My Boracay Travel Journal (part 3)
May 27,
2007
Morning
Yesterday’s relaxing evening strolls managed to detoxify me from
worldly anxieties and pessimisms. I started the morning feeling quite
refreshed. I was bent on making the most of my final night in
Boracay, so I won’t waste any minute being unhappy or doing anything
detrimental to my enjoyment.
But apparently not everyone woke up refreshed. Some could hardly wake
up at all. Assembly time was supposed to be on 900 AM yet there I was
swimming on the pool (which was next to our meeting place), all the
way to 1000 AM, with almost nary a single colleague on plain sight.
It was really weird, but everyone’s been greeting “good morning”
to me. I’ve got a feeling that I’m the person the staffs in Patio
Pacific remembered the most. It’s quite peculiar having to go around
places and being greeted by warm strangers everywhere; the last place
where this happened to me was in Manhattan (but that was Manhattan).
Anyway, the staffs probably knew me as the vegetarian guy who was
very inquisitive about the ingredients of the foods that they were
serving, or maybe as the guy who would say thank you for however
small services the staffs had brought out. It’s pleasant both ways,
and I was actually able to chat with quite a few of the staffs, and
learned that some of them spoke the vernacular that I have
assimilated before.
Team building activities resumed from yesterday. Rankings indicated
that our group came in second, and the activity coordinator promised
great rewards for whoever came in first at the end of today’s
session. Winners would be given certificates that they would have to
show Joana, so that they’d be given a t-shirt. “With any luck,”
joked the coordinator, “you might also get Joana’s phone number.”
“Yay!” approved most guys. Rrright. Also, there were new
instructors that led our morning exercise activities. These dudes had
Greek god’s physique and they were introduced as fresh and single.
Cue sound of girls getting giddy. Here we go again.
The first activity consist of running around in blindfold while doing
silly things like eating bananas, crawling under tables and twisting
on hula hoops. The second activity had us filling up 20 packets of
pool water in the shortest time. By themselves the games were pretty
basic, but they were sufficient in establishing rapport and teamwork
among group members. Most fortunately, our group got in first place
on both events, making us champions. Woo!
The coordinator had one more task left for us, which was to discuss
and to reflect on what has happened. The coordinator cited various
observations from the games such as how some groups were nasty to
their opponent on their first game, how some groups love to create
strategies, how everyone was good sport about everything, etc. Some
of the topics brought up had people arguing back and forth about
competitiveness, sportsmanship, teamwork and chuva. Or that’s
how it sounded like anyway since I wasn’t really paying much
attention. It was just so weird being within earshot of assorted
paraphrases from Sun Tzu, Michael Porter, Dale Carnegie and Justin
Timberlake while the radio played Black Eyed Peas’ “bebot bebot
bep… PILIPINO!!!”. I was almost nonexistent from the whole
discussion with the exception of answering a question of if anyone
knew what schadenfreude meant. I knew. I was praised for my
extensive English dictions, I guess. Of course, no one knew that
schadenfreude is one of my many hobbies. Hah!
What immediately followed was the (mandatory) moment of gratitude for
a job well done. This moment of inspiration was like those times when
people held hands and sang “If we hold on together” in unison.
Ick. Well, at least the bags given to all of us were all kinds of
awesome. To quote the McDonald’s catchphrase, “I’m lovin’ it!”
And thus the team building ended. We spent the rest of the morning
swimming on the private pool.
I should be thankful they didn’t ask us to jump, or else we’d look like monkeys
Half the team had to fill up packets with pool water…
… which they had to throw to the remaining half opposite of them.
She’s teaching Confucianism!
Current mood: Happy
Current
song: Summertime - Billie Holiday
Summertime, and the livin’ is easy
Fish are jumpin’ and the cotton is high
Oh! Your Daddy’s rich and your Ma is good lookin’
So, hush little baby, don’t you cry . . .
Noon
Lunch in Vanilla Lounge. Zzz.
At noontime, we didn’t spend a lot of time outside, partly because it
was so hot, and partly because everyone wanted to have a good rest.
Eventually, by around 3 pm, we all went out. As it was before, we
were again divided into two groups: the first one of those who wanted
to spend the noontime on a bar, the second one of those who wanted to
bathe in the beach. I was among the second one, though I didn’t
really swim for too long when compared to others. It was quite
thrilling to be swept away by constant streams of tides; however,
seawater was a little too irritating for my facial skin, so I
couldn’t last long being at the sea. Maybe a reason to this was due
to heavy UV rays brought by global warming. Yeah, I remembered The
Inconvenient Truth even if I was at a place where I wouldn’t watch such
documentary.
On our way back to the resort, we went to buy a few souvenir clothes.
I managed to snag a few good bargains too, so, yipee!
Somewhere between going from this place to that, I passed by someone
I’ve unmistakably seen before. It happened so fast that, by the time
I realized that it was actually Ley, she was already too far away and
it would be silly to chase her. Shucks, it would’ve been cool if we
could hang out with each other on Boracay. What’s worse was that I
was reminded again that I missed this Saturday’s Web Design class
(Ley was our HTML instructor in First Academy; I’m now taking up the
next subject, Photoshop). Oh well, I guess I just have to make up
when I go back to Manila.
Tayo na sa beach… at tayo ay mag-swimming…
Current mood: Bluesy
Current
song: I Let A Song Go Out of My Heart – Andy Bey
I let a song go out of my
heart
Believe me, darling, when I
say,
I won’t know sweet music
Until you return some day
Night
One of the items we were required to bring for this company outing
was a white clothing. On this night we were to wear our white clothes
in participation of this activity called… err, what was that again?
Luau? Lualu? Luaualalalilolelelolipops? Lulu… oh, I give up.
I had
no idea what we were supposed to do.
Dinner was served on the garden (the natural one, not the Garden Cafe
one) and bad trance music was played. I happen to have an intense
dislike for house and trance music, so I instead listened to my iPod,
and then I realized that the battery was near dead. So I left my seat
and attended to my iPod’s needs; gee, I love that stuff far too much. On
my way back to my room where I can charge my iPod, I saw Joana, and
she invited me for a cup of coffee. I declined because I was supposed
to be present in the Lu-whatchamacallit event. And so I went back
there, finished my meal, and wondered what on earth was supposed to
happen next. Then I got bombarded and beleaguered by questions of how
it must suck being a vegetarian, how meat tastes great, how I should
try it to have a more complete life, yadda yadda yadda. You know what
occurred to me right this very moment? I probably should have just
hang out with Joana. I was liking the idea more and more, and so I
excused myself again. This time I agreed to have a coffee with Joana
along with her company of friends.
Gee, the coffee tasted terrific! I was so curious about what blend it
was but I didn’t get any answer. Too bad. What’s even better was that
the coffee was actually ON THEM, that I did not have to pay anything.
Wow! I was quite amazed that people were being so generous to me. Joana
and her friends chatted with me about various things, especially asking about what
has happened during our stay. I found it very entertaining to be at
her presence too because she and her friends had a way of keeping our
conversations very lively and interesting. I got her call card, and
later on I realized that hey, I was the person who actually won
Joana’s number, and to think that I was also the person who had initially
despised the idea of objectifying Joana as a prize of some sort.
Hahaha. Sometimes irony just loves to bite people in the ass.
We look like human toothpastes
Current mood: Lively
Current
song: I Feel The Earth Move – Carole King
I
feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumbling down
I
feel my heart start to trembling
Whenever you’re around
Midnight
Everyone knows what it’s like the final night of every excursions.
Most people would choose sleeping on the wee hours of the morning.
Some wouldn’t even sleep. I was one of the people who planned not to
sleep.
Four of my colleagues and I waited until 5 AM so that we could watch
the sun rise. It sounded like a good idea anyway, except it rained on
5 AM and the sun didn’t actually rise on the beach where we were
near. We were on west side. And so we learned that we would’ve sucked
as sailors since we didn’t know squat about heliacal and celestial
arrangements in relation to us.
The overlong wait was, in fairness, quite entertaining. We talked on
a lot of subjects (like office life, life’s philosophies, us,
politics, love, etc), mostly expressing our point of views on certain
situations and sometimes even debating with so much passion. Too bad
the plan to see the sun rise was foiled by our ineptitude to constellations, further worsened
by the inclement weather.
(No pictures here)
Current mood: Pensive
Current
song: Mood Indigo – Tony Bennett
You ain’t been blue; no, no,
no, you ain’t been blue,
Till you’ve had that mood indigo.
(CONCLUDED HERE)
