Island Hopping at Mactan

 I had a wonderful, full-blast adventure last Sunday. A long lost high school friend invited me to join their planned island hopping trip along different islands offshore Mactan mainland.

 Most of the islands were already inhabited by natives and (sad to say) were highly commercialized. You have to pay a quite unreasonable amount once you set your foot on their territorial waters.










We went to Hilutongan, Nalusuan, Kawhagan (home of famous sand bar) and Olango islands. When we reach Talima, our last point and was still part of Olango island, we were surprised to know that it now offers a themed children park along its seashore.

The best part of each island visit is seeing so many species of fish underwater. I felt so excited whenever I get to see various schools of fish. They swim freely unmindful of unwanted visitors like me. Someone instructed not to catch them and not to throw our garbage on the water, to which I agree. I feel it is imperative to preserve them and keep them as clean as possible.

Too bad we don't have an underwater camera. How I wish I could capture them using a camera. They would really look great in pictures. Pictures of them would be very lively and colorful. Speaking of colors, I even saw a boat painted in my childhoold favorite color, pink.

The whole experience was nice and memorable.

At some point, my imagination flew again and dreamed of having an underwater wedding

then a honeymoon in an isolated island.

Whew! So much for impossible dreams...

When our group decided to go back to the city, the sun already started going down...

The sun may go down everyday, but my hopes and dreams of tomorrow will remain... ;')

of blue beaches, blue skies, blue moods...

I've been to one of the beaches in Bantayan Island, Cebu last weekend. It is an almost three-hour drive from the city to Hagnaya port and another almost an hour ship ride to the island itself. I went with a group of young ladies who were all too eager to getaway with the buzzy office life, too happy to hear the silent rush of the ocean instead of ear-wrenching phone calls and too relieved to see white sand and blue beaches instead of a boring flat-screen computer monitor.

The place is quite commercialized, but it still has its power to make beach bums like me to realized how great our Master is. The excitement of being in this far-flung renowned island was overwhelming. But I can't help myself to stop and to be amaze with its splendor and beauty. I would like to see everything around me and to remember them in my mind, complete with its magnificent details. The shoreline, the skies and the birds. The sands, the innocent starfish and the rock formations. I want to visit this island again and again, though only in my mind.

I sat quietly below a shaded coconut tree and let myself detached, for about just a few minutes, away from the bustles of building tents, food preparations, drink mixtures, excited laughs on wacky poses in pictures made by my friends. I don't know why but I always have this habit to make myself aloft and detached amidst happy company of friends. I always allow myself to dwell on my inside world, though happy solitude. Thoughts brought to me during these solitudes never fail to surprise me. I realized, every time I came out of this short-lived 'self-invented time machine', it makes me feel renewed and a bit wiser. But people around me thought otherwise, I don't know why. Maybe I am so reluctant to show the real me. Or maybe, that's the real me, so dumb stupid just like what people say. Whichever might be true, but I don't care.

That time in Bantayan, it made me look on the way I live my life. I realized that I am pursuing worldly, material and less important things which I thought would lead me to a more fulfilling life, but oftentimes leave me either unsatisfied or yearning for more. During one of religious conferences I attended before, they told me that there is nothing wrong with pursuing these empty pursuits except when these begin to consume me or to take greater priority than my pursuit of Him.

I agree, and I guess most of you will also agree, that almost all of us are currently pursuing to one of these pursuits: pursuit of success, pursuit of satisfaction and pursuit of security. Let me quote excerpts from a handbook of the conference I attended before:

• Success is not a bad thing, we just need to examine our motives for wanting to achieve success.
• Things that will give us pleasure in order to fill the emptiness inside of us, or to help us forget our hurts. This could be food, drink, sex, emotional attachments, shallow relationships, etc. These things may give us temporary satisfaction but will never completely satisfy us. We must remember that only He can satisfy our hearts.

Perhaps, I should start re-engineering my life, set new and appropriate priorities when I get back to the city. Though I can't do this alone, at least I'm confident someone will just be there no matter what. Hopefully next time when I get back to Bantayan Island, I am not alone anymore sitting under the shaded coconut tree....