Part 3 I left my heart in the Philippines

I left my heart in the Philippines by Patrick Duffey

Living it down

Today I arrived at my Nanay’s house in Dolores, Eastern Samar. It being a Saturday, others have insisted on my joining them to go and the festivities at their town plaza square. It is also Valentine’s Day and my friends search for a “part-time” Valentine on this special night for me.
San Miguel is my choice of beverage throughout the evening as we walk; I am more comfortable this way although I am the mosquito’s choice of fresh blood. I wished I had brought a tennis racket or at least golf clubs. I meet new friends and feel transported back in time as if I were once again in high school.
Five thirty in the morning and I’m up. This is supposed to be a vacation, relaxing and unwinding in paradise, but I realize that there is a need to get things done around here before it gets too hot. I take my morning shower (that I will find out comes in handy three or four times a day). The “shower” is a large, plastic drum with water that has been drawn from a well and a bucket to bring the water over my head. I scream from the shock; it is cold! My apartelle at least had hot water. But as i soon get over from the shock, I am ready for the hot sun that dries me off almost instantly.
Someone tells me that we’re going to an island (hey this is an island!). We travel to Hilabaan, about 45 minutes by pump boat into the Pacific Ocean. It is what they call an outrigger with a 16hp engine. My thoughts of Gilligan’s Island come to mind as we head out to a speck on the ocean’s horizon. As I step onto the beach my feet hit something fairly sharp. There are seashells all over and it’s almost impossible to step without missing one because these things are moving small and large exotic shells housing hermit crabs scampering for safety.
Walking into town past huts hugging the beach, people come to greet me and I somehow think they have not yet before seen a white man with freckles and blue eyes. I make a joke that I am a Filipino American new breed. I am invited into someone’s house for lunch where I try a coconut wine called “tuba”. Let’s just say it’s an acquired taste. I am also given a sea turtle shell and other artifacts as gifts. Now me must return to Dolores before the waves get too big for this small boat, and I am treated to my first picture-postcard sunset.
I am getting used to getting in my car and just “doing it.” I am used to picking up the phone whenever I want talking as long as I want, sending a fax, getting e-mail, getting global news, getting paged. Here it seems time has slowed down. There are few television sets. The day’s are hot and dry, and the nights are sticky. I sleep under a mosquito net around my bed. This reminds me of when I was a small boy and I would watch my mother put a net around the food to keep the flies out.I wonder if the mosquito’s lick their chops on top of my net wishing they could get to their dessert. There is a nighttime serenade from gecko lizards looking for food.

Here the effect of El Nino is just the opposite. There is no rain except for the occasional seeding of clouds from the Air Force. The source of food is being depleted because of lack of water. The rice crops and carabaos that are used to plow the fields die as well.

I had planned on visiting other places such as the rice terraces of Sagada, do some diving in Cebu at Moalboal or Yopak in Boracay, but I seem content to stay in Samar. I have been back to Hilabaan, the small island, and have spent a few nights watching sunsets, gathering seashells and fishes as the natives do. At low tide, I can walk through the Philippine Ocean to a half dozen islands. One night I paid three pesos (about 8 U.S. cents) to see the movie “Titanic;” it obviously was recorded on someone’s video camera as the quality was poor and sometimes there are shadows of people walking in front of the movie screen. On my last night there, I wished my friends well and thanked them for their kind hospitality. Goodbyes come too early. At 4 a.m. we walk in the darkness (only lit by homemade oil lamp) across to the other side of the island on a trail through the jungle to meet our boat around 6 a.m. there are no private boats at this hour to hire.
Tomorrow I am leaving for Borongan; tonight I sample the night life of Dolores one last time with Franco, my bodyguard. He suggests that maybe if we drink more, the better he can speak English and I, Tagalog. But I sit this one out and watch others enjoy. The local police captain wants to meet me- the stranger that he has heard about, and pulls up a seat with his M-16. He says he can’t drink as he is on duty then he takes down a couple of shots of gin and lime juice.
It is now the first of March and we ride by jeepney to Borongan, about 65 miles south where I will spend my last night before having to leave Samar for Manila. When I was here a few weeks ago visiting, I saw my first American. A black modified VW pulls up and a rather large man extracts himself from it. He is Willie White, who lived in the San Francisco East Bay before settling down here after Vietnam. He is now a true Waray-Waray. He tells me of a Southern Californian surfer that now owns a resort here, and through the gates I arrive at Pirate’s cove but he is not there to see. A monkey climbs down from a tree to scrutinize and make some obscene gestures to me.

In the morning I find that Noling has booked me on the same bus that I had arrived on with the same driver because I had so much fun. I did not know this until boarding and they greeted me by name. They once again gave me my seat in the front and they started singing “Hey Jude” to me. Noling was only to be gone three or four days but has stayed the whole month. He accompanies me back to find out if he still has a job driving. In a few hours on the road riding on the bus a quite charming Filipina sits next to me. This is the first time she has met an American and for the rest of the trip we talk. She asks me about my culture and somewhat rather personal questions about myself. She is easy to talk with and confide in; share food and all too soon, this ride is over as her stop leaves her well before Manila. I exit the aircon bus to see Rowena, the mother and Winnie, the little girl I spoke of earlier that made tears come to my eyes.





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