Friday February 19, 2009 8:05 a.m.

San Vicente, Palawan

Much better this morning. I had three bottles of beer with Jason last night instead of five (or was it six?). And I slept well and I have no hangover at all this morning. It wasn’t even Jason who got me to drink. I showed up at his place last night with a knapsack of beer. He doesn’t have a fridge, but he has a powerful freezer, and the beer came out of there ice ice cold. I stayed at his place chatting till 9:30 or 10:00. Then I drove back here, read for a few minutes, and went straight to sleep. This is the good life.

I had a great day yesterday. All the days here are great. Jason had invited me over for coffee and/or brunch, and around ten o’clock, I hopped on the motorcycle (I LOVE having that motorcycle) and drove over to his place. He had made a big pot of vegetable soup for himself and his two sons. They had already eaten and he spooned out a big bowl for me. We sat around talking for a while. I could tell that Jason was a little bit tired, too, after the night before. They were still in the middle of trying to get money wired over here, and Craig had gone to Roxas on his motorcycle to visit a Western Union outlet. He came back around noon and said that he hadn’t had any luck. They hadn’t managed to get a confirmation number of the wire transfer from their company in Arkansas, and they needed that number to get the money. The problem was twofold: time difference and “Load Na Ditto.”

The time difference is an obvious problem. When they tried to call from here it was already night in Texas and the office was closed. “Load Na Ditto” means, I believe, “Buy credit for your cell phone here.” “Load” is a very useful word in Tagalog. It is both a noun and a verb. You can “load” your phone, your bank account, or almost anything else. You can also buy a “load.” As with so many things in this part of the world, the local people have figured out a way to make money off it. I saw how they do it last night. They buy a large amount of credit on their own cell phone. Then they put up a sign in front of their house saying ‘Load Na Ditto.” You buy cell phone credit from them, and they transfer it from their cell phone to yours. I don’t think you can do that in other countries, but for some reason they can do that here. And they make a bit of profit on each transaction somehow. Jason ran into trouble because his cell phone didn’t have any credit left, and when he went out to buy a “load” he found that all the shops in his neighborhood were out. None of them had any credit on their phones that they could sell.

At some point, Jason suggested that we drive down to Paninigan and see whether his boat was ready. That was what I was waiting to hear and we roared off down the road. I love the drive to Paninigan. From Jason’s place we first have to drive back to San Vicente and then turn right down a second road. Paninigan is such a laid-back place. I love it there.

Jason had raced on ahead of me with his better suspension, and he was nowhere in sight when I arrived. However, I ran into Beck Beck and we chatted for a while on the street. Among other things, she told me that her son’s wife was going to Canada in a week. She was going to work in a restaurant. She was hoping that when I went back to Canada I could show her around and show her the ropes. I told Beck Beck that I likely wasn’t going to go back to Canada anytime soon. Then I asked her where her son’s wife was going to live in Canada. No surprisingly, she didn’t know. I’ve come across that again and again. People tell me that they have a relative in Canada or that a relative is going to Canada. And they don’t know where this person is going. You might think they are just making up a story to connect with me in some way, but I believe they honestly don’t know. Details just aren’t that important here.

I was pleased to hear that Jason’s boat was ready to go into the water. Everything was done. The new benches were in place. the new “masts” were built and the new canvas roof was in place. Jason wanted the roof raised quite a bit so that he could walk under it comfortably. The standard roofs are very low. The paint job was done. The engine was in place. All that remained was to get it into the water.

I thought getting it into the water was going to be a big deal and a big job. I also thought it would turn into one of those third world events that take hours and entail lots of chaos and confusion. Beck Beck was there on the beach with us, and when Jason asked her when we were going to put the boat in the water, she said “Now.” Her husband had gone to round up some men to pick up the boat and put it into the water. I assumed that “now” would end up meaning in five hours or tomorrow or next week. But in just a few minutes, men from the village started to trickle onto the beach and gather around the boat. Jason’s boat is a big monster, and I thought we’d need thirty or forty men at least to move it. In the end, just a dozen or so was enough. We didn’t really pick up the boat and carry it so much as just push it down the slope of the sand. And once the nose got in the water and started to float a bit, the rest was easy.

When that new boat in Nagtabon was completed, they had a big party. And I thought there would be a big party for Jason’s launch. However, all that happened was that Jason sprang for several bottles of rum, and the men scuttled off to get drunk. It was pretty cool, though. I was in there with the rest of them grabbing hold of an outrigger and pushing the boat along. It was exciting to see it finally floating along. They started up the engine and drove it around a bit. I had a feeling the engine was underpowered for the size of boat it was, and the men who drove it around seemed to feel the same thing. Jason is now in negotiations to buy a 4-cylinder diesel engine to put into it. I don’t know what kind of engine he has now. I was hoping there would be instant plans to take the boat into the ocean and do some island-hopping. Chances are Jason will take it out today and invite me along, but it’s possible he won’t go on the maiden voyage till later. I’m only here for a couple more days or even just one more day. He is here for the long-term, so he is in no hurry.

After the boat launch, we went back to Beck Beck’s store. Beck Beck gave Jason half a watermelon to eat, and I got a big chicken drumstick. They are very free with gifts like that. Then Jason went home to take a nap and I took the motorcycle back to Long Beach. I can’t get enough of driving on that beach.

The high tide and big waves of the last couple of days had completely transformed the beach. Most of the jellyfish were gone and the sand wasn’t nearly as hard, making driving a trickier proposition. The first two times I was out there, the sand was as hard and wide as a highway, and you could race along at speed. Now I had to be a bit more careful.

Halfway along the beach, I ran into a couple of foreigners. I’m not sure who was more surprised – me or them. They had arranged for a banca from Port Barton to take them to this beach, drop them off, and pick them up again at five o’clock. They had the sense that they were in the middle of total wilderness, and in a sense they were. They were the only people on fourteen kilometers of white sand – until I showed up on my motorcycle. They were very curious about where in the world I had come from.

They looked to be in their late twenties. The guy was from Estonia. He was tall and athletic and tanned a deep brown, though I think he had naturally dark skin to begin with. The girl was from the Czech Republic. I found myself envying this Estonian fellow very much. She was very friendly and intelligent and pretty and wearing nothing but a yellow bikini.

After I rode to the end of the beach and back, I lent them the motorcycle and the two of them drove off. They were gone for a very long time and I had a great swim in the ocean. There were no jellyfish at all and the waves were quite large. When they came back from their drive, they were babbling with happiness. It was the first time they had driven a motorcycle on a beach as well, and they had had a great time.

The day was pretty much over by then. All that remained was a shower to get the salt off my body, dinner at the canteen, a drive around some new roads around San Vicente, and then some beer at Jason’s place.

My drive was not without interest. I found lots of new roads to explore leading into the jungle around the town. On one road, I spotted an 8-foot snake sunning itself. It moved with lightning speed when I got too close. It made me look at the jungle with new respect now that I knew what kind of creatures lived in there.

Things were pretty relaxed at Jason’s place when I showed up. Jason had just finished making a spicy spaghetti sauce with chicken. I had already had dinner, but I had a bit of it. It was good. I’d brought out two loaves of bread the day before (they don’t have any good stores in their town of New Agutaya), but they had left them outside during the night and the dogs had eaten them. I brought two more loaves this time as well as the beer.

Jason was as full of stories as ever. He told one story about being drugged in Nicaragua. I’m hoping to get more of the story today. Jason, though a passionate Christian, is not above a good drunk and a night with hookers. One night in Nicaragua, he and his friend that he was traveling with went out and picked up some women. The women drugged them with roofies and robbed them. When Jason woke up, he said he was out of his mind with panic and anger and disorientation. He still had his pick-up truck and he tried to drive it, but he lost control and smashed into a store and put a woman in the hospital. He spent four days in a Nicaraguan jail and had to pay $25,000 in damages/bribes before they let him go. That’s a sample of the kinds of things that happen to Jason everywhere he goes. He is, as I said, larger than life.

He’s also a contradiction. He has traveled a lot. He has money. Yet, his knowledge of the world is very limited. He didn’t recognize the name Che Guevara. He knew nothing about the situation in North Korea. He had never heard of the Khmer Rouge and the Killing Fields. He just seemed to know very little about anything. All these things kept popping up in casual conversation, and he had to ask me to explain what they were.

I thought his son, Craig, had been all over the place as well. He certainly looks the part with a full head of dreadlocks. However, this trip to the Philippines is his first time to anywhere except the United States, Canada, and Mexico. He says that the Philippines is a thousand times better than Mexico.

I like Craig a lot. And I like Jason. He is certainly a great guy to spend time with. He opens up a lot of doors with his high energy. We’re not exactly kindred spirits, though. I can imagine a hundred ways in which we wouldn’t really get along. He really is something of a backwoods character, and it sounds like he has a violent temper. Not exactly open-minded either. He told another funny story last night. He said that he loved cowboy movies, and friends of his in the United States told him about this great cowboy movie called “Brokeback Mountain.” So he got together his family and some friends and they all went to see this great cowboy movie. Of course, just a few minutes into the movie you come to the love scene between the two men in the tent up in the mountains. Jason was horrified. He gathered up his whole family and marched out into the lobby and demanded to see the manager. He told the manager, “I brought my family to see a cowboy movie and it’s just about a couple of queers!” He asked for his money back, and he got two free tickets to the theater for everyone in his group. I told Jason that the director of “Brokeback Mountain” was Ang Lee from Taiwan. I didn’t go so far as to tell Jason that when I saw “Brokeback Mountain” I thought it was one of the better movies I’d seen in a long time. I don’t think Jason would have appreciated that.

Craig was going back to Roxas this morning, and I asked him if he would see if there were any cottages available at Coco-Loco this Saturday and Sunday. I was just thinking that it would be nice to do a bit of snorkeling before my trip ends. I’ve enjoyed my time in San Vicente immensely, but I wouldn’t mind rounding out my trip with a coral reef and some exotic fish.

 

 

 

 

Tags: Beck Beck, Canada, Load Na Ditto, Palawan Motorbike Trip, San Vicente