

The best part of this trip was not the snorkeling or kayaking but the time we got to spend with fifteen other amazing people. There are tons of great stories from the few days we all spent together and I'll mention a few but if you want every minute detail you will have to read Mitra's post. Trying to figure out which stories to tell is no easy task because I could write a small novel about this trip if I were so inclined. However, I will just give you a few quick stories so that you have a general idea of how the trip unfolded.

I will start with the first day after we all returned from our day out snorkeling and hiking we settled on the beach with a cooler full of San Miguel and bottles of Tanduay rum. It was a great way for everyone to talk and get to know each other better. Just to preface this a bit we had 11 cases of beer and 6 bottles of rum for the trip. Of the 17 people we had 3 non drinkers so that first night sitting on the beach watching the sunset, talking, laughing and joking we went through 7 cases of beer and 5 bottles of rum. I think we scared all of Lee's employees with the amount we drank although there was a late night karaoke session with the guys for whoever stayed up late enough. Needless to say they had to go and make a beer and rum run the next day so that we had enough to drink the rest of the trip. Well they actually had to make a beer and rum run every day because they couldn't stock enough booze for us and Four Seasons for Mitra.

This amount of drinking is what led to the next story and it was the talk of the breakfast tent the next morning. Since we were camping when you have to go the bathroom in the middle of the night you just walk out of your tent and find the nearest tree which is no big deal right? Well the one thing that you have to remember when there are ten identical tents on the beach is which tent is yours. So Bobby went to the bathroom in the middle of the night and on his way back to his tent he unzipped the one he thought was his and as he saw one other person in there he got into bed. Only this wasn't his tent that he was sharing with John but the tent of Kate who had a solo tent. He snuggled up and got comfy while Kate freaked out a little trying to figure out who just got into her bed in the middle of the night. However, Kate was very gracious about it all and laughed it off although I think that Bobby was a little embarrassed about the entire event.

A quick little side note that had me laughing the whole time was Stefan and Simon. Now they shared a room in Sabang and ended up sharing a tent and bed on the camping trip. It came out I believe on the second day that Stefan made sure that Simon did not enter the tent with sand on him as he did not want to sleep in a sandy bed. I'm not sure how he pulled this off after Simon got drunk and rolled from the dinner tent all the way down to the water and was covered in sand from head to toe.

One story that I can't forget as long as I live was Andy being turned into a Hippo! On our drive up to El Nido Andy gave a ten minute speech on how he would like to have plastic surgery that would allow him to breathe out of notrils on the top of his head like a hippo as this would allow him to spend a lot of time under water without having to come up for air. Our last dinner after we had finished eating and Quincy was saluting all the dead soldiers (empty Tanduay bottles) Mitra went and got a sharpie and a clothespin. Ian and Melanie proceeded to draw a Hippo face on the top of Andy's bald head and then sealed the deal by using the clothespin to keep him from breathing out his nose. As this was going on Peewee was just shaking her head as if to say "This is what I married!" I'm not sure if Andy still wants to become a Hippo but for one night his dream came true.

And last but not least was sitting at dinner every night and we always rotated seats so that we sat near different people and had new conversations. There was one constant of every dinner though and that was Quincy looking at Mitra and saying "Tell me a story." To which Mitra would always pull some crazy story from her life out and relay the details to which Quincy's jaw would drop and he would stare with utter amazement and say "I love this girl!" It never failed and happened every single night of the trip. I will never forget Quincy's face when he was listening to these stories it was absolutely priceless.

All in all this quick trip to El Nido with 15 amazing people was an absolutely unforgettable experience where I made some great friends that I can't wait to see again. I have to thank Andy and Peewee for sharing their beautiful wedding with us and of course deciding to spend their honeymoon with a bunch of crazy people on an island in the middle of nowhere. I love every single one of you and can't wait to try and get the whole Sabang Gang back together again.

Of course I can't thank Lee and Jasmine Goldman enough for the amazing time they showed us in El Nido. Without their guidance we all would have been lost and in no way would have had the amazing experience that was El Nido. And Bobby would have had one less concussion!

Thanks again to all involved I will remember this time always.

Brian
______________________________________________________

Ba ba ba, ba!

(Yes, I’m going down)

Snorkeling my way to hell!

Song for the car ride for this post:

(What else!?!) Highway to Hell by AC/DC

            So we got up Wednesday, had some breakfast (after deciding that our mistake on the van ride to Sabang was not eating anything and thereby making all of us wanting to vomit) and headed off in two vans to pick up the rest of the group.  We stopped by wherever Ian, Melanie, Kelly, Quincy, John, and Bobby were staying (Bamboo I think it was – there was some confusion among the drivers) and had decided for reasons of comfort to divide the group amongst the two cars according to size.  I don’t know how this made sense to anyone at the time because looking back on it now, it doesn’t really seem logical, but pretty much all of the tallest people in our group ended up in one van (except for Mavis whose at least maybe 6’3” and Brian, who isn’t the tallest but is at least a Peewee and a half wide) which meant we lost Simon and Stefan and gained Melanie and Ian (and 6 cases of San Mig beer). 

           

           I only have a few choice words to say about the 7-8 hour (after stopping for about an hour for lunch) hurling bolt of steel, passing cars on uphill, blind curves, like a bat out of hell, speeding across bumpy, unpaved roads van ride from Sabang to El Nido (and not in any particular order)… centipede, screaming, the little kid at the side of the road putting his face in a water buffalo’s ass, Bengali cock-washing (if anyone knows the reason behind this ritual, please let us know.  I’ve Googled the hell out of it without any satisfactory answers), spec-cock-ular, Hippo-Andy-mus, and asstastic.  And that – in a nutshell – was our van ride.

Song for the rest of this post:

Viva la Vida by Coldplay

            So we arrived in El Nido at about 8p.m..  Lee and Jasmine were waiting for us and had expected us much earlier.  They were so wonderful and helpful though about making sure we all got situated.  Some of the gang had made reservations for accommodations for the night, while others of us (Brian, Kate, and I – and I think a few others) did not.  No problem – Jasmine took Brian, Kate, and me to the Bayview - which was a blessing because it’s where we were all to rendezvous at 8a.m. the next morning – while Lee took the rest and we made plans to meet up at Sea Slugs restaurant at nine.  The three of us decided to share the one room the Bayview had available since it was just a place to sleep.  We threw down our bags and headed off to the restaurant.  I guess all the speculation and theorizing about cock-washing and its purpose and/or meaning and the centipede scare had left us all worn out as the group was pretty subdued.  (It was no indication of what was to come!) I think everyone just wanted to eat and sleep and get to the next day already, as we’d all been greatly anticipating this trip – especially Simon, who was the most prepared for it out of all of us!

Oh – I completely forgot – I need to introduce you to the players:

Peewee and Andy (who I think I nicknamed AnD.D. on the van ride, which I think speaks for itself – love you and all your energy Andy!  And yes – they spent their honeymoon with US!!!  I think Peewee deserves at least a week at the George V in Paris for this trip!) you know, as well as Kate, and of course Brian and myself.  I’ve introduced you to Mavis and Summer, but haven’t told you much about them…

Mavis:  totally hysterical and just very good-natured.  He seems to never really lose his cool – even if he’s getting “Yes, yes, yes’d” to death – and lets pretty much everything roll off his back and always keeps everything as upbeat as possible.

Summer:  A California girl through and through – blonde and bubbly.  Summer is also a total mom-in-the-making.  You know the girls that just have that quality about them; just very nurturing and always making sure everyone is ok and has everything they need.  Plus she has that great mom wink.  You know, that wink that your mom gives you when you’re in a group of people that no one else notices but it makes you feel like you’re the only one that matters at that moment.  And I think the phrase I heard most often uttered by Summer on the trip was, “Wasn’t that so much fun?  I’m having so much fun!” which always made me stop and think – no matter what kind of self-effacing, miserable crap was sloshing around in my gray matter – made me always stop and think, “Yeah, this is pretty cool.”  

Kelly:  Just a great, kind, gentle soul and heart.  We had some great long talks about subjects we share passion for and I really enjoyed our time together.  Kelly is the kind of girl that I sense has a deep passion for the world around her who is game for pretty much everything and doesn’t seem to get too riled up about anything – I mean that in the best possible sense, that she seems to live by the creed of “live and let live.”  At least, that’s the best way I can put it.  She just seems at ease with everything around her and I truly admire that.

Quincy (Kelly’s husband):  I’ll describe Quincy to you as the wonderful Mr. John Bauman (Kate and Andy’s dad – oh!  And now Peewee’s too!) described him -  “Quincy is soooooo laid back that if he was any more laid back he’d be moving backwards.”  One of the best moments of the trip to illustrate this point took place in Sabang.  I think it was Stefan who went up to Quincy at his table at dinner to talk to him and in the middle of their conversation, Quincy said that he was tired and had to close his eyes, put his head on the table in the middle of the restaurant and fell asleep.  I think that about says it all.

Stefan (Simon’s better half?):  Stefan is a tall, handsome, Swiss and true to his nationality, he pretty much remained neutral on everything that was going on around him.  (I’m not sure what his stance is on chocolate, watches, or army knives.)  Like everyone else in the group, he has an incredible sense of humor and an indescribably great heart.  And I’m not exactly sure what Stefan does beyond surfing sofas and scuba diving, but I do know that he’s been many places, has seen many things, has made many good friends (I’m sure that’s true wherever he goes and I can’t imagine anyone not befriending the soft-hearted Swiss) and he doesn’t seem to need or want any more out of life than that.  He’s the kind of guy that looks the same on the inside as he does on the outside – beautiful.

Simon (Mine and Brian’s soon to be adoptive father):  What can I tell you about Simon… he is as generous, sensitive, caring, and introspective as he is crazy!!!  (Crazy as in “The Hangover”, Fat Jesus kind of crazy, not as in “Fatal Attraction” kind of crazy.)  Simon’s philosophy on life is why waste too much of your time or energy being mad at people, places, things, circumstances no matter how much they may have “done ya dirt.”  There’s no way you can NOT love the enthusiastic Irishman.  In two words to describe Simon (cuz it’s too hard to choose just one): he’s just grand, he is legend.

Bobby:  Bobby is just as spirited as everyone else, same great sense of humor, same big heart, same care freeness, same love of life and adventure, has a true interest in everything around him and gives you all of his attention – everyone, at the same time.  Bobby loves, loves, LOVES to laugh.  Well, I don’t know if he loves it but he laughed more often than anyone else on the trip and that’s saying a lot because there was A LOT of laughing going on.  And Bobby is so comfortable with his surroundings and being in nature that he doesn’t care where he sleeps.  The only negative thing I have to say about Bobby is that he is probably one of the most accident-prone people I have ever met in my life.  I mean, once his concussion started to subside, sure – it was hilarious.  But there were a few harrowing, worrisome moments along the trip.

John:  John is probably the toughest for me to explain, since I didn’t talk to him all that much on the trip, so I observed more than I learned.  John was probably the quietest of the bunch.  He didn’t say much, didn’t try to force himself into anything – any conversation or situation – but when he did speak it was witty, intelligent, meaningful, and no bullshit.  He tells it like it is and he does what he likes.  He was just as comfortable being off on his own, doing his own thing as he was hanging out with the rest of us raucous hooligans.  I thought many times on the trip that that was very cool of him.

Melanie:  In short, the best way to describe Melanie is that she is a sunshiny, cigar-smoking firecracker.  She’s one of the most self-aware 24 year-old girls I’ve ever met and she could probably be President someday if she wanted to.

Ian (Rasta Simmons):  Ian will let you perform obscene, lewd sexual acts on him for some feta cheese.  Ian pretty much rocks. ‘Nuff said.

A little more on Kate:  I know I already told you a little bit about Kate, but wanted to add a few things…  Kate is the kind of girl that can walk into a room of 20 strangers of any sex, age, or background and within half an hour, she’s got 20 new best friends.  She loves people and life and loves them intensely.  You know when Kate cares about someone or something, it’s not a superficial, casual kind of caring, you know that for the rest of her life she will care and love fiercely anyone or anything that speaks to her heart.  She is immensely affectionate to everyone around her in a way that is admirable and contagious and watching her – as well as everyone else – over the course of the trip taught me a lot about myself.

Lee and Jasmine (Our host and hostess):  All I can say about Lee and Jasmine is that they have the patience of frickin saints for having put up with our motley crew!  Jasmine was extremely gracious and a very good sport and always made sure I had a Four Seasons to drink.  She always had a smile on her face – even after being viciously attacked by jellyfish when she didn’t even want to get in the water!  Lee is extremely passionate about the work he does and it was always a thrill and a pleasure to see his enthusiasm for what he does and what he was able to show us.  What they gave us in those days is priceless and I don’t think any of us could ever thank them enough for all they did for us – no matter how much poo-powder we might send them.

(The length of what I wrote about people and my lack or abundance of verbage in no way reflects my depth of feeling for them.  I cherish and adore them all!!!  They are all some of the most asstastic people I’ve ever met.  Spec-cock-ular even!)

Okay – so now you know all the players, so let’s get to it, shall we?

            Dear reader, all of my life this is the one fact about me that people adamantly refuse to believe – I am excruciatingly, painfully shy.  I guess I’ve done a pretty good put up job because no one truly believes me (and will argue with me fervently) when I try to confess this fact.  People see the tattoos and hear the crass, loud jokes (my mother says I have a mouth that would make a sailor blush – if you hadn’t caught that already.  Ironically, she’s most likely the one I learned it from!)  I admit, I like a fair amount of attention but have long ago given up the battle or the desire of constantly vying for the spotlight, so I guess it’s not really attention I crave as much as just being included and a part of whatever’s going on.  Also, I LOVE to shock people – I habit I also picked up from my mom.  (Love you mommy!)

            

I won’t go into speculation as to why my mother adopted this habit, but for myself I can tell you that it’s definitely a defense mechanism, most likely developed as a way (aside from having a sick, twisted sense of humor anyway) to test people who are new to me, but also to further perpetuate the idea that I’m tough and should not be fucked with and to hide the fact that I’m trying to divert myself from having a flat out grand mall seizure and/or peeing my pants over the agony of wondering whether or not this or that person likes me.  Plus, with my lack of socialization in the past year mixed with what I am certain is a difficulty grasping, participating in, or having an interest in small talk due to my own chemical makeup and my experience in a 12-step program - where it has become second nature for me to discuss with a perfect stranger the deepest, darkest recesses of my being and mind without necessarily even knowing their name and share a certain language and sense of acceptance with that person - getting to know people gives me effin’ shingles!  I don’t really know how to talk to people or what they might even want to talk about if it’s not about feelings or their biggest fear or what the most horrible thing they’ve ever done in their life. 

Not that I’m ALWAYS quite so dramatic in what I discuss with people but trying to not jump right into the most heinous details of a person’s life and rather starting with something like whether they prefer cats to dogs makes me feel like my intestines are eating themselves and that my heart has a sleeper hold on my esophagus and that I might melt in my own sweat.  But in the right circumstances, the right setting, the right situation, if there’s just the right combination of caffeine and nicotine in my system and if I’m feeling goofy, I will be loud, gregarious, outgoing, talkative, I will be at ease, and I will be a part of.  Ironically, I have an easier time of achieving Chatty Mitra in a group of people rather than in one on one encounters.  My only guess as to why this might be (as you’d think it’d be the other way around) is that it’s easier to hide in a crowd – if you want to hide something, the least likely place that it will be found is usually in plain sight.  (Kind of has an international jewel thief feel to it, doesn’t it?  Or is that just me?)  It’s easier for me to hide my insecurities by being so over the top in a group of people than it is when one person is looking you right in the eyes, that I’ve done an incredible job in discouraging anyone from ever believing that I am probably one of the shiest people they’ll ever know.  I only mention any of this because it will come into play later in the trip…

So SOME of us were ready and waiting outside the Bayview at 8:30 sharp.  All we had to do was gather the rest of the group and we would be off.  Lee had told us to meet at 8:30 because he wanted to leave no later than 10 and he figured his best shot of meeting that deadline with this group was to totally lowball the meeting time.  Not pointing any fingers but some people (Andy) took that to mean that 10 a.m. was just the time given to us so we’d be out of there no later than 10:30.  So some people – still not pointing any fingers – Kelly and Quincy didn’t show up until 10:30 on someone’s (Andy’s) instructions.  Thank sweet baby Jesus they showed up when they did because right next to the Bayview they were drying little nasty fish in the sun and I can only describe the stench as being so awful that I was wishing I had a water buffalo’s ass to stick my head in!

We get on the boat and head out into the gorgeous, clear blue water and head off to our island.  Along the way, Lee pointed out a little microscopic shack high up on the cliffs of one of the islands and explained to us that that was someone’s home.  What it was was basically a guard station that was put up for someone to live for a few weeks while guarding a bird’s nest.  Bird’s nest is a delicacy in much of southeast Asia and one nest will sell for up to $5,000 so these guys find one and then throw up a little shack to watch over it until it’s ready to be sold.  It was pretty remarkable that someone got up to where it was to build it let alone that people actually would live in one of those things for weeks at a time.

Finally we approached our campsite and it felt a little like something out of a movie.  Set back a bit from the water was about 10 pretty decent sized tents and an even bigger one at almost the very end of the beach – our dining tent.  Now, I’m not much of a camper and the one time I did do some “real” camping was hellish to say the least, but what was provided for us was amazing!  My mom might have even camped there and she’s even less of a camper than me.  We ran onto the beach like orphans who were moving into Daddy Warbuck’s mansion and went to pick out our tents.  Simon and Stefan were going to take the tent closest to the kitchen and bathroom figuring that would be the safest bet after late nights of drinking – an easy commute home – but there was no mattress in it.  Brian and I took the one right next to it and used the empty tent as our closet, which was kind of nice.  All of the tents had mattresses and bed frames and clean sheets (the beds were made for us everyday).  It was phenomenal.

We dropped off our stuff and Lee was anxious to get going since we’d had a later start than hoped – there would be no kayaking that day, just snorkeling – and got us all rounded up so he could go over the basics.  We all congregated by the shower and toilet tents so he could give us the run down – there was a big bucket in the shower tent that would be filled daily with solar heated water (finally hot water!!!) and in the toilet tent there was a little camping toilet that Lee explained to us we were supposed to put these bags in that were filled with poo-powder that Ian had brought from the states.  The poo-powder was essentially supposed to compost well, the poo.  The instructions were very clear – if you were just doing #1, you didn’t have to change the bag if it wasn’t that full.  (Right as he said this it became my goal to never pee when the bag was almost full.  I liked these people, but I’d be damned if I was going to get their pee on me!!!  And as luck would have it, I ended up being constipated the whole time we were there.)  If you were doing #2, there was a bin outside the tent that you put your bag in when you were done.  Inside the tent was a new bag that you were supposed to replace after doing your business for the next person.  Mavis was talking during Lee’s instructions…remember that.

We all piled onto two boats and headed off to one of the many islands that were surrounding us.  We got wherever we went to go snorkel and everybody headed for the water.  Now I should interject here that marine life – when it’s in close proximity to me and there’s a possibility, not so much of me touching it, but it touching me – freaks me the fuck out!  I don’t know why that is.  My parents love to talk about how when I was younger they had to constantly coax me into the ocean when I would emphatically refuse to set foot in it and when they’d ask me why my reply was simply, “The bones!”  I don’t know what that means or what I thought that meant but I’m sure some psychoanalyst could have a field day with that.  My aversion was so great that I would not touch pages of books or magazines that had any sort of aquatic life plastered on it and would often find myself blowing apart pages of National Geographic to get to the next article.  These days I will go into the ocean but I’m reluctant to go far if the water is murky and I can’t see to the bottom, so not wanting to be left out, and feeling somewhat confident about the water clarity, I put on a snorkel and mask and got in.

That day, the water was a little churned up and sandy and though there were a few cool things to see, I kept getting nailed by seaweed and flailing around in a panic. After what seemed an eternity, I decided to head for the shore of a little beach nearby and though the water was quite shallow, it was full of coral and God knows what else so like an epileptic puppy, I paddled my way to land holding in my stomach so as to not drag it against any sea things and tried to calm myself out of a full on panic attack.  If that’s what snorkeling was going to be like, I wasn’t gonna go again!  Everyone eventually got out of the water and we all dried off and settled down to enjoy a wonderful meal on the beach that had been prepared for us by Lee and Jasmine’s team while we were in the water.

After lunch, Lee wanted to take us on a hike through some stretch of forest.  After our experience with the Monkey Trail, this hike was kid’s play, though there was a little less of an actual path than the Monkey Trail and I figured if any of us were going to get Malaria or Yellow Fever, this would surely be the place.  About half way we came to this ginormous tree and stopped for photo ops and goofing around.  Then we set off once again and ended up at this little lake or reservoir or something (I can’t remember) that was beautiful but smelled like ass.  I can’t remember now why that is but it had something to do with nature so I could forgive it somewhat.  We sat there for a while and then headed back.  I can’t remember if we did any more snorkeling that day – I don’t think so – so, back to our beach.

We got back to our campsite and that day Brian and I happened to be on the fast boat so we were some of the first to shower.  Well, I was – the boys were gracious enough to let all the girls go first, even the ones on the slow boat.  Taking a warm shower was heavenly!  And, I was starting to get used to the whole bucket shower thing, actually even starting to like it a bit.  So we showered, we changed, and then it was happy hour on the beach.  Peewee and I were pretty much the only non-drinkers on the trip, so at least I wasn’t alone in that endeavor which kind of ended up saving my ass a little bit since – for an alcoholic – I was not in the best frame of mind to be trapped on an island for 3 nights with a gang of drinkers.  For the most part, being around drinkers doesn’t bother me – I’ve been a bartender for most of my sobriety – and usually the people I’m around are super respectful of my not drinking and everyone on the trip chipped in in some way to make sure that I had a juice or a soda or I was comfortable with the situation.

One of the general public’s greatest misconceptions about alcoholics is that alcoholism is about drinking and that being an alcoholic means you’re an around the clock drinker – that’s not it at all.  Sure, some alcoholics drink constantly but that doesn’t make them an alcoholic.  Being an alcoholic is about the thinking, not the drinking and my thinking at that time was working me over!!!  These days I don’t get really upset about something and think, “God, I need a drink!”  I’ve become so accustomed to not drinking that I rarely think of it, rarely think of doing it.  But there are times…  Nothing has to be exceptionally good or horribly wrong for me to want to drink or to think about it.  When it happens, when I have more than a fleeting thought of how nice a margarita would be on a hot summer day, it’s very rarely anything outside of myself that’s happening to make me want to drink.  And usually what it is for me (and it’s different for everyone) is feeling left out.  Feeling like there’s something innately in me that’s so defunct and unacceptable for public consumption that it feels like my veins are being wrung out with a vice grip right under the surface of my skin and my chest wants to shoot like a geyser right out the top of my head.  I only mention this because this is how I was feeling a lot of this trip.

It wasn’t anything anyone did or didn’t do or said or didn’t say.  It was everything and it was nothing that set me off.  I’d been ramping myself up to this frantic state for quite some time and it was all coming to head on this trip.  For a long time now – it’s hard to say when it actually started, maybe a year, maybe two years ago, maybe more – I haven’t been taking care of myself and so I’d come to a point where my perceptions and feelings had become so twisted that it felt like I was in quicksand and just constantly grasping for air.  That night at happy hour on the beach I’d started talking to Quincy and I can’t remember who else was there, but somehow the story of how I’d done meth one weekend, ended up in a strip club in the middle of the day, in the middle of West Virginia, and killed all my mom’s plants.  (It’s always good for a few laughs.)  It was all fine and good until someone asked me to share the story with the whole group at dinner.  I was semi-mortified. 

This may contradict all I said about being better in a group of people than in a one-on-one but one of the many hallmarks of an alcoholic is that they can be in a room of 100 people and 99 people can love them and sing their praises and blow sunshine up their ass but if there’s one person in that room that the alcoholic THINKS feels very “eh” about them, they are a fucking gobby goo of sniveling, neurotic mess.  (In the simplest of terms, just about any alcoholic in recovery will tell you that they are an egomaniac with an inferiority complex, I am no exeption to the rule!) That was me.  I was feeling that there might be one or two people in the group that might not have wanted to hear my story and I had been torturing myself with that feeling for some time leading up to this and would continue to feel that right up to the end.  I should probably also mention here that my recent onset of self-doubt and my might as well go eat wormsedness was not doing great things for mine and B’s relationship.  I could tell I was wearing him down but also I felt horrible that we were on this trip we’d always dreamt about and I couldn’t relax, I just couldn’t seem to get happy and stay there.  We were both extremely frustrated and I was starting to shut down.

The next day, we got up early in the morning, had a magnificent breakfast and COFFEE (yay!) and loaded up the boats.  Again, I have no clue where Lee took us, but the boats stopped somewhere and it was everyone into the water.  Though I’d been hesitant after the previous day’s experience, the water was absolutely gorgeous, the sun was beating down on us and I could see right by where the latter off the boat was, that there were a million vibrant, Technicolor fish swimming around.  I got in and the fish showed no fear, so neither did I – we swam together!  It was unbelievable!  I’ve only been snorkeling a few times – mostly cuz that shit grosses me out and so I don’t seem much point to it – and the other times I’ve gone I’ve thought, what is everyone getting so exited about?  This looks nothing like the pages of National Geographic that I refused to touch!!!  This was the day that I FINALLY understood.  We saw the most amazing, beautiful coral and sea stuff ever!  Andy kept saying, “So THIS is what a coral reef is supposed to look like!”  So my amateur opinion aside, the marine biologists were raving about it.

After that was another fabulous lunch on another beautiful beach after a quick duck into a cool cavern that Lee informed us had been discovered to be a former dwelling of natives long ago.  And after that was more snorkeling, which I did opt out of this time, when I saw jellyfish.  I will have no part of jellyfish!  At least, I think that’s what happened this day – it’s hard to remember out, but that’s the general gist of how things went pretty much every day.  Then it was back to camp and unfortunately and somehow Brian’s snorkeling gear and mine had been moved to the slow boat that day so I had to wait in line for the shower.  While waiting for the shower, Melanie stormed out of the bathroom and said something to the effect of, “I will fucking kill one of you motherfuckers!”  Apparently someone had left their used poo bag in the new poo bag bin…and hadn’t tied it up…and it’d been sitting on the hot tropic island for 7 hours.  Again, not going to name any names, but it was someone who obviously hadn’t heard Lee’s instructions that day, maybe because they were talking while Lee was giving his informative speech.

After everyone had showered, we congregated on the beach for happy hour and collectively shamed the poo bandit, talked and laughed until our four course, gourmet dinner.  At dinner that night, Brian and I sat at a corner of our square table with Bobby and Simon with Quincy and Ian within earshot.  Somehow we got on the subject of disgusting things people do in public.  In all confidentiality, I tried to whisper to the boys one of the most disgusting public displays I’ve ever witnessed a human being taking part in and once again, I was asked to repeat it for the group.  Once again, complete mortification, but with all eyes looking on me, I did it somewhat begrudgingly.  Honestly, I was horrified at what the girls of the group were thinking about me.  I do better with boys, have always been one of the boys, I talk like the boys, I even kind of think like the boys.  Girls terrify me, always have.  Probably because I’ve always compared myself to other girls and have never quite felt like I measured up.  But boys are easy in that way.

So I was already feeling painfully uncomfortable when Summer and Mavis started relating a story about how they went somewhere and as they were going through customs they noticed all these signs about cheese being forbidden.  Our corner of the table was already pretty rowdy what with my disgusting story and Simon’s story about his midget friend jumping out from a bail of hay (which is one of those things that you have to hear the whole story to understand how funny it was and why it made me laugh so hard I spit my food out), and then we started making jokes about contraband cheese and (what I thought was) somewhat under my breath I made a comment about exchanging sexual favors for feat cheese (but using all the dirty words) and Ian laughed so hard he ran out of the tent and either spit out his food or puked.  (So at some point amid all of our riotous laughter, we resigned ourselves to the fact that we were all going to hell – Simon was going to reserve us a suite and someone was going to be sure to procure us some bunk beds.)  I was completely embarrassed about having interrupted Summer and Mavis’ story.  I felt absolutely horrible about it and at that moment when everyone was looking at us, I wanted to shrivel up and fade away.

The next day was more fabulous snorkeling and kayaking and wonderful food and amazing scenery and it was all terrific but I was feeling a little low.  I was trying to understand where this uneasiness came from and why I felt so guilty for just being myself.  It’s just as I would have acted with my own friends and I never would have agonized over my behavior like I was, like I had been for days now.  I’m sure there were a lot of factors that were contributing to my restlessness, irritability, and discontent, but what it came down to was this – I was pissed.  I was absolutely livid over the events of the last year and what they’d done to me, what I’d let them do to me, and what and who I’d become.  It hadn’t all quite sunken in yet, but I was starting to understand that I no longer had an identity and was even more confused and at a loss for knowing who I was.  I’d always presented myself as the tough-talking tattooed chick who could own a room if she wanted, who knew how to size people up and give them exactly what and who they wanted. 

I used to be the girl intimidating people.  I didn’t necessarily set out to do that, but I didn’t mind, it gave me a certain sense of protection.  But in the last year, it seems I’d lost that power.  I wasn’t exactly sorry; one of the things I’ve longed for, strived for in my old age is authenticity.  I want to be authentic and though at times I didn’t mind if I intimidated people, it also has always kind of baffled me and hurt my feelings.  I don’t want people to think that I’m unapproachable and it confounds me at times that they don’t see that really I’m just a shy, scared, sappy dork who just wants to be part of the gang, who ultimately wants nothing more than to connect with the people around me.  The pieces weren’t all there yet, but I was starting to understand that what I was wanting was for people’s perceptions of me to match who I really, truly am.  That I want my outsides to match my insides, but right now, they are in polar opposite directions, so far away from each other that the prospect of finding balance seems daunting and unattainable.  And right now, I have no fucking clue what the truth about me is…

That night at dinner, I was quite.  I tried to just be quiet and not sullen, but honestly I was disappointed in myself and naked in the rawest most vulnerable of ways, though I didn’t say much, my head was screaming.  Some of the guys were asking me to tell another story, but I had nothing and wouldn’t have shared anything even if something had come to mind.  I didn’t want anything that night to be about me.  I was sitting next to John and he asked me why I wasn’t regaling them with one of my stories.  I told him that it was because I was shy.  His response was something like, “Yeah, right! You!?!” Luckily everyone else stepped in to fill the hole and everyone’s attention became directed at Andy and his hippopotamus head.  (Andy wants to have reconstructive surgery to get rid of his nose and be able to breathe out of the top of his head like a hippo so he can pretty much stay underwater forever.  You gotta love that kid!  I kept telling him I’d pay good money to see him walk into a plastic surgeon’s office, throw a picture of a hippo on the doctor’s desk and say, “THIS is what I want!”)  So our last night was little more subdued and ended on a jovial note.

The next morning we all loaded back up on the boat with all of our gear and headed back to the beach in El Nido where we said our goodbyes as half the group was taking off that day back home or wherever they were off to next.  All in all, it truly was a fantastic time, besides my self-torment and seemingly constant mental anguish.  (My body had been in paradise and my mind was in hell!)  It’s all part of the ride and a few more pieces to the puzzle and as I said at somewhat of the beginning of this post, I had the pleasure of meeting a truly top-notch cast of characters that showed me many wonderful things about the world, the human spirit, nasty sea creatures, and not only about the kind of person I want to be, but who I’m not anymore. Once I wanted to rule the world, thought it was the only way that I could trick people into thinking I was ok, like I had to be more than everyone and everything just to be equal to all that was around me.  But I learned from those people on that island that I want to come by my place in the world honestly, have wanted it for a long time, and I love them all for the people they are and for all they gave of themselves. There are many wonderful, amazing things about this trip that I will hold on to for a long time to come and many things were discovered that it’s time to let go of…

xoxoM