Thank you, Nepal; a Postscript

More than two months after our visit, the enigma, magic and unshakeable faith of Nepal still linger in my mind.

Thank you to the Nepali people for their unwavering strength and resilience and to this Himalayan country for revealing its beauty amid the devastation. 

Here's my collection of stories from the trip:

Nepal is still strongly in need of help, my story for The New Internationalist even as Social Caretaking Keeps Nepal Going, as I wrote for Womensenews.

And reminisce with me again as I reflect on this amazing place for The Starweek, made extra amazing and strong by its women, who played visible roles in rebuilding Nepal as I wrote for Womensenews.

Again, thank you to everyone that Jes and I met in this journey. It was magical to say the least. 

Once again, Namaste!

Nepal's Unshakeable Beauty and Magic

My latest piece for Starweek:

Kathmandu - The chaos begins long before I even reach the city center. It begins right at Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport, a small building made of orange bricks, then on to its jam-packed parking lot, an ocean of dusty white cabs with no air conditioning.

It is a dry and sweltering late morning and I am in the Himalayan country of Nepal, known for its enigmatic beauty and also for a 7.8 magnitude earthquake that struck a month ago. From the plane, I walk inside to what seems to be the immigration, Customs and baggage area. There were several lines of people – perpendicular and parallel – and I’m not sure where to fall in line.

When I finally find the right immigration line, the officer leaves his post without a word, leaving me wondering whether I should just walk through the unguarded exit of the airport or move to another queue. Turns out, he went to help an elderly man who tried to enter Nepal without paying his visa.

There are all sorts of people at the airport – travelers, aid workers, journalists, non government workers – all off to somewhere. Outside, in the noonday heat, a swarm of taxi drivers are racing against each other to win over the next passenger who exits the airport. And one can hear the honking of cars, the shouting of parking attendants and the whistle of security guards as they try to bring order to the disarray of vehicles all desperate to get out of the parking lot as quickly as possible.

The scene at the airport is a perfect metaphor of what I saw throughout my stay in Nepal – people are doing their best to rise above the chaos, to rebuild their lives amidst the disorder, to go on with the daily grind even if it seems impossible. One can see this in the many tent cities all over the capital, in the unpaved roads filled with fruits and vegetables vendors, in the stupas – ancient Buddhism shrines – and temples and in the many curio shops all over Kathmandu.

Rebuilding officially started a month after. It took a while because the people were really shocked, says 22-year-old Success Ad, my Nepali guide and translator.

“In my village in Gorkha, everyone was crying and shouting,” Ad says.

He believes it would take a year or two before the situation will go back to normal.
At the same time, he says, Nepalis are learning a lot from the Philippines, after surviving Yolanda (Haiyan).

“It’s like the Philippines, in a way. You survived Haiyan so we are trying to survive, too,” he says. As what happened in the Philippines, the help of international media is important, he says, as it brings attention to the situation on the ground.

I am here exactly a month since the  earthquake, which left at least 8,800 people dead and injured more than 23,000. The earthquake occurred at 11:56 a.m. on April 25, with the east district of Lamjung  as its epicenter. It is said to be the worst natural disaster to hit the country since the 1934 Nepal-Bihar earthquake.

It caused an avalanche at Mount Everest, killing 19 people on the mountain that day.

Ad, manager of Happy Home Hotel, says the hotel staff was having lunch on the rooftop of the building when the earthquake struck. “Now, they don’t want to eat there anymore.”

Indeed, there is damage almost everywhere. The road where our five-story hotel is located is closed because a building, also five stories high, has slanted and is leaning on another building, putting all the buildings on that side of the road – our hotel included – at risk of falling like dominos.

Most homes are propped up by whatever support the people can find – stilts made of branches, old wood or bamboo – to prevent further collapse. Some roads are filled with the thickest dust and dried mud; some are closed to motorists because they are too damaged for people to pass through. There are heaps and heaps of fallen orange bricks everywhere.

In Thamel, a tourist place, vendors manning the souvenir stores and curio shops opt to wait out on the streets for fear that the earth will tremble again.

Everyone has a story to tell – of survival, of hurting, of trauma, of losing loved ones, of losing homes and a lifetime of hard earned money, of moving on and of finding healing.

And everyone is trying to do their best to help.

Prateebha Tuladhar, a Nepali journalist, believes that women are playing a significant role in the rebuilding of her country. “Women are holding out better,” she says.

The trauma of the people, she says, goes beyond the memories of that day. Some are dealing with post-traumatic stress disorder and are having difficulties continuing with work or with their relationships.

When the earthquake struck, she narrates how her mother and sister stood strong to save their family.

“My mother seems to be very strong. She was always telling us not to panic,” says Tuladhar of her 56-year-old mother. As the whole family stormed outside, her mother went back to the house to make sure everyone was safe. After the earthquake, her 30-year-old sister instinctively picks up her newborn baby whenever there is an aftershock.

She says even the government is too shocked to act quickly. But individually, everyone is trying to help. She especially notes how women are working on individual actions to help ease the situation.

Tuladhar puts the spotlight on a project initiated by her female friend, A Tiny Little Perspective. It is a project that helps provide nutrition packages for mothers and their newborns.

Dipti Sherchan, an anthropological researcher, founded the project. Days after the first earthquake, she found herself among two newborns, a 7-day-old and a 3-day-old, in the camping area in their community. The mothers, she says, all looked traumatized.

“Every tremor would lead the mothers to move along with the villagers to a nearby tent, holding on to her baby, and after things became a bit calmer, return with their babies to stay inside a room,” 
Sherchan says in an e-mail interview.

The initiative provides nutrition packages that contain relief materials catering specifically to the needs of pregnant women, post-natal women and their infants.

There is a bucket filled with rice, lentils, salt, biscuits, multi-grain cereal; a box filled with a mosquito net, sanitary pads, nutrition supplements like vitamins, calcium and iron; water purifier, soap, toothpaste and toothbrush, toilet paper rolls and baby products such as blankets.

Despite all the damage, Nepal is still worth visiting, even in these times. Its beauty, deep, raw and profound, is still very visible because it is seen more in the everyday life than in its damaged temples.

It is a magical journey, a feast for the senses. It is bursting with colors, with its well-dressed women in their long saris and adornments of jewels; its Lung ta prayer flags that are everywhere – blue, green, red, white and yellow; its rickety rickshaws decorated with glittering makeshift canopies and its hundreds and hundreds of shops and roadside stalls selling anything from bright yellow mangoes to antiques from the Himalayas.

There’s also a kaleidoscope of sights and sounds: its stupas with Buddha’s giant eyes, surrounded by the colorful prayer flags and the never-ending noise on its roads; the honking of cab drivers who seem to drive with no rules and limits, and the rhythmic sound of Nepali songs that blare from their radios.

Nepali food – from curries to dumplings – is a gastronomic adventure, with strong Indian influence and lots of lentils and spices. There’s a lot of rice and roti and the freshest vegetables. You never want to stop eating. There’s authentic lassi, the popular yoghurt-based drink, sweet, plain, banana or what-have-you.

But more importantly, it’s the Nepali people that make one’s visit worthwhile. They are always warm and happy despite what they are going through, always ready to greet and welcome visitors with Namaste and a warm smile.

On one of our last moments here, we stood on top of a hill overlooking the city of Kathmandu. We lingered for a long, long time, forgetting the minutes and the hours, admiring the city down below, those hundreds of small pastel-colored houses glittering under the warm Nepalese sun, taking it all in and getting lost, grateful to this Himalayan country for opening its doors to us and revealing its beauty despite the devastation.

I close my eyes one last time before leaving the hilltop, in an attempt to seal in my mind’s eye this magical, breathtaking view, to keep in my heart forever. It is a stark reminder that even in the most chaotic places, the spirit and the soul, in all their beauty, are never destroyed.


To know more about the Tiny Little Perspective Project, please email dipti@atinylittleperspective.org or visit http://withlove.atinylittleperspective.org.

EverydayPhilippines: The ExtraOrdinary in the Everyday

A belated repost of my story on Everyday Philippines for Starweek.  Everyday Philippines is the Instagram project put up by Jes Aznar, Veejay Villafranca and Tammy David, which joins the growing Everyday movement. A big congratulations to the EP crew!

A town elder, in a red cap and white long-sleeved shirt, “reads” the liver and bladder of a newly butchered pig, its blood still splattered on the ground, somewhere in the mountains of Benguet in the northern Philippines.

Boys and girls of different ages, their faces in between the light and shadows of the afternoon sun, gather at the Metropolitan Cathedral of Palo in the Visayan province of Leyte to rehearse a presentation for the visit of Pope Francis.

Inside a Starbucks outlet in Manila, people are queuing for cups of latte as a group of women devotees gather at a table outside it to eat their provisions of food after hearing a mass celebrated by the pope. 

And in a place called Pandacan, in the belly of the Philippine capital of Manila, a story goes that the image of the Santo Niño was recovered from a well near the district’s stone church, built in 1732. The story goes that water from the well resulted in the miraculous healing of the residents and to this day, the people of Pandacan – sinners and devotees alike – celebrate the feast of the Child Jesus every third Sunday of January to honor the Santo Niño.

Welcome to the Philippines, where the most mundane meets the uncanny, where truth reads like fiction and where the ephemeral weaves with age-old traditions.

This is the Philippines and it’s as real as it can get.

Indeed, there’s more to the country than just poverty and politics. The images that paint a more complete and accurate portrayal of what the country is and what it is not are as endless as they are varied.

And this is exactly what Filipino freelance photojournalists Tammy David (tammydavid.com), Veejay Villafranca (veejayvillafranca.com) and Jes Aznar (jesaznar.com) had in mind when they put up 

EverydayPhilippines, an account on photo-sharing site Instagram that shows the everyday life in the Philippines and which joins the growing global Everyday movement inspired by EverydayAfrica.

EverydayAfrica started in 2012 initially as a Tumblr Blog, put up by photographer Peter DiCampo and writer Austin Merill.

The blog, which turned into a big Instagram project and which is now funded by the Pulitzer Center, sought to show what Africa is – beyond the usual stories of disease, war and famine – which mark the common portrayal of the continent.

This landmark project gained the interest of people worldwide and spawned similar Instagram accounts: EverydayIran, EverydayEasternEurope, EverydayMyanmar and also to non-geographic issues such as EverydayClimateChange and EverydayIncarceration, among others.

The EverydayPhilippines project, which officially started on Jan. 1, 2015, joins this global movement as it aims to break the visual stereotype of the Philippines being just another Third World country mired in deep poverty.

The three sat down with STARweek to share the ideas behind the project and what they hope to achieve.

We want to break the stereotypes on the Philippines,” says David, whose works have appeared in both local and foreign publications including the Wall Street Journal.

Breaking the stereotypes applied not only to the audience but to editors around the globe as well.

Villafranca, who works for Getty Images, says the project was also borne out of the difficulty of pitching stories about the country because some Western media have preconceived – or, if you will, simplified – notions of what the Philippines is.

“The Philippines on its own is very rich (but) when you pitch (stories) to the Western media, there are a lot of misconceptions,” says Villafranca.

He notes for instance that some people know the Philippines just for poverty, the Smokey Mountain and Imelda Marcos, issues that made headlines decades ago.

Today, however, there are so many other stories of life in this country of roughly a hundred million people, he says.

And while the age-old issues of poverty and Madame herself still exist, what the three photographers want are for the stories to be given the proper context through the EverydayPhilippines project.

EverydayAfrica’s DiCampo and Villafranca were classmates at the World Press Photo Joop Swart Master Class in 2013. Villafranca remembered the EverydayAfrica project that DiCampo told him about and mentioned it to Aznar and David, who were also familiar with the Instagram account and who also thought of doing it in the Philippines.

The three agreed to formalize it and thus, EverydayPhilippines was born.

How does it work? The rules are simple, says Aznar, whose works appear on the pages of the New York Times.

First and foremost, the project is open to other photographers, whereas some of the other Everyday accounts on Instagram are limited to certain photographers. The photographs must be, as much as possible, phone-camera captured, square-shaped, visually interesting and must have context.

“There are many photographs and stories but what is important is to put the context,” Aznar says.

Photographers can post their photos on their individual Instagram accounts and use the hashtag #EverydayPhilippines.

The three proponents, among the best photographers of their time, then curate the photographs that appear on this hashtag search before reposting these on the EverydayPhilippines account.

“It has to catch attention. It has to be stunning. It has to be arresting,” David says.

And true enough, the result is a visually stunning tapestry of vignettes of life in the Philippines that entices the audience to take a closer look at a nation whose daily life is so rich in history, culture and magic realism.

Just a month old, the project has already attracted the interest of photographers, local and foreigners, young and old alike.

Photojournalism professor Jimmy Domingo, on Instagram via @jimmysunday and who teaches at the Ateneo de Manila University, has contributed to the feed as well as photojournalist Luis Liwanag who is on Instagram via @luisliwanag.

Veteran photojournalist Ben Razon, on Instagram via @stellamylab and who now runs a pub after partially putting down his camera, is shooting again and has contributed to the feed.

Indeed, the project has created a micro-community among photographers, says Villafranca.

“And everyone’s excited to shoot again,” says Aznar.

David stresses that this is not some exclusive camera club and is, instead, a platform where the individual stories of photographers matter.

“You don’t have to shoot a Manila Bay sunset. Or the Sinulog. Your stories matter,” David says.

In the long run, the proponents are excited for bigger projects that EverydayPhilippines may turn into, such as a book or an exhibition. There will also be guest curators and feed take-overs by other photographers, says Aznar. The project is simultaneously on blog site Tumblr at everydayphilippines.tumblr.com and on Facebook at EverydayPhilippines.

“More importantly, what we hope is for the project to make a dent on people’s perception,” he says.

But before all that, EverydayPhilippines is every photographer’s chance to do his story, his own insightful journey as he fulfills his love affair with photography and his country, says veteran photographer Sonny Yabao, the only one revered by generations of photographers as the Master.

“EverydayPhilippines is a great idea. It gives the photographer the chance to fulfill the promise to photograph every day. It is a torrid love affair with photography, a romance in action,” says Yabao, commenting on the project.

Indeed, it is a chance to capture every single day in this chaotic and magical country, in the stillest, stillest moment of the everyday life.

A Journey to Maldives

The seabirds -- with their thick feathers of blue, white or black and wings spread out perfectly -- flew above us and guided us as we rode the waves on a white four-seater speedboat across Maldivian waters. 

There we were, the lone boat in the middle of the vast blue sea, on our way to a sandbar called Sexy Beach. I could see nothing in the faraway horizon except islands that appeared as tiny specks of land and the birds that seemed to signal us to just follow.

There was a soft drizzle when we left the island of Guraidhoo on this August afternoon but the drizzle soon parted like soft white curtains swaying in the wind to reveal a narrow patch of pinkish sand, dotted with the seabirds that seemed to give us a warm welcome to this island bliss. I felt the soft wet sand on my feet as soon as I jumped off the boat; I struggled to keep my balance while the big waves embraced my hundred pound body and soul as I made my way to paradise.

The afternoon sun is now out, glistening on the waters that splashed on this isolated sandbar, sitting perfectly in the middle of the wide, wide sea. Looking at it from above -- in my mind's eye --, I could see us walking in the middle of a painting -- the sandbar is a streak of cream colored paint in the middle of a giant emerald blue canvas.

We had this tiny paradise all to ourselves though there were signs of life before us -- a used lighter, a drenched box of menthol cigarettes and strangely, -- I say strangely because alcohol is prohibited in Maldives -- an empty bottle of rum.

A wooden box in the middle of the sandbar served as our makeshift table.

Ibrahim, our local guide, put a white picnic umbrella that stood perfectly in the middle of it all.

We had tuna sandwich for lunch, served with roti bread and fresh coconut juice. We had a box of ice cold lemon juice and the lazy afternoon all to ourselves. The island was ours and only ours to savor and enjoy.

Oh Lou Reed, you were right: It's such a perfect day.

We stayed for an hour or two, enjoying the waves, the big, big waves, chasing the seabirds and lying on the sand before the waters rhythmically devoured it.

Soon, it was time to head back to Guraidhoo, the second stop in our journey. It is our fourth day in this island country, Jes and I.

A few days ago, we woke up in the Maldivian capital of Male, to the sound of birds chirping outside the window of room 402, our temporary home in this Muslim country of only 393,500 people.

I had my first glimpse of the city that morning, while sitting on the rattan chair of our fourth floor balcony.

I could see my reflection from the window of the building right across us, the distance was just a little longer than arm's length. No kidding.

The streets are narrow, so narrow that cars have to fold their side mirrors when they pass by; the buildings are pastel colored, mostly cream and faded yellow. For a second I thought I woke up in Lisbon, as I did one morning in the April of 2011, because of hints of Portuguese architecture. This is not a surprise, with the island colonized by Portugal many lifetimes ago.

The morning sun is out, the air is gentle. It is a quiet perfect morning, with the smell of brewed coffee wafting in the air and restless pigeons dancing outside our window, far from what I had imagined the night before.

Evening had already descended by the time our plane from Singapore touched down the runway of Ibrahim Nasir International Airport. In the dark, I could not see the paradise that people say Maldives is even as I squinted my eyes many times over,

On the contrary, I felt like a war refugee traveling in the dead of night on a ferry with about a hundred more passengers to a far-away place. There was nothing but darkness and the roar of the ferry's engines.

But the far-away place I imagined turned out to be just ten minutes away, the capital of Male, a quaint city littered with curio shops and filled with Maldivians who are as warm and laid-back as islanders can be.

They don't fake hospitality, not these men and women. There's no extra effort to make you feel at home, just genuine courtesy, sincere smiles and a ready hand to help if they can.

The Maldivian women are in their garbs and veil the whole time, seemingly unmindful of the heat on warm afternoons, though they are used to foreigners strolling the city in their colorful beach wears and wide brim hats. 

There is a pristine white mosque, with a golden dome, casting shadows on the sand; its crescent moon glistening in the afternoon sun. By the port, there is a market of vegetables, fruits and fish with mostly male vendors. The fishermen are busy unloading their catch and so are the traders, with their goods from nearby Singapore or Sri Lanka.

On our last afternoon in Male, we were swept by a big crowd marching on the streets of the city, waving flags of India and Maldives and shouting in the sweltering heat: "India - Maldives Friendship Day!"

We trailed the crowd, turning left, right and left again when the marchers did. They shouted in their revelry as they waved their orange and red flags. Music blared, too from their mobile speakers. It's as if we stepped inside a Bollywood movie, with Indian music reverberating in the air.

By the time the march ended and the crowd dispersed, we found ourselves in another huge gathering, this time by the city's Artificial Beach, the paradise of the locals, where Muslim men and women, young and old are whiling their time away swimming in this crowded beach. The women are in shirts or shorts or modest swimwear; two-piece bathing suits are not allowed.

Here, there is a rally against Israel's attacks on the Gaza strip. Songs and shouts blared from the loud speakers; stop the attacks they say, the children are dying, the women are crying, the men are disappearing.

We sat in the nearest cafe we could find after all the revelry and the chaos. Our legs were aching. We were so tired we longed for ice cold pale beer but we were in the wrong country to be dreaming of beer, malt or spirits. And so in this cafe overlooking the city, we settled instead for "mocktails," drinks that looked and tasted like cocktail concoctions but minus the alcohol.

Jes ordered Maldives' version of mojito, which looked every bit like it but minus the punch, of course. It's sort of like getting drunk psychologically.

In the darkness, we walked back to our room, there are men huddled together in the park; some women, too.

The next day, we packed our stuff and prepared to leave for yet another island but not before having lunch in a local eatery where I had basmati rice and curried gizzard, it's so authentic, the taste still lingers. Ibrahim, a local photographer, took us to this place.

We went to the port at 2:30 in the afternoon and at that exact moment we arrived at the pier, the ferry that was supposed to take us to Gurhaidoo, just left dock.

With our heavy backpacks on our shoulders, we stood there, under the scorching sun, watching the boat move farther and farther away from us.

But this slight delay would be forgotten as we soon found ourselves on another ferry to Guraidhoo.

Two men with a wheel burrow for our heavy bags welcomed us at the dock. This quaint little island is now our new temporary home, a paradise of a place and truly the quintessential islander's life.

For days, we roamed the island. Many times, we got lost in the labyrinth of single-storey homes, shops and tall coconut trees. We saw souvenir shops and the locals who sat idly outside their homes. This is what island life is -- time stops here or it moves at a snail's pace, if it moves at all.

In the evening, the sound of hypnotic Muslim prayers cuts through the silence. In the mornings, early, early mornings, the women pick up the trash while their husbands go away to catch some fish or to work in nearby islands.

The last stop in our Maldives journey is the Holiday Inn Island resort in Kandooma, a very short boat ride from Guraidhoo but a strikingly different paradise.

The resort sits on one whole island and each part has a different story to tell. Tall coconut trees line the white sand beach. Surfers are riding the waves on one part while Korean women in their flowery hats are taking selfies outside the seafront villas.

Jes and I spent our last afternoon just swimming and chasing the kaleidoscope of underwater life before we headed back to our villa.

Ours is a garden villa with a tiny porch facing a giant Balete Tree. There is a hammock and a blue green day bed on this cozy area. Here, we sipped the $40 dollar Tiger beer we painstakingly bought from the minibar, our first alcoholic drink since leaving Manila. In private resorts such as these, alcoholic drinks are available but for a very high price.

The bathroom is total luxury, with black and white tiles and a tub. There's no roof above, so at night, one can take a bath under the stars or simply spend hours in the warm tub while listening to the crickets and the rest of the nocturnal world.

On our last day, before boarding our flight, we stood outside the airport, by the wooden plank overlooking the Maldivian sea, watching the crimson sun slowly disappear beneath the horizon. The sky is a palette of blue, violet and orange, nothing I've seen before here or elsewhere, or even in my dreams.

The image rushes in, seeps through the veins and stays for good. And so we are still there, right there, frozen in the moment by the edge of the wooden plank, with the sound of the waves wafting in the afternoon air, a fitting ending to our visceral journey inside the magic of Maldives.



Photos by me

Postcards from Maldives

Travel only with thy equals or thy betters; if there are none, travel alone. - The Dhammapada

A week before Maldives:

Jes: Alis tayo next week...

me: tara, sa Bali. 

Jes: Hindi, sa Maldives.

at the plaza in Male. Photo by me.

on a ferry to Guraidhoo. Photo by me

beautiful misty morning at Island Way. Photo by me

by the beach. Photo by me

Holiday Inn island resort. Photo by me

perfect time for a swim. Photo by me

waiting for the speedboat to the airport. Photo by me

my ootd, Male. Photo by Jes Aznar

Sexy Beach, South Male. Selfie by Jes Aznar

The Sunny Side of Life: Maldives 2014

SOUTH MALE, Maldives - Here in Maldives, dubbed as the sunny side of life, you master the art of doing nothing. You just enjoy the sun, sea and the sand, the paradise that it is. 

In Today's Starweek: Life Among the Waves

Life Among the Waves

by IRIS C. GONZALES

MANILA, Philippines - From the air, I could see the tear drop-shaped island, a patch of green-covered earth, as our plane prepared to descend.

It seemed enticing enough – sun, sea and sand. But I would later discover that what was visible to the eye would pale in comparison to the experience that Siargao has to offer.

Nestled in the province of Surigao del Norte, roughly 800 kilometers southeast of Manila, Siargao is the country’s surfing capital and the world’s eighth top surfing destination. It is a welcome break from other beaches bursting with tourists.

It is still fresh and relatively raw, with an embrace that is warm and welcoming to any visitor.

There are a lot of foreigners in the island – Australians, Americans, Europeans – many of whom opted to relocate to the Philippines for the love of the waves or simply for love. Each foreigner here has a story to tell – some lured by the great escape, some smitten by sun-kissed island girls while others simply forgot to go home – wherever home may be. Some work in inns as cooks, managers or surfing instructors in exchange for food and a bed to sleep on.

From the airport, one can hire a motorcycle or tricycle to General Luna Street where most room accommodations can be found. One can choose from small inns, high-end hotels, bed-and-breakfasts or homes that welcome visitors at affordable rates.

To enjoy Siargao is to let it linger, like a sip of ice-cold beer or the surge of a shot of Scotch in one’s veins.

Life in the island is as laid back as island life can be. There’s no fake euphoria or manicured festivities, just pure no-fuss paradise living.

Time stops in Siargao. People don’t look at their timepieces, if they have any. Instead, they look at the sky and check where the wind is blowing to see if the waves will permit a good surf ride.

I roamed the island with documentary photographer Jes Aznar, with the six-star $800-a-night Dedon Island Resort as our first stop.

Neither one of us – or both of us combined – had $800 to spare for a night at Dedon, but a quick visit to the island resort allowed us a taste of luxury, albeit short lived.

Dedon, from the German outdoor designer furniture company of the same name, is a high-end intimate nine-villa resort designed by Jean-Marie Massaud and Daniel Pouzet. It has a gaming room, bar, swimming pool, a relaxing massage hut and a dining room where guests have a perfect view of the clear blue sky while feasting on a gastronomic adventure prepared by Chef Nico, who hails all the way from France.

Guests can walk around the island resort barefoot and lounge by any of Dedon’s signature furniture pieces. The perfect spot is the brown “nestrest” – a chair shaped like a piece of Kisses chocolate – hanging perfectly from a tree by the beach.

The villa is another paradise in itself. It is so inviting guests would not want to step out, if not for the lure of the waves or the embrace of the warm yellow sun.

Inside each intricately-designed villa, white curtains and drapery swing to the rhythm of the wind, like ballerinas dancing in harmony.

It is filled with signature Dedon home furniture pieces, such as the swingrest, a seductive hanging lounge chair. There is a canopy bed with the softest sheets.

The gem inside is the walk-in shower, with the shower itself positioned in a way that water rains down on a cradle of pebbles.

Guests who wish to just lounge around the island resort have the option to experience deep-tissue massage in a candle-lit cozy hut, at the hands of a masseur who came all the way from Spain.

Aside from Dedon, there are other places to stay such as Buddha Bar or The Board Walk at Cloud 9.

The Board Walk at Cloud 9, a no-frills inn, is perfectly situated on the famed Cloud 9 spot, one of the best known surfing waves in the world because of its thick, froth-like hollow tubes. It is the site of the annual Siargao international surfing competition.

According to Wikipedia, surfing enthusiasts discovered the wave in the late 1980s.

“It was named after a chocolate bar of the same name, and made famous by American photographer John Callahan, who published the first major feature on Siargao Island in the United States-based Surfer Magazine in March 1993, and hundreds of his photos in many other books and magazines since his first visit in 1992. Callahan has put the island on the international map and has drawn thousands of surfers and tourists to Siargao,” the article said.

Surfing enthusiasts, both beginners and veterans, locals and foreigners, usually wait for the perfect weather to hit the board.

In between waiting for the perfect combination of wind and wave, islanders just go to where their feet will take them, sometimes to another island, a boat ride, a far-away cliff, an inn to enjoy whisky, wine, beer or a hot cup of barako by the bar or from one home to another, feasting on food and booze.

We gate crashed a birthday party, thanks to Marlo Gallardo, a surfer we met along the way. The celebrant is an Australian who moved to the island many years ago, the same man I saw at the check-in counter at the airport in Mactan, Cebu on the way to Siargao. He came from Cebu where he runs a business that makes skateboards out of bamboo.

His fellow foreigners from all over the island joined the party and feasted on lechon, pasta, seafood casseroles, vegetable dishes and a wide array of desserts, prepared by his Filipina wife.

Guests danced under a round yellow moon and strobe lights, to the beat of music that blared from loud speakers.

Amidst the deafening music, Marlo tried to convince me to hit the board, saying that it is worth every second.

Marlo is a laid back guy with strands of sun-roasted hair falling on his tanned shoulders, without a care in the world except for the thrill of surfing.

Like many other men and women who chose to live in the island, he was once just an ordinary visitor who hit a rented board. It was love at first sight, he confesses. He boarded the plane back home only to tender his resignation from an eight-to-five office job.

Now, Marlo spends his time enjoying the waves as they swoosh and splash in all shapes and sizes. He doesn’t need money or a high-paying job, he says. He just needs to be close to the water so he can hit the waves anytime. It is a paradise truly his own, and there is an unbelievable high, he enthuses.

“You just have to try it. You have nothing to lose,” Marlo says with a dream-like gaze.

I give in and on my last day in Siargao, I rented a yellow surfboard. I was promised it would be easy. 

And I believed him. After all, I know how to bike, skateboard, rollerskate, ice skate and even do the stand-up jet-ski. In short, I know how to balance. But surfing was a totally different experience.

First try = splash. Second try = splash. Third try = splash... I lost count of the number of attempts.

And then, miracle of miracles, it happens. For several fleeting moments, I succeed. I will never forget the first time.

There it goes...the world freezes and time stops. There is nothing but blue water, splashing waves and 

my 100-pound heart and soul on a surfboard, riding the waves.

Ah, truly a dharma of sorts...here in a paradise of an island called Siargao.

Photos by the author, Marlo and last photo is by Jes Aznar

Nana Buxani on Documentary Photography

Nana Buxani appears on Jes Aznar's Pitikan, sharing her experience as a documentary photographer.

 


Meanwhile, behind the scenes....

A Brave New Year

Thank you for the beauty of the year that was. May the new year be even better. I have faith in new beginnings, in reset buttons and fervent hopes. I wish for a better 2013, much better than last year and the year before it. I long for many more trips and journeys, with love and kisses backlighted by the setting sun. I wish for more words, gentle and steady, and the warmest hug, in and outside the hamster ball.

Of Tomorrows and End of the World Worries

In the cobblestone streets of Paris, a novelist stands in the dark. The clock strikes exactly twelve times and a car from the 20th century comes and transports the writer into the magical world of Hemingway, Fitzgerald and Gertrude Stein. It is Midnight in Paris and the journey back in time begins.

There are people often trapped in nostalgia, waxing sentimental over the better years of the past, of lost time and the glorious years of youth. The curses of nostalgia are often immortalized in movies and the best literary works.

But not me. I fuss about tomorrow. I worry sick of growing old. I desperately try to squeeze whatever I can do with my thirty plus life and imagine in my wildest imagination that tomorrow, I will be gone. I count the wrinkles on my face, and frown upon the fact that the lines are growing everywhere -- and in the process cause more and more lines to appear.

I check my bank account often and wonder where all the money I struggle to save everyday goes. I dream of the dreams I have yet to fulfill -- a children's story book, an in-depth story on child abuse victims and hell yeah, at least one marathon in this lifetime. No, I have no delusions of being Murakami, the great novelist who finished marathons here and there while doing novels here and there.

And there's the long bucket list of places to see: the south of France, Istanbul, Barcelona and Greece. Africa, too as well as The Great Wall of China.

I think about these trips and worry with urgency that I may no longer have the endurance to walk around a strange city for hours on end or to even see the ends of the earth. I say to myself I should have done more trips than I had done when I was younger. Hindsight really is always twenty-twenty.

Jes always tells me that it's not the end of the world, that waiting for the time to pass isn't a mortal sin.

Of course, it's tempting and comforting to live in the now, to not worry at all, to lie on one's back and to forget about the rest of the world. I do that when I am in a foreign land, thinking of nothing at all because the essence of traveling is exactly that - to take in everything the moment has to offer, no fretting over the future or looking back to the past.

But here at home, my days are spelled out from exactly 7:45 am to until whatever wee hour I am needed by a growing five year old. There's hardly time to pause and rest. I look at her growing up so fast and wonder, too where did the time go? 

In times like these, I can only dream of Einstein's Dreams where time is circular, or bending, or a nightingale trapped in a bell jar.

Written while while stuck in horrendous traffic on Friday, October 5. The world from Roxas Boulevard, Taft Avenue and Luneta were in a mad rush to go home but got stuck in the traffic all because Jesus Is Lord.