Thursday September 11, 2014
6:10 a.m. San Juan, Siquijor
Room 2, Casa Miranda

Yesterday turned out to not exactly like every other day. It was the type of day that only I ever seem to have. Everyone else would have had a lovely day at the beach. I turned that potentially pleasurable occasion into a seventy-kilometer triathlon event, a robbery, and a couple of hours in the company of the local police.

It started in what I guess I should say is a lucky fashion. I was getting ready for my bike trip to a beach I’d heard of – Kagusuan Beach. I decided to leave the 60mm macro lens on the camera and also take the 12mm wide angle. That should be enough for what was supposed to be a deserted beach. I had to rummage and fiddle quite a bit to make sure that I had the right lens cases, adapter rings, lens caps. And the circular polarizer. Not having the correct size polarizer filter is a major pain. Switching from lens to lens is overly complicated. I also made sure to pack some bandaids and sunscreen and a small towel and my mask and snorkel and enough water. I made sure I had good batteries in my bike’s headlight. I rigged a way to put my big map case on my front rack. It is usually wrapped around my sleeping bag, but with no sleeping bag, there is no convenient place to put it. Anyway, getting ready for this trip was like going to war. I faced a long and hard and very hot ride on my bike. Then I faced a potentially difficult climb down a long set of stairs down a cliff. And then, most important, I had to deal with security. How would I secure the bike at the top of the stairs? Or would I be able to carry the bike down to the bottom? How could I secure my pannier bag on the beach while I went into the water? I wanted to snorkel, but was there any reasonable way to do that? If I were even fifteen or twenty feet away from shore and someone came along the beach and just grabbed my pannier bag, there would be nothing I could do. I couldn’t get out of the water fast enough to catch them. I could only wave goodbye as all my valuables disappeared. And if I stuck my head under the water and started snorkeling and looking at fish, I’d be totally oblivious to thieves. So, I was thinking about security, and at the last minute I decided to take my main money belt and neck pouch containing my passport and money out of the pannier bag and leave it behind in the hotel room. The problem is that you can’t really trust anyone at your hotel either. The obvious solution is to just leave your valuables in your hotel room. But in some ways, the hotel room is the most dangerous place. The locks are a joke and there are a million keys floating around. Anyone working at the hotel can just go in and take what they want. So I tend to bring my most valuable things with me at all times. But a beach is a different animal. A beach is a dangerous place, so I took out my money belt and neck pouch and put it inside another pannier bag and locked it up. That turned out to be the only wise decision I made all day.

The day itself started off very well. The sun had appeared in blue, blue skies and through my polarizing sunglasses, the ocean was every shade of green, blue, and aquamarine. The views along the water with the sand and water and palm trees was stunning. I had a refrain of OMG going through my mind as I rode along.

Kagusuan beach was located eight or nine kilometers past the town of Lazi down some small coastal roads. A wiser person would have rented a motorcycle to get there. After all, how can you really enjoy a day at the beach after a brutal thirty-five-kilometer ride in a hot, hot sun to get there? But I was on my bike, and I first had to struggle through the long and steady four-kilometer climb over the hills separating San Juan and Lazi. It went faster than my first trip because I wasn’t stopping to look at things or have my feet nibbled on at the fish sauna. I’d had coffee and buns in my room when I’d woken up, and I stopped in Lazi for a solid breakfast. I found a nice little diner and had an order of rice, a meat dish, a vegetable dish, and a bowl of beans for less than $2. They also had a water dispenser and I knocked back seven large glasses of ice cold water. It was heavenly.

From Lazi, I faced another very long and difficult climb to reach the turn-off to the small coastal roads. I generally have trouble tracking down these out-of-the-way spots, but the stars aligned a bit and with the help of my map and some sleuthing, I figured out which road was the correct one, and I turned toward the ocean. I might have missed the next road completely, but by chance, my eyes caught an old and rusty sign nearly covered in leaves and branches. It pointed the way to Kagusuan beach, and I rode down the last narrow and jungle-lined road. It was closer to a path than a road. Apparently, there once was a type of beach resort here. That made sense since by all accounts the beach was one of if not THE most beautiful beach on the island. But they were hit hard by typhoons year after year and after one particularly destructive year, they just gave up and abandoned the place. Now all that remained was that rusty sign, this overgrown track, the shattered and graffiti-covered walls of a couple of old buildings, and the stone staircase.

I was very pleased to arrive at the stairs to Kagusuan beach with so little trouble. I had anticipated losing hours in the struggle, but I had ridden right there and found it without a problem. I struggled a bit when I got there, though. I had seen one old woman doing something in the bush long before at the turn-off to the backroads. After that, I had seen no one at all. The area was completely deserted. There were no farms, no villages, no houses, and no people at all. That might mean it would be safe to lock up my bicycle at the top of the stairs. Chances were low that anyone would even see my bicycle. But the flip side is that if someone did see my bicycle, they would have all the time and privacy in the world to strip it or to somehow smash open the padlock and take the whole thing. On this trip, I didn’t bring one of those massive hardened steel padlocks I bought for Ethiopia. I just have a regular padlock, and though it foils your average thief, it would not stand up very long to a concerted attack with a good hammer. And, of course, a bolt cutter would make short work of my cable. I attempted to carry my bike down the stone steps but soon gave up. It’s not that I couldn’t do it. I could and then I would be able to carry the bike back up, but it would have been very difficult and require a huge physical effort. These stairs were no joke. I’d just finished a hard ride over the mountains, and my legs were a bit shaky and I was drenched in sweat. I already felt a bit silly having worked so hard for a pleasure outing at the beach. It felt sillier to then carry my heavy bike down that cliff. I decided to take a chance and lock up my bike at the top. I tried to find a hidden spot behind the remains of the buildings, but there was nothing there to lock the bike to. I had no choice but to lock the bike up out in the open next to the cement poles of the stairs. One funny thing is that every time I lock up the bike somewhere, I now think about how valuable the pedals are and how easy they are to remove. I had to buy those new pedals in Cebu, and they cost more than most brand new bikes in the Philippines. That’s pretty crazy. And they come off with a few simple turns of a big Allen wrench. That’s great for bike maintenance and disassembly, but it’s not great for security. At least the old pedals were very hard to get off. You’d need a big 15-mm pedal wrench to do it. And most people wouldn’t think to steal pedals anyway. But with my new pedals, some random dude with a tool kit could take off my pedals in seconds and walk away with the price of a brand new bike.

Leaving my bike there was even more complicated than that. I had three full water bottles on the bike, and I had to remove those and put them in my pannier bag. Someone would surely steal them if I left them on the bike. I also had to remove the map and bungee cords from the front rack. And, of course, I had to remove the Cateye computer. Even doing all that, I was still leaving the compass on the bike, and I keep expecting to return to the bike to find that someone had cut the zip ties and taken it. And let’s not forget about the Incredible Hulk. I still have the Hulk mounted on the handlebar stem. I get inspiration from his huge muscles and facial grimace as I power my way up these mountains. The point is that just leaving my bicycle anywhere is a complicated business and I have trouble just mentally keeping it together. My mind is already full of all the preparations for just a day on the road in the tropics, and then a beach trip, and then the photography, and then security, and I’m constantly recharging batteries. Then there is thoughts of food and water for the day. I find I’m constantly losing focus. I simply can’t keep everything straight in my head. It’s like everything I do has gone one step too far in terms of complications. For example, I keep removing the Cateye computer, but then I forget where in my pannier bag I put it. Which of the thousand pockets did it end up in this time? So I keep thinking I lost it or it was stolen when I’ve just misplaced it. It seems like five or six times a day, I experience a sudden panic attack when I think something has been stolen. My heart suddenly surges and beats like crazy and I fumble through my bags looking for something. I have dreams about theft all the time. Over and over, I have long dreams about returning to find my bicycle or all my pannier bags stolen. I never experienced this kind of anxiety before. It’s made worse in a way by the Internet and online banking. I now worry about my debit cards and credit cards and passwords and numbers. I feel at risk 24 hours a day, and I never had that feeling before. As I said, every aspect of my life seems to be just that little bit more complicated and it has amounted to altogether too much.

These were my thoughts as I walked down the stairs to the beach, and then those thoughts we instantly obliterated by the beauty I found at the bottom. It took my breath away. I’ve seen a lot of beautiful beaches, and this one could easily be the most beautiful I had ever seen. It was stunning. Gorgeous white pebbly sand, limestone rock outcroppings and boulders, hidden little coves, an ocean so blue it hurt your eyes. It hardly seemed real. How could a place this beautiful be sitting right in front of me and be completely deserted? I was the only living soul anywhere in sight. (Whether I was truly the only living soul present is open for debate, as we shall see.)

I reacted to the beauty as I always do – I broke out the camera. I used the 60mm first, since it was mounted on the camera body, and I walked the full length of the beach from end to end snapping pictures – trying to frame up the limestone outcroppings and boulders in a pleasing fashion. Then I stopped and switched to the 12mm lens. That was a major chore. I thought, for the millionth time, that I really should have two camera bodies so that I could have two lenses mounted at all times. Making the switch out in the open on a hot sandy beach is a difficult and dangerous operation. It feels like it is just a matter of time before I drop a lens and smash it or drop the camera and fill the interior with sand. I have a system for this and I go about it methodically, but it is still difficult to do, particularly when you start throwing filters and adapter rings into the mix. I did it this time without disaster, and I walked back along the beach snapping away with the 12mm lens. I had the polarizer on the lens now and perhaps I overdid it a bit. Who’s to say? It’s a weird thing because my sunglasses are extremely good and they have polarized lenses. So what I take pictures of is exactly what I see – the brilliant blues and greens and the clear glass-like water. But that is not what an ordinary person would see. It would still be a heartbreakingly beautiful spot, but the water, for example, would not be transparent. Light bounces off the water and obscures the view underneath. The filter removes that light and gives my eyes and camera access to what is under the water. The same thing goes for the blue sky, the white clouds, and the green trees. That blue and white and green is there in reality. It is simply obscured and hazed over by the light bouncing around and getting in the way. The filter removes that annoying light and reveals the pure light underneath. That image is really there, so the pictures I took are not fake. They were not Photoshopped to enhance the colors. The filter removes polarized light to reveal what is truly there. Still, it’s an interesting fact that what I see with my high-tech sunglasses and camera is not the same thing as what the locals see with their bare eyes. This then begs the question (in my mind anyway) of what animals see. Who knows what a dog, cat, bullock, goat, or chicken sees with their eyes and brain? They might see a completely different world – a more beautiful one still.

After my walks with my camera, I set about getting organized for a swim, and this is when the story starts to get a bit complicated and perhaps murky. It’s also when I start to make mistakes. I realize now what my biggest mistake was, and it is an understandable mistake. My mistake was that I thought I was alone. There was no one else on the beach and the beach was wide open and clear. No one could approach from any direction without being visible. So I had a choice to make in terms of my pannier bag. I could put it right out in the open on the sand near the water. It would be the closest to me, but it would also be visible to everyone. Or I could put it back among the rocks near the cliff edge – still visible to me but hidden more or less from anyone else. That appeared to me to be the wiser choice. I would stay in the water so that I could see my pannier bag, but it would be largely hidden from everyone else.

I found a convenient spot and I set about thief-proofing my bag. This was complicated, too. I had to remove all the objects from the pockets – my sunglasses, my flashlight, my regular glasses, my pocket camera, and put them in the main compartment. Then I had to remove the outside pouch (it is held in place by Velcro) and put it inside the main compartment as well. Then I secured the padlock through the main compartment zippers and hung the key around my neck – where it always is. Then I draped my bright yellow tank top over the pannier bag along with my small hand towel. Then into the water I went.

One of the many wrinkles appeared while I was doing this. I was startled to find an older foreign man walk past me on the beach. I greeted him happily – hoping to share some of the beauty of the beach with him – but he kind of just grunted at me and kept walking. I learned later that he wasn’t entirely unfriendly. He just happened to be a 60-something Italian man who spoke next to no English. He walked down to the next cove over and went into the water.

I took my snorkel and mask and went into the water in my cove near my pannier bag. For about a minute, I tried to snorkel, but it was impossible. I was far too paranoid about my pannier bag sitting there in the rocks. As soon as I put my head under the water, I became worried and had to pop my head back up to look around. I quickly gave up the effort and just paddled around in the water with my head above water so that I could see. Even then, I wasn’t entirely comfortable. I hated facing out to sea. I ended up floating on my back with my eyes directed toward the shore. While doing so, I noticed that the Italian man in the next cove over kept staring at me. I glanced in his direction a few times, and every single time, his view was locked onto me. He seemed to be staring at me and never looking away. It was kind of weird, and I just assumed he was another of these half-insane ex-pat foreigners. It ended up annoying me a little bit, but I didn’t think about it beyond that.

I enjoyed my swim immensely, I have to say. You can’t imagine how wonderful it was to just float in that crystal clear water with that beauty around. I didn’t mind not being able to snorkel. I think to find interesting fish, I’d have had to go far out from shore to the edge of the coral reef, and I just couldn’t do that, so I never thought about it. But just being there in that place on that beautiful sunny day was wonderful.

After a time, I went back to shore and sat on a driftwood log and enjoyed the setting. I went in and out of the water a few times, and then I made my second big mistake. I went back to my pannier bag to get out my sunglasses. I unlocked the padlock and removed the sunglasses, but then I neglected to lock it again. I zipped the pannier bag closed, but since I was sitting just ten feet away on a log and there was no one around but the crazy Italian man, I didn’t lock it up again. It’s one thing to be security-conscious, but it eventually becomes overwhelming. You have to think about your belongings ALL the time. It’s stressful and exhausting. You get to the point when you wish you were inside an Ironman suit and could finally relax – totally protected and able to blast away anyone with a tank missile. Either that, or you could go out into the world naked and have nothing for anyone to steal. Just wear nothing and carry nothing and sleep in ditches. Then you could finally be free of worry.

Now enters the third mistake. I was sitting there on the log when a third foreigner showed up. I waved at him and he waved back and came over for a chat. He was a young, very fit and muscled and very friendly guy from New Zealand. My log happened to be at the front of a very large limestone boulder and my pannier bag was kind to the side of this boulder. To be polite, I got up and walked toward this guy as he walked toward me. We met sort of in the middle and we chatted for a few minutes. The point is that by walking across the front of the boulder, I no longer had a line of sight on my pannier bag and the main compartment was unlocked. I didn’t really think about it at all. I was enjoying my chat with this guy too much, and I was only a few feet away from the pannier bag anyway.

After chatting for a few minutes (we actually talked about theft and security on beaches for a little bit), the guy from New Zealand decided to go in for a swim. He ran and dove into the water, and I walked around the boulder. To my horror, my pannier bag was now completely open and the Velcro pouch was now on top – also zipped open – and my wallet was open and sitting right on top of the pile. In the few minutes that my pannier bag had been out of my sight around the boulder, someone had robbed me.

It was a good news, bad news type of situation and it took me a long time to process what had happened and begin to make sense of it. It’s weird that I think of myself as a man of normal intelligence and one that is up to challenges and difficulties. Yet, whenever I am faced with a sudden challenge, I react poorly. I can only assume that I’m not nearly as intelligent and capable as I think I am. Witness my utter stupidity in Tacloban when super typhoon Yolanda was bearing down on the place. Now after being robbed in paradise on Kagusuan beach, my only response is to take stock of what had been stolen and then pack up and get out of there. I wasn’t thinking clearly at all.

I made sudden conclusions about what had happened. The guy from New Zealand had actually mentioned that there was a beach on Siquijor where young boys hide up in the trees and wait for dumb foreigners to leave their bags on the sand. They jump down out of the trees and run off with the bags. With that on my mind as I stared down at my open wallet and open pannier bag, I jumped to the conclusion that some boys or men had been hiding in the jungle up the cliff this entire time and had been watching me and waiting for their chance. When I walked around the boulder, they came out from the bush stole my money and then disappeared back into the jungle. If this is what happened, then there was nothing I could do. My money was gone. I didn’t even really think about attempts to go after the thief or recover anything. All I could really feel was relief because all my other valuables – my cameras, lenses, memory cards, MP3 players, tools, glasses, camera batteries, bike computer, bike headlight, snorkel, mask, map case, bicycle gloves, padlocks, keys, compass, and the pannier bag itself – were still there. Even my wallet was still there, and, strangest of all, not all the money had been stolen. I had had about 2,380 pesos in the wallet. The thief had taken the 2,000 pesos (about $50) in 1,000-peso notes, and left the 380 pesos in small bills. Then he’d tossed the wallet down and left. It was a very polite thief, I thought. I didn’t think it through at the time as to why a thief would behave like this. I was just extremely grateful that the thief hadn’t picked up my entire pannier bag and run off with it. The value of the contents and pannier bag amounted to sixty times or more the value of the money, not to mention the hassle (impossibility, really) of replacing all those items. My two MP3 players are not extremely valuable by themselves, but they each contained a 32-gigabyte memory card filled with thousands of downloaded podcasts representing untold hours downloading in Internet cafes. The pannier bag itself is essential to my style of travel on the bike. Without it, I’d be screwed. And I’m not about to go down to the local sari-sari store and pick up another one. There isn’t another one in the entire country. And the bicycle tools and bike pump and on and on. Of course, my main concern was the camera and the lenses. Losing those would have been a disaster. I’m sighing with relief even now as I stare at my pannier bag sitting here safely on the floor at my feet, and I wonder how I would feel if it had been stolen with all its contents.

When I saw my open pannier bag and my open wallet sitting on top, the first thing I did was check my wallet. I noted that the 2,000 pesos were missing. Then I dove into the pannier bag with my hands and was relieved (and surprised) to feel the familiar shape of the camera and lens cases. I quickly went through the rest of the pannier bag and noted with increasing relief that everything else was still there, even my little Canon point-and-shoot camera. Once I’d established what was missing, I ran out to the water and shouted to the guy from New Zealand that I had just been robbed. He came out of the water instantly and we traded thoughts on what had happened. It seemed pretty clear that even though I thought I was alone on the beach, someone had been watching me the entire time. It was so strange that this person knew exactly where to go to get at my wallet. It was inside the bottom zippered compartment of a folding set of pouches that was then pushed down inside the pannier bag underneath all the other stuff. The thief got at that wallet in an extremely short amount of time. How in the world did he know where to go? At no time had I removed my wallet and put it there. So even if someone were watching me, they would have no idea where to look in my jumbled pannier bag to find it. That was a mystery – the precise nature of the theft. We speculated that there was likely a gang at work and that I had been spotted cycling toward the beach and phone calls had been made (on cell phones, of course) and preparations had been made. Someone or several someones were then in the bush on the cliff waiting for their chance. Whatever happened, neither of us wanted to hang around after that. The New Zealand guy was worried about his motorcycle up at the top of the stairs and I was suddenly very worried about my bicycle. I packed up my pannier bag as quickly as I could and we walked back to the stone steps and climbed up. He was relieved to find his motorcycle still there, and I was even more relieved to find my bicycle still there and all in one piece – no missing wheels, pedals, or anything else.

We talked a bit more about what had happened, and I kept thinking if there had been anything else of value in the wallet. This was more of the good news, bad news theme. It was bad news I had been robbed, but it was good news that the thief had taken only the 2,000 pesos. He’d left not only everything else but even 380 pesos so that I could buy food and water and such things on my long ride back to San Juan. It was bad news that a thief had gotten to my wallet and stolen money, but it was good news that just recently in Cebu, I had thrown away my aging wallet and purchased a replacement. In making the transfer, I had slimmed down the contents of the wallet and taken out everything of value except for the money. So I had lost no ID or bank cards. It was bad news that I’d been robbed, but it was VERY good news that just that morning, it had occurred to me to remove my money belt and passport pouch from the pannier bag and leave it in my hotel room. Imagine the worst case scenario – my entire pannier bag stolen containing both cameras, two lenses, all the other stuff, plus my passport, traveller’s cheques, credit card, and emergency cash (not to mention vaccination booklet and no end of other important things). Had I lost all of that, my life would be very different this morning. I doubt I’d be sitting here drinking coffee and munching on some delicious bread. Maybe, after getting a new passport, I’d book a flight back to Canada and find a nice quiet job as a greeter at WalMart and live out my days not in a constant state of fear.

I should give props to this young fellow from New Zealand, He was worried about the safety of his motorcycle, but he was much more concerned for my welfare. He offered to give me some money so that I could at least buy water and make it back to my hotel in San Juan. He asked me over and over again if there was anything he could do. And he offered to help me scour the area and look for the thief. Luckily, I still had the 380 pesos, so I was not completely helpless. Even so, I didn’t need any money to ride back to the hotel. I thanked him for his offers and help and said that I was fine. And in a way, I really was. I said earlier that I don’t seem to react well in emergency situations. But at the same time, I don’t react poorly. I have a strong “what’s done is done” attitude. I wasn’t angry or upset or distraught in any way. Even when I tripped in Tacloban after the typhoon and smashed my camera and lens and cut open my face, I didn’t go crazy. I just sat there with blood pouring down my face and thought, “Well, that just happened.” And after this theft, I was equally calm. I’d lost 2,000 pesos and nearly lost everything, but it’s not like screaming and yelling and getting angry would accomplish anything. It doesn’t even occur to me to react that way.

However, saying all that, I do think I would benefit from a little bit of crazy emotion. I say that because of what happened next. I was standing there chatting with the guy from New Zealand when I was surprised to see the older man from Italy suddenly emerge at the top of the stone stairs. I was surprised because I had completely forgotten about him. Totally and utterly. A normal response upon discovering the theft would have been to go over to the next cove and talk to him and ask if he had seen anyone or anything unusual. But I forgot that he was on the beach. When I saw him at the top of the stairs, I approached him and told him what had happened. His English was extremely poor, but he said that he had seen a young boy or young man wearing a blue shirt near my pannier bag. He didn’t even know the English word for blue and said something like “azule”. I assumed it was the Italian word for blue, and I suggested that and he agreed that it had been a blue shirt. This Italian man also said that he, too, had once been robbed on this beach. He had come out of the water to find everything gone – including his clothes. I got the impression that this man was a long-term resident of Siquijor. He was certainly not dressed like a tourist and he did not behave like one. He seemed to come to the beach for a swim as something that he did several times a week if not every day. Anyway, there was nothing else to say, and he got on his motorcycle and drove away. Then the guy from New Zealand drove away. I was in the middle of putting my pannier bag back on my unlocked bicycle when I finally started to think a little bit more clearly and slow down. Why not look around a little bit? Why just give up on my 2,000 pesos and assume it was lost and there was nothing I could do? I had made a lot of quick assumptions – that a gang of thieves had tracked me and emerged from the bush to steal my money and then faded away. The cliff was extremely steep and covered in thick jungle, but I figured there must be trails there and the locals would know the trails and have an escape route all planned out. But was this true? I really had no idea. So I took the time to lock up my bicycle again, and I started exploring the top of the cliffs. There was a trail of sorts behind the abandoned buildings and I went down those as far as I could. They were heavily overgrown, and I got nothing for my trouble but a series of long gashes along my calves and hands. I didn’t even know how badly I was cut until I fought my way back out and saw the blood pouring down my arm and legs. If a thief had gone down that trail, they were much stronger than I.

I then went down the stairs and back to the beach. I didn’t have a clear idea of the point of this, but I thought it was worth a shot. For all I knew, the thieves had been hiding in the jungle the whole time and had now emerged and were celebrating on the sand and dividing up my money. With this in mind, I did some silly things. I took off my neon yellow tank top so that I wouldn’t be visible. I also took out my Canon point-and-shoot camera. Even if I saw the thieves, there would be no way that I could catch them. But I might be able to take their picture and that would help the police locate them. I crept slowly along the edge of the cliff toward where my pannier bag had been, being careful not to step on the loose stones and make any noise. My sleuthing was all for naught, however, and the beach was just as deserted and empty as always. I scanned the jungle, looking for telltale eyes peering back at me through the leaves, but I saw nothing. I found some small paths leading through the boulders and up through the jungle. This seemed like the clear escape route for the thieves, and I tried to follow the paths myself, but it was practically impossible. The trails were far too steep and overgrown and my sandals were too loose on my feet to give me any kind of purchase. All I got for my trouble were more scratches and a couple of close calls as I nearly fell.

When I had given up and was about to climb back up the steps, I spotted a small Bangka with two men on board coming around the point and heading for the beach. The man in the front stood up several times and peered hard toward me. I got the impression that he was even using binoculars, and I started to wonder if this was the thief. I let them beach the Bangka and then I walked over to them. They were friendly guys and when I told them about the theft, they were very concerned and very apologetic. They felt bad that this had happened to me on Siquijor. When they learned that I had a bicycle at the top of the steps, they insisted on going with me to make sure that my bicycle was safe. When I finally left, they assured me that they would report the theft to their barangay captain and he would report it to the police. Up until that point, it hadn’t even occurred to me to go to the police. What could be the point? It’s not like they would throw up a dragnet and find the thief and get my money back.

I rode away rather despondent. I was now getting angry. But I wasn’t angry at the thief. Thieves I understand. I was angry at all the mistakes I had made. Mistake number one was going to a remote beach alone. However, that’s how I roll, so there was nothing I could do about that. Mistake number two was bringing 2,380 pesos to the beach with me. I didn’t need 50 pesos let alone 2,000 pesos. Why bring that much money with me? It was stupid.

Adding insult to injury, I reflected that three times in the past month, I had been standing in a store in Cebu holding a waterproof neck pouch in my hands. The idea is to use such a pouch when you go snorkeling. You simply put a bit of money and your hotel room key in that pouch, and away you go. You swim with that pouch around your neck, and your money is perfectly safe. Unfortunately, these pouches were designed for iPhones and such things and were very expensive. I couldn’t bring myself to part with 1,300 pesos for what was essentially a plastic bag with a string attached. But had I purchased such a bag, I’d now be 700 pesos ahead having avoided the theft.

Mistake number three was putting my pannier bag on the rocks close to the tree line and the cliff. I imagined I was alone on the beach. It never occurred to me that thieves could emerge from that jungle. Now I realize that thieves could be anywhere. The fact that you don’t see the thief doesn’t mean anything. He would be a poor thief if he was standing out in the open and you could see him. I should have put my pannier bag on the sand and out in the open.

Mistake number four was the worst mistake. And that was neglecting to relock the zipper on my pannier bag. That was what allowed the thief access to my wallet. Sure, I was standing just feet away from the pannier bag. But, as I’m well aware, that doesn’t mean anything. It only takes a minute for a theft occur. Even standing next to your bag doesn’t guarantee safety. Quiet hands can easily slip inside them even when you’re sitting in a café or market. The only protection is to carry nothing that you regret losing and locking everything up at all times. It’s a big pain to unlock that padlock every single time I want to get something out of the pannier bag, but it’s a habit that would have saved me $50. Why go to all the trouble of buying all those padlocks if I’m just going to leave the darn things unlocked? I spent a long time searching for a special set of padlocks that were light enough to carry yet strong. And, best of all, I got a set of five identical locks that can be opened with just one key. So I can lock all my pannier bags and open them all with just the key that is always around my neck. I had a great plan, but that plan was pointless if I don’t actually lock the locks.

Mistake number five was losing my line of sight on the pannier bags. I can almost be forgiven for that. I only left my pannier bag unlocked because I was sitting on a log just a few feet in front of it. Then I got distracted by the arrival of the friendly guy from New Zealand. Instead of thinking that I should secure my pannier bag, I got up and walked a few steps towards him. What could be the harm? The beach was empty. But that brief loss of focus was all it took. A quick chat with this guy and on the other side of the boulder, busy hands were making off with my money. I’m not sure if I can be forgiven for this mistake or not. I mean, come on, I was on what could be the most beautiful beach in the world on the most perfect day imaginable. It was a moment to be treasured and savored and lived. It was not a time to be living in a state of fear over theft. Yet, I paid the price for that. The price was not even close to what the price could have been, but I paid a price nonetheless. That 2,000 pesos was going to cover my hotel bill for my entire time on Siquijor, and now it is gone. And I might run out of cash and I’ll have to leave the island early to go find an ATM back in Dumaguete. I rode my bike to the beach because I enjoy riding my bike, but also because I didn’t want to spend 300 pesos a day to rent a motorcycle. But that 2,000 pesos could have bought me six days of motorcycle rental and I could have enjoyed my time on Siquijor much more. I still might have been robbed had I been on a motorcycle, but I don’t think so. On a motorcycle, I would have travelled much more lightly. I would not have needed the pannier bag and all the bike repair gear. And, more to the point, I would not have been nearly as tired or distracted. I was so focused on security for the bicycle and all that stuff that I just lost focus. To be honest, I was so worried about my bicycle being stolen that I did not enjoy my time on the beach nearly as much as I could have. This constant worry about theft is exhausting.

Now we get to mistake number six. And this might be the biggest mistake of all. I had totally and utterly forgotten about the Italian man and had not even for a second thought of him as a suspect. Yet, in retrospect, he was almost certainly the thief. Everything points to him. I mentioned that while we were in the water, he stared at me intently the entire time. He really seemed to be watching me. This doesn’t just occur to me now. I was very aware of it at the time and I kept wondering why this strange dude was staring at me so much. I concluded that he was a bit crazy.

Then the theft itself was so strange. Wouldn’t a Filipino, given the chance, have simply grabbed the whole pannier bag and run? Why would he take the time to open the bag and rummage through it until he found my wallet? And then why would he not just take the whole wallet? Why open it up and take only the cash? And, most important, why would he not take all the cash? Why leave 380 pesos behind?

All these facts point to a foreigner as being the thief. A foreigner – particularly a European – would recognize a pannier bag and be able to search through it quickly and understand where a wallet might be. A foreigner would also have a bizarre morality where they would take the bulk of the cash but leave enough behind so that I wouldn’t be left stranded. Finally, why take the money and not the far more valuable camera? Well, this Italian man could easily hide the money or just claim that it was his if he was discovered. How could anyone prove otherwise? But if I saw him walking around the beach or coming up the steps with my pannier bag or snapping pictures with my Olympus, I think I would recognize it. So he couldn’t take anything else – not even my wallet. He could only safely take the money. And he certainly had the opportunity. He could easily have walked over from his cove to mine, rummaged through my pannier bag, and then walked back. Finally, he seemed like a strange man, and he was dressed in quite old clothing. He did not look prosperous in any way, and I could easily see him needing some extra money.

Why didn’t I think of him when I discovered the theft? And when I saw him at the top of the steps, why didn’t it occur to me that he could be the thief? I had just jumped to the conclusion that a habitual Filipino thief had stalked me and was hiding in the bush and pounced when I wasn’t looking. But, really, that theory doesn’t make a lot of sense. The beach was a couple hundred meters long with a whole series of beautiful little coves separated by limestone boulders. If people were waiting in the jungle, how could they possibly know which cove I was going to select? They couldn’t, and based on my experience with the trails, it would be nearly impossible to move easily from cove to cove along the cliff and through the jungle. It was far too dense. And if, by chance, they had selected the right cove, how in the world did they get up the cliff along those old trails? I’m not saying it was impossible, but the long gashes along my calves attest to how difficult that ascent would be.

So, in retrospect, I’m almost fully convinced that the elderly Italian man had robbed me. Yet, I never suspected him for a second. Even when he told me that he had seen a young Filipino in a blue shirt, I took him entirely at his word. I just assumed it was the truth. And I was so convinced that finding the thief and recovering my money was an impossibility, that I didn’t even press him for a description of this suspected Filipino thief. I see now that a normal response would have been to ask him for more details and to even ask him for his own name and find out where he was staying in case I needed more information. I guess I’m too passive. I had already concluded that there was no hope of finding the thief. I should have at least whipped out my little camera and snapped a picture of the Italian man and the license plate on his motorcycle. But I didn’t.

When I finally left the beach area on my bicycle, I stopped at the little house at the end of the access road and spoke to the people there about the theft. I was being a bit smallminded in doing this. I pretended that I was trying to get information about any locally known thieves, but really I just wanted to punish them and make them feel bad. I had been robbed on their beach on their island by one of their countrymen (I assumed), and I wanted someone to blame. I wanted to make them feel bad.

I stopped at the next house, too, and I spoke with a very friendly woman with excellent English. Here, I made another mistake. I told her about the theft, and she instantly suggested going to the police in Maria. I told her that it was impossible on my bicycle. Maria was far away and I couldn’t go there and hope to return to San Juan. I had neither the strength in my legs nor time left in the day. She, however, said that she could call them for me. Looking back, I should have agreed to that. I know now that the police in Maria would have dispatched a vehicle to come to the beach and meet me at the scene of the crime. But I didn’t know that, and I assumed that contacting the police was a waste of time. If I had lost my camera, bicycle, and everything else, sure, I would have headed for the police. But no one was going to recover my 2,000 pesos. I also started to reflect on how complicated and implausible my story was. How could I possibly explain all this about my pannier bag and the padlock and being distracted by the guy from New Zealand and how the thief hadn’t even take my wallet or all of the money. What rational thief leaves you enough money to get home on? (A European thief, I now believe, but I didn’t think of that at the time.)

At least this woman had put the idea of the police in my head. Everyone said that the only police were in Maria, but when I got to Lazi, I ran into a well-dressed government employee type of man and I asked him if there was a police station there. He said there was and told me it was up by the church. I rode there, and sure enough, there was a police station. I locked up my bicycle – after going through the long process of removing everything of value and putting it all in my pannier bag – and went into the building.

I’m running out of steam here, so I don’t know if I can do this story justice. To be honest, given hours, I don’t think I could do it justice. Words simply fail me. It’s funny, but I keep hoping that I will be able to report glowingly on something that happens in the Philippines. Yet, I’m always critical. I wrote at length about everything that was wrong with the whale shark tour near Oslob. I wrote about the horrible and frustrating experience with GL Express and the boat to Siquijor. Now, I go to the police to report a theft, and if I write about it honestly, I can only make them sound like totally and utterly hopeless boobs – like going to the Three Stooges or the gang on Gilligan’s Island and asking them to solve the crime. I should be clear that in this respect I’m only talking about the police station in Lazi. I was later passed on to the police at Maria. Kagusuan beach is in their jurisdiction, and the police from Maria were the very picture of professionalism and efficiency and helpfulness. It was in Lazi – where I had my first impressions and where looney tunes lived.

I honestly don’t where to begin. I found a closed door into the one room where the police staff were hanging out. I was urged to just open the door and go in. I did so, and found myself absorbed into a party. I learned later that one of the men was having a birthday and he had recently been promoted. So they were celebrating, and half of them were drunk – constantly filling up their glasses with water and rum from a big bottle under the table. Right away I was told that there was nothing they could do for me. Kagusuan was outside their jurisdiction and I would have to go to Maria. That was about what I was expecting to hear – that the police could not or would not help me in any way – and I told them that I couldn’t go to Maria on my bicycle, and I got up to leave. But then the woman at the desk – the duty officer – stopped me and said that she would take my report. She got out a random sheet of blank paper and a pen and started asking me questions. I tried to answer her questions as best I could, but the drunk men were constantly interrupting and waving their drinks in my face and pouring more rum and trying to get me to join them and have a few drinks. The duty officer and the other women now started to go into hysterics as they asked me for details like my age, nationality, and marital status. That I was single and from Canada brought about jokes and laughter and loud screams as they competed amongst themselves as to which of them could marry me. The duty officer asked me for my full name and then my address in Canada. A man asked her why she wanted to know, and she said that was just interested. Maybe we could get married someday and she can come to Canada, and they all started shrieking and laughing. The shouting and laughter was so loud that I could barely hear the questions of the woman, and the drunk men were shouting other questions at me from other directions, and I had no idea who to listen to or who was just being chatty and who was asking an official question. My story was complicated and it was hard to get out all the details. I’d answered most of their questions, and then the birthday man suddenly got in my face and practically shouted things like “Why are you here?” “What are you doing?” “What do you want?” It seemed I was suddenly on trial. He had apparently missed the entire story about the theft and he started yelling the same questions that the others had already asked. The women tried to stop him and they all physically started slapping at each other and pushing each other around. It was total insanity. I’m used to informal and crazy behavior in officials in the Philippines, but this was beyond anything I had ever witnessed. Forget about being drunk on the job. What about practically forcing the victim of a theft to get drunk with you? I waved away the rum over and over and over again telling them that I still had to ride my bike over the mountains back to San Juan. I couldn’t do that drunk. But every time they refilled their glasses, they tried to force a drink on me again. I got the firm impression, also, that this atmosphere was not far off from a normal day. It was a birthday and a promotion day, but it seemed that a normal work day for them was simply to hang out in this office all day long laughing and joking and surfing the Internet. One woman told me as much directly. We were talking about her family members in Canada working as nurses and how hard they worked there. Here, in the Philippines, she said, they just hang out all day and have fun. She came out and told me this. It reminded me of that young boy I’d talked to the previous day who said that there were no jobs and that they just sat around and did nothing day after day. This same police officer told me that she had worked there for 16 years. In 4 more years, she would be eligible for early retirement. I guess then she can move on to doing nothing but laughing and joking at home.

One older man – the largest and fattest and perhaps drunkest of the bunch – was particularly confusing for me. I couldn’t follow his questions or what he was talking about most of the time. Yet, he seemed to hold the most official power. I guessed that he was the senior officer, and through talking to him later, I gathered what was really going on here. The point was that they were trying to get rid of me as an official complainant. If I insisted they take my report of this theft, it would go on their official record. It would look bad for them and their jurisdiction particularly since the theft had occurred to a foreign tourist and that there was no hope of ever catching the thief. It would remain forever an official unsolved crime. He was doing everything he could to keep my report from becoming official and going on his “blotter” as he kept saying. When he said “blotter”, he patted a big blue ledger (unopened) on the duty officer’s desk. If the theft went into that blotter, it would stain their record. As long as everything was written down on a random piece of paper and I was passed on to the police at Maria, then the whole thing could be ignored. Toss the paper in the garbage, and no one would have to worry about it or look bad.

Things got crazier and crazier over time. The duty officer had gone quiet, and I noticed that she had written out my statement in a narrative form. Now they were going to read the statement aloud to me so that I could confirm the accuracy of the details. The drunk birthday boy grabbed the paper and tried to read, but his English wasn’t up to the task. He kept making mistakes and I had no idea what he was saying and there were words he didn’t know. A woman beside him got fed up and took the paper away from him. She started to read and I heard phrases like “on or about the tenth of September” and “at approximately thirteen hundred and thirty hours an incident took place at or near.” I couldn’t really confirm much of anything because I could barely hear her over the laughter and jeers and jokes. In any event, people kept trying to snatch the paper away from her and read it themselves. There was more slapping and pushing amongst the officers. I could only look on in amazement. The situation was so extreme, I could only imagine there were hidden cameras and I was on the Philippine version of Candid Camera. This had to be a joke. The truly sad thing was that I knew it wasn’t. This was normal life.

I was looking for a way out of this insanity when I was told that the chief of police from Maria was on his way and I would have to stay to talk with him. I had mixed reactions to this. I didn’t mind meeting the chief of police from Maria or going to Maria and filling out an official report. But it was getting late in the day, and no matter how many times I explained it, people were not grasping that I still needed at least an hour and a half of daylight to get over the mountains and back to my hotel in San Juan. I don’t think anyone ever really heard anything I said. There were long stretches where I had actually told my story in detail and I repeated certain aspects many, many times, including my new suspicion that this elderly man from Italy could be the thief and that he was clearly a long-term resident of Siquijor. My idea was that he could probably be tracked down if not as a suspect at least as a witness. He was the only person to have seen anything on the beach – the young Filipino in a blue T-shirt. It was very funny, then, when much later, one of the officers I was speaking with most of the time suddenly said, “Maybe the Italy man stole your money!” It had just occurred to her and she was quite pleased with her deduction, totally oblivious to the fact that I’d said the same thing – loudly – half a dozen times already. I was still fighting off the bottle of rum all through this, and at least I now had the excuse of needing to be ready for the chief of police of Maria. The chief of police was driving all the way over here to speak to me, and I didn’t want to be drunk when he got here or be breathing liquor in his face. That hardly seemed polite or respectful or wise. The Lazi officers waved away my excuses. It doesn’t matter, they said. He can’t smell anything unless you breathe right in his face. And this officer got right in my face and breathed right on me to show me what I shouldn’t do. His breath smelled like a distillery – as did the whole room.

Luckily, some sanity and calm and professionalism, in the form of the police of Maria, came into the room. I don’t know if the guy I spoke with first was the chief of police. He seemed a bit too young and a bit informally dressed for that. However, he was well-dressed, sober, serious, concerned, and seemed 100% competent. He shook my hand and sat down and asked me for the details of my story. He listened intently and then asked me if I was willing to go with them back to the beach to show them where the theft occurred and to go to Maria to file an official report. I said that I was more than willing to do both. I just needed enough time to be able to cycle back to San Juan. I was hoping, deep down, that they would be able to throw my bike in the back of their police car and drive me back when our investigation was over.

I finally got out of the Lazi police station (police room, actually) after one last long exchange with the senior officer about his beloved blotter. His concern was all about saving face and reputation and his official record. To that end, he wanted to make it 100% clear that after this, I was NOT going to go to the Canadian embassy or to any other official body or make claims through an insurance company. He did not want the details of this event in his precious blotter, but he also did not want some high official coming back here and looking for information and finding no official record of anything. I lost count of the number of times and the number of different ways this officer asked me this question. He wanted firm assurance that I was there in his police room ONLY to give information. It was NOT official. I wanted nothing. I expected nothing. I would do nothing else. I would not follow up. No one else would follow up. I wanted nothing written down in his police blotter. I did my best to reassure him of this, and then most of the police officers present trooped out with me to watch as I got in the police SUV with the officers from Maria. We all waved and said our goodbyes and I was sent on my way. Even then I was thinking that losing $50 was a small price to pay for that experience. The beach was beautiful, sure, but I’ll probably forget about that beach soon enough. My time in the Lazi police station will surely never be forgotten, and after the events of typhoon Yolanda, will remain as one of the highlights of my time here.

It was such a change in atmosphere to get into the police SUV with the sober and serious officers from Maria. I didn’t realize it at first, but they had sent a complement of three to escort me – the professional guy I met first, a fresh-faced and intelligent man in a bit more official clothing, and a driver. Later, I found out that they had even sent out a fourth man on a motorcycle – an expert in that region who knew all the secret pathways in and out of Kagusuan beach. They were taking my report extremely seriously. I don’t think they had any hope of “solving the crime”, but they felt bad that this had happened to me and they wanted to impress on me that they were taking it seriously. They also were police officers, and this was their job. I respected that very much, though, in a way, their professionalism was almost as much over the top as the clownish behavior in the Lazi police station. I assume that a dozen tourists are robbed a month on Siquijor. How could it be otherwise? Therefore, it seemed excessive to assign the chief of police plus three other officers to me and to escort me all the way back to the beach. I wasn’t complaining, though. It was great fun to ride in the front of the SUV with a police escort up those steep hills and then down the coastal roads and then down the final track to the beach. The officers all got out and went with me down to the beach and I brought them to the exact cove and the very rock on which my pannier bag was perched when the theft occurred. I could even show them my footsteps in the sand where I was standing when the theft occurred – just a few feet away from my pannier bag but on the other side of the boulder. The officers pointed out the vague hints of trails going up the cliff, and they said that the thief or thieves were almost certainly hiding there and then made their escape that way. I tried to point the finger of suspicion at the Italian man, but that point never quite seemed to get through. An overused and clichéd word certainly, but it was quite surreal to be standing there on the sand reenacting the crime while the police officers took photographs from different directions. I noted with a smile that before the officer took the pictures, he spoke to the more senior officer, and this officer suddenly tucked in his shirt and made himself look neater and more respectable. All for the official record.

I was given plenty of time to show everything that happened and how it happened. I went over how nothing was taken but the 2,000 pesos and how my wallet was left open and sitting right on top of the pannier bag. I was trying to demonstrate how odd a theft it was if the thief was a Filipino. Wouldn’t a Filipino have simply taken, if not the pannier bag or the wallet itself, at least all the money inside it and perhaps the camera? Why such an odd theft? I was trying to lead them to suspect the Italian man. I pointed him out as the main suspect, figuring that at least he would be easier to locate. I wanted the satisfaction of the police tracking him down and at least questioning him. But the Maria police never seemed to think that way. They were focused on the trails and the cliff and jungle and local thieves. In a fantastic and almost unbelievable turn of events, they said that there was a known thief at Kagusuan beach. He was known as “the Sniper”. He would be their first suspect, but he was in jail at the moment being held on another crime. So it couldn’t have been him. How perfect is that? You couldn’t write a TV script better than that. A known thief called “The Sniper”? And he avoids suspicion because he was in custody at the time of the crime? It was too perfect. Where were those hidden cameras? When do I sign the release papers so that they can put this hilarious sequence on TV? That sounds ridiculous, but the whole episode was so ridiculous that I wouldn’t be entirely surprised if there was a sudden knock on my door here at Room 2 and I find the whole gang – including the Italian man and a film crew – standing there and laughing and explaining that it had all been a set-up and a joke.

After we visited the scene of the crime, there was little else to do. They had wanted me to go to the police station in Maria to complete the official report, but they understood the problem with the time and the rapidly approaching sunset. I hinted broadly that I could go with them and spend as long as they wanted if there was some kind of “taxi” to take me and my bicycle back to San Juan. They were quick on the uptake and knew I was referring to the police SUV, and they said that there wasn’t enough room to carry the bike. That was disappointing. I was pretty tired by that point, and I wasn’t looking forward to a race against the clock going back over the mountains.

We drove back the way we had come with the expert on his motorcycle pointing out the various paths to the beach from the road and staying behind to examine them. Our conversation moved on to other things and they told me about all the various waterfalls and other beautiful places there were to visit. Of course, they told me repeatedly that if I went to this or that place, I had to be careful of my belongings. They even kept saying that before I went to a known dangerous place like Kagusuan beach, I should have notified them. They would have assigned an officer to accompany me. I wasn’t quite sure what to make of that. They seemed perfectly serious, but with hundreds of tourists visiting Siquijor every month, you couldn’t really expect them to provide personal security for everyone who calls and asks for it.

This last bit is connected to one other angle to this experience – the blame the victim angle. My initial reluctance to go to the police was precisely this. In fact, I was already thinking that I wouldn’t bother to mention the theft to anyone. No good could come of it, and everyone would – whether they truly meant it that way or not – blame me. They would tell me that I should be more careful of my belongings. That I should be more careful when I go to the beach. That I should leave my valuables at the police station. The police in particular blamed not only me but also the owners of Casa Miranda and the barangay officials from nearby Minalulan. They said that they communicated with the resort owners all the time and told them that they should warn their guests against going to Kagusuan beach, that it is a dangerous place because the resort there was abandoned. But the resort owners fail to do this. They said that they told the barangay officials to safeguard that area for tourists, but they don’t do it. They said that they insisted that the access road be blocked, but people keep tearing down the barbed wire. And, of course, I was ultimately the one at fault for not being careful enough. I imagine that the vast majority of thefts and crimes here go unreported for the simple reason that people are too embarrassed to admit that they made mistakes and got robbed and that they don’t want to hear the long, long lectures about how they should be more careful – blame the victim.

Also from this point of view, I reflected that no good can come of my reporting the theft. Kagusuan beach is a wonderful place for all the reasons that the police think it is dangerous. It is remote and untouristed and unpoliced (not to mention fantastically beautiful). Because I reported the theft, the beach could even be closed off completely. I can see the police putting up barbed wire across the access road again and making it illegal to swim there. That would be a bad thing, and it reflects the process that is going on all over the world – the overreaction to every little crime and the addition of more and more safety and security procedures until the whole world turns into a prison cell. We’ll be safe, sure, but only when we stay inside our little cells behind high walls topped with barbed wire, too afraid to go outside.

I parted with the Maria officers back at the Lazi police station. I really could have used a trip to the bathroom and a chance to fill up even one water bottle (I was completely out of water), but I didn’t dare go back inside. I’m sure it would have taken me a long time to leave again, and I had barely enough time to make it back before dark.

The ride back over the mountain was hard after such a long day, but it went by uneventfully. I just put my head down and pedaled while pondering all the crazy things that had happened. I reflected mainly on all the mistakes I had made and where those mistakes had come from. I’ve noticed for a long time that I’m simply not as focused as I have been on other trips. I don’t seem to be engaged or paying attention. I’m drifting. I see things, but then I don’t act on them. And on top of that, I’m trying to lead a very complicated life – doing too many things at once – and each aspect of my life is overly complicated. My brain is simply overwhelmed with all the details. There’s enough to worry about just riding a bike around this part of the world, period. That could take all of your energy and mental focus. But I’m always thinking about other things and spending hours doing photography. The cycling and being overseas feels almost like an aside when it really should be the center of all my thoughts and efforts. That’s why I can sit there in Tacloban with a super typhoon heading my way and I just leave my bicycle down in the courtyard. Of course, I had zero way to predict that an eleven-foot near-tsunami would hit my hotel, but anyone with half a brain would have at least taken the bike inside and stored it safely in his room. I didn’t even do that. And anyone with half a brain wouldn’t leave an unlocked pannier bag just lying on a rock near a jungle cliff while he stands around chatting on the other side of a boulder. It’s so weird. I’ve trained myself fully in restaurants and Internet cafes and boats and such places. Over the years, I’ve developed a habit of keeping my bag locked and physically attached to my body. I know that it is impossible to be aware of your possessions at all times. Your only protection is to be physically attached to them. So why yesterday did I break that habit and just leave my pannier bag unguarded fifteen feet away from me? And why did I bring that much money to an empty beach anyway? At some level, I was aware of the money. But I didn’t worry about it. I knew I was going to bring my camera and an extra lens or two. That, plus the other gear, is worth thousands of dollars. So I already had extremely valuable items to worry about. The 2,000 pesos didn’t seem like a big deal. If I were going to the beach with nothing but my shorts, sandals, snorkel and mask, THEN I probably would have thought to bring just a hundred pesos to buy water and food for the day. Once I have thousands of dollars in gear and another fifteen hundred dollars worth of bicycle, then things get out of control. I never thought to worry about the money in my wallet. Dumb, dumb, dumb. So many mistakes. The big problem is that I don’t see myself not making more mistakes. I can’t seem to focus and come to grips with the details of life on the bicycle on the road. Even my ride back to San Juan was like that. The sun did eventually go down and I was faced with riding in the dark. I reached into the top pocket of my pannier bag and my heart started racing when I realized that my bike’s headlight was missing! That damn thief. He’d taken my money AND my headlight. What a nightmare. I’d come to the Philippines with one headlight that turned out to be far too big and heavy, and I got rid of it and bought another one. It fell apart. I had to buy another one – after much searching and effort. And now it was stolen. The thief probably just saw a flashlight. To me, it is more than that. It is a complicated light designed to go on my bike. Expensive and not easily replaced. I got back on my bike and start pedaling and cursing that thief. Then I realized that when I was on the beach, I had emptied all my pockets into the main compartment of the pannier bag. I had then put the sunglasses and other items back into the pockets, but I had missed the headlight. So it was probably still inside the main compartment. I got off the bike and opened up the main compartment and rummaged around and found it way at the bottom. But everything in there was so jumbled up from the craziness of the day, that things fell out and scattered around the ground in the dark. I had to use the light to find everything and put it back. But had I found everything? Where was my wallet? Sudden panic attack. Oh, here it is. Oh, no! The 60mm lens is gone. Panic attack. Oh, here it is. It was hidden underneath the snorkel mask. Then I start riding again, and I wonder if I zipped up all the pockets? Are things falling out? I have to stop and recheck all the pockets. Phew! They’re all closed. I have to look to see if everything is still there. But now I can’t remember what I had with me at the beginning of the day. Maybe other things are missing that I totally forgot I brought with me. And for that matter, what else was in my wallet that is missing? Am I SURE that I didn’t have my bank debit card in the wallet? My credit card? Was there other important information that I’m now missing and the thief now possesses? I have to change modes so often from cycling mode to Internet café mode to swimming mode to camping mode that I lose all track of what is where. Even now I’m sitting here and I’m not entirely sure of where my bicycle computer is. Did I leave it on the bike last night? Did I take if off? If so, where did I put it? Too many details all the time. I used to track this sort of thing smoothly and without a problem. But my life seems much more complex now or perhaps my brain is just suffering from some kind of overload.

I stopped off in San Juan to buy some bread and a can of corned beef for my spaghetti dinner. I also found a water dispensing machine and filled up my three bicycle water bottles to get me through the night. (I have to get water today.) Then I rode the final kilometer back to Casa Miranda. I popped my head into the main building to just tell them that the police might be dropping by. They said that they would come here to confer with me if they had any questions or had any new information. I suspected they would also lecture the owners of Casa Miranda for allowing their guests to go to such dangerous places as Kagusuan unescorted. As I feared, they wanted to hear the whole story and spent half an hour blaming me for the crime and telling me all the ways that I should be more careful. It’s interesting that no one ever blames the thief for being a bad person. That is just accepted. They blame the victim for being a victim. It seems that evil is understood and accepted with a smile. It’s natural. Dumbness – especially the dumbness of a white tourist in southeast Asia – the dumbness of a victim – is not so easily accepted. That deserves a lecture.

I cooked a spaghetti meal and tried to go through my gear to make sure nothing else was missing and that my version of events was accurate. I had a list of exactly how much money was in my money belt and how much in my wallet. I didn’t really need that list. I knew how much was in my wallet, but it was nice to see the figure written down in black and white and the date beside it to confirm that. My worst failing on this trip has certainly been a casual disregard for my money. I’ve been spending it like it I have an unlimited supply. I left Taiwan fully intending to keep a strict, strict, strict budget but somehow that never came to be. And with typhoons destroying bicycles, me tripping and destroying camera lenses, and thieves helping themselves to my money, my bank accounts have been shrinking much faster than they were supposed to.

Tags: bike, pannier bags, Philippines Bike Trip 2013, San Juan, Siquijor