Fake Mermaids And A Ceiling Waterfall

Manila Trip Day 3
(June 6, Saturday afternoon)

Eli: S'go out, Doogie
Woog: It's raining out there.

Boys: We're in, we're in! Yay!

Eli-gator? Doogie-dile?


Tatay: I'll throw you in, 'Pet?
Eli: No! Throw you...Tatay!

Woog: Me, me! Throw me in, Mom! Can I bring one home?

Cuddle time in the dark

Some are gray...

and some are red...

and some can swallow your entire head!


Woog: Ew. Sting-ray fart. Ew.


Eli: Sweep! Want to sweep!

Woog: Let's sleep here, Eli.

Woog: Whoah!

Eli: Shark...eat you!

Soaking tired footsies and getting our calluses cannibalized

Woog is tickled. Literally.

Mom: Woog, let's go watch the mermaid show!
Woog: (rolls eyes) The mermaids are fake, Mom. They're wearing goggles.

Back at the Sampaloc aparment penthouse. 11 P.M.

Propery manager: Dondi, you better call home. You mother rang. She says your ceiling caved in.

Me: !!!!!

Hello? Mom?! What happened?

Wawa: Haaaay, Dondi. You really put me on the spot. I'm still here cleaning up your apartment. It rained so hard, the wall of the master bedroom is a waterfall. What a mess! I've had to dry your birth certificates on the clothesline.

Me: Oh no!

Wawa: (aggrieved sigh) This is a sign that you really need to get a house of your own.

Me: Is there anything else that's damaged?

Wawa: Stuff. You can check when you get home. There's no food in the fridge, either.

Me: Remind me again why I hate vacations.

Mall Zombies

Manila Trip Day 3
(June 6, Saturday)

Like any family on an expensive vacation, we are trying to squeeze in as many activities as we can without falling down in exhaustion. Still, we have a lazy and leisurely breakfast at the Sampaloc apartment's penthouse before heading out to Robinson's Place Malate a short drive away.

Atch, "the cooker"

Waiting for "the cooker"

Too impatient to wait

Before we leave, my sister Deedee, a BPO lawyer and staunch Manila denizen, drops by from her midnight shift laden with goodies, and we haul her with us into our uncle's Revo for the day's fun.

As Atch's geographical memory of Manila thoroughfares kicks in, he drives us through practically empty streets free of the horrendous start-of-weekend traffic the night before. The sun actually manages to hail a weak "how do" from her cloudy perch in the sky.

Even the mall is quiet, but the kids, armed with a short night's sleep and the natural hyperactivity of the very young, swarm all over the electronic toys exhibit, while we adults sprawl on lounging chairs at the Wi-Fi area. All too soon I am awoken by mall security

"Ma'am, bawal pong matulog dito" *

without my realizing that I have actually fallen asleep. Ah, the signs of progress...




To get me conscious, Atch drags me to one of the gadget stores where he makes a very brave purchase of a much-coveted iPod, while I try not to clap hands to my mouth in horror at the cost. Still, the extravagance sufficiently rouses me enough to respond much more efficiently to handling frisky kids during a very loud and messy lunch at one of the mall's Filipino-themed restaurants.

My first taste of the Ilocano bagnet: deep fried pork with a spicy vinegar-garlic-pepper dip. There go my cholesterol levels.....

____________________________________
* "Ma'am, you aren't allowed to sleep here."

Wanders

Manila Trip - Day 2
(June 5, Friday)

Two traffic-filled hours and rain-flooded highways later, we reach the Sampaloc apartments. The kids are bouncing off the sofas and climbing up the walls, and Yaya Rose is at her wits' end. We console them with our 168 loot, and Yaya Rose proudly struts around in the blouses we bought for her.

In the evening, we are scheduled to attend Wanders, an international-class extravaganza at the PAGCOR casino in Paranaque. Inday is the physician-retainer at their branch back home, and she has scored a total of 10 complimentary tickets. We are excited despite our exhaustion, panting to attend a show with free tickets that the casino has been selling to the public for 3,000pesos each.

By popular demand, and because we are loathed to repeat our sweaty public jeepney experience in the smog and rain, Atch heads off to Pasay City to borrow my uncle's car while the rest of us spoiled mortals put up our feet and snooze.

By 5pm, Atch textes us to grouch that he is still stuck in traffic. To save time, all eight of us pile sardine-like into a cab to PAGCOR Paranaque. We make plans to meet up with Atch there, as well as Nat's husband Eric, who has flown in from Bacolod that noon.

Two hours later, we are wedged in horrendous traffic in the pouring rain. The kids have thankfully buried their collective heads in various cellphone games, while Yaya Rose moans fretfully into a paper bag

"Mapatay ko! Indi na ko magliwat di!" *

in one of her bouts of car-sickness.

We are provincial hicks who have forgotten that this is Manila. It is the weekend. And the rain is drumming us out of our minds.

It is a quarter of 9 in the evening when we finally reach our destination. We shudder into the arctic air conditioning of the Philippine government's answer to the rich and pseudo-rich's quest for gaming and gambling amusements.

The government monopoly on the millions of pesos sucked each day into this nation-wide gambling franchise doesn't solve any of the country's economic problems or endear its public officials to the poor and working classes. We shamelessly venture into the casino anyway: wide-eyed with wonder and eager to experience what well-heeled gambling enthusiasts see, hear, taste and smell on a daily basis.

We buy hundred-plus peso club sandwiches (they are the cheapest food items we could find) in the luxuriously appointed lounge, and duly present our tickets to the tuxedo-clad ticket inspectors at the entrance to the casino's auditorium, where the musical circus is set to take place at 8pm, or so our tickets say. However, once inside, we are bombarded with socio-political advertisements in large screen format for more than an hour, as the show's organizers wait for the rest of their 3,000-peso and 5,000-peso ticket crowd to make it in from the traffic and the rain.

It is in the middle of this maddening lull that Atch and Eric, waterlogged and rush-hour cranky, finally arrive to help us calm the restless kids, who are themselves cranky with the stupendous wait. It is 10pm and they have watered every stall in the restrooms with their urea-filled impatience.

The show finally starts with sudden darkness and the earth-trembling vibration of drums. The thundering progress of acrobats across raised wooden platforms startle us, and we surrender ourselves to the sights and sounds of people twirling on ribbons in the air right above us; natives in loin-cloths brandishing clubs, their heads bristling in feathers; the sun, the moon, and bird people in flight; punk kids playing synchronized basketball; ballerinas piled on bicycles, and the story of birth, growth, and decline presented in a musical score ranging from primordial chants to full-blown arias.

Our chests resound with the beat of drums and the clash of cymbals, and our feet chatter on the floor in time to sambas and rumbas and the rapid-fire skipping of steel-toed tap dancers on the wooden stage.

That we have waited for centuries and missed our dinner has become irrelevant. Even Yaya Rose has forgotten her nausea and is hard-pressed to keep drool from escaping her gaping mouth. A free pass to a world-class show will do that to anyone.

The show finally ends past midnight, and Inday and Sam hoist a sleeping Ia in their arms, while Woog and Eli scamper amongst the feet of the departing audience, picking up the colorful metallic streamers that have rained from the sky at closing.

I pay a jaw-clenching 100pesos to have our picture taken with the cast, wishing I had surreptitiously taken a few prohibited shots during the show with my camera phone.

The international cast of Wanders, with Yaya Rose, Atch & Eli, Woog & Mom

We finally make our way out of the casino, suddenly realizing we are ravenously hungry. Thankfully, we have my uncle's car that Atch has so painstakingly braved traffic for, a thousand eons ago it seems when he went off to get it earlier that afternoon. We grab a midnight snack at a McDonald's in Makati, and make our way home to bed in Sampaloc, still in midst of a thrall.

Smiling in the aftermath: Eric, Nat with Woog, Yaya Rose with Eli, Sam & Inday carrying Ia

______________________________

* I'm going to die! I'm never going back here again!

Our Whirlwind In A Tempest

Manila Trip - Day 2
(June 5, Friday)

168

The kids are exhausted. The air of this teeming capital city doesn't quite agree with them, and they are lethargic the next morning. We leave them watching TV at the penthouse of my mom's family's apartment complex in Sampaloc with an equally lethargic Yaya Rose, hoping the idiot box would keep occupied them until we return.

The four of us: Atch, Inday, Sam, Nat, and I head off to 168 in Divisoria, part of our itinerary to acquire as many material possessions as possible without spending a great deal of money. Ah, the wonder of mass-produced China goods!


The sky continues to weep intermittently, like an aging widow remembering her dead. I haven't been here in nearly a decade, and I do some double takes at some of the transformations. The snot-inducing smog hasn't changed much however, and we breathe it all in courtesy of crowded public transportation. I despair that my hair will never be the same again.

We scatter like chaff in the wind at 168, greedy eyes and hands reaching for items sold at half-price. Embroidered throw pillow covers, 3 for 100pesos. School shoes, 200pesos. We haggle and acquire in a frenzy. We only have half a day, after all.

Atch and I get into a fight at one of the shoe stalls, and I head off in a huff, pushing into the thick crowd of bargain hunters, picking up socks, underwear and school supplies for the kids, while employing my sharp glances and even sharper elbows into the competitive fray. I am a more productive haggler when I'm mad, it seems.


Hunger reunites us at the top floor's food court, our earlier argument forgotten, and we lunch on fast food - typical gastronomic fare for the perpetually in-a-rush. By the time we leave the mall, the sky has let out its pent-up torrent of grief, and we make a run in the downpour, squelching ourselves into a near-to-bursting jeepney. In this city, the transportation doesn't wait around for you. Its a chase-or-be-cast-off world.

The First Time

Manila Trip - Day 1
(June 4, Thursday)

The First Time is always one of the most fascinating things to observe. The eyes light up with wonder, and the mouth drops down to gape. A gulp or two, maybe. And sometimes a moment of introspection (is this for real?)

I am so caught up in this observation that I plumb forget to take pictures of Woog and Yaya Rose as they spider-money up the windows of the taxi, craning their necks to behold the glorious skyscrapers of Makati.


Whoah! Says Woog.

Grabe, taas-taas ba!* Says Yaya Rose.

Atch is up front, chatting with the cab driver. Eli is fussing in my lap and longing for his siesta, wondrous city sights notwithstanding. The slight drizzle fogs up the windows, and the goggle-eyed duo on either side of me climb up the windows even more.

We are headed for Eric's family's condo unit at Prince Towers for a long-needed nap. In the taxi behind us is his wife Nat, plus Inday and Sam, who are trying to restrain an equally nap-deprived Ia from throwing a tantrum.

We reach the condo in due course, despite the heavy traffic, and the kids fling themselves into the beds, Yaya Rose included. It seems riding an elevator to vertigo-inducing heights, and viewing the whole city from the umpteenth floor

Whoah! Says Woog.

Grabe, taas-taas ba!* Says Yaya Rose.

is worthy of a whole body bed slam.

________________________________

* Wow! So tall!


Atch is impatient to scratch an itch. The years of his fast-paced Makati life are hopping lively back into his head, and he is pulling me off one of the beds. C'mon, he urges the heavy-lidded Inday and Sam, let's go and take a walk.

Translation: I want to relive my glory days. Now, now!

We leave pregnant Nat in charge of the napping kids and head off to the heart of Manila's business district, Atch marching in the lead of three lethargic and siesta-deprived adults.

A few leg-achey hours later, we all meet up at Glorietta 1 where their Auntie Nat has taken the kids for a romp in the rubber-floored central playground. Woog is hanging upside-down from the monkey bars, in animated "conversation" with another boy, despite the dialect-gap. Eli is running up a slide, the wrong way. And Ia it seems, is teleporting herself everywhere.


We have poured five bottles of overpriced mineral water down their throats to prevent dehydration when the inevitable happens: Woog's head connects with some little girl's front teeth. Both youngsters run off to their respective parents in barely suppressed tears, holding on to their offended body parts.

Fiasco over, we herd the kids to the Landmark basement food court for dinner, where Eli gleefully practices his new-found artistic talent onto the floor with pieces of squashed burger steak and a good deal of gravy.

Maiden Flight

Manila trip - Day 1

Woog knows his dinosaurs. His particular favorites are brachiosaurs, diplodocuses, and brontosaurs - those huge lumbering long-necked lizards that lived millions of years before his own father ever thought of depositing the sperm cell that eventually formed half of him.

Woog emulates these favorite dinosaurs even as the plane taxies off into the runway. He and Yaya Rose crane their necks out the window as the whole world tilts at an uneven angle. If human necks could get any longer, theirs does the day of their first plane ride: June 4. Woog's 7th birthday. What better present can a boy and his nanny get?

Trying to believe his eyes

As the houses and trees depreciate into miniature structures down below and the clouds rush pass their faces, Woog trumpets his glee, the sing-song whoop spiraling up from his elongated throat to emerge shrilly out his mouth, only to reverberate in a pressurized cabin where a couple of hundred other people share limited air space. As one, his fellow passengers stretch their necks like a herd of grazing dinosaurs searching for the source of the sound.

The absurdity of imagining dinosaurs on a plane thousands of feet up in the air strikes Woog's mother as funny, and she takes a dozen shots of the first-time flyers who are straining against their seatbelts in excitement.

Yaya, are you going to be sick?

Eventually, one other starts to protest the papparazo invasion before attempting to escape his own restraints.

Fortunately, a stick of spearmint gum placates him, and his mother doesn't even scold when he swallows the whole wad after chewing. The window is beyond his line of sight, you see, and he is enjoying his maiden flight as only a two-year-old can.



Nine people land an hour after their scheduled time of arrival, having dipped and shimmied in the overcast sky, waiting for air traffic to clear before touching terra firma. The kids battle their midday hunger pangs at the airport by ganging up on each other until their irritable parents pull them away by their ears, or separate them with firm taps to their bottoms.

Finally, after the confusion of looking for and finding the car and driver sent by a cousin, six hungry adults and three hungry kids pile into a pick-up that seats four people (Atch spends the drizzling journey out in the truck bed, bedecked in a raincoat and umbrella). After the typical speed -crawl that one can only find on Manila streets, everyone finally settles down to a lovely meal that is summarily devoured without much fanfare, expense notwithstanding.

Chomping our way through The Aristocrat, Roxas Boulevard

Happy Birthday, Woogie! Welcome to Manila!

Speeding Through Time, Heels Digging In

It is June. Woog's 7th birthday. Where did my baby go? Where did the summer go? The rain is pelting down on the roof, and the sun is making its requisite weak effort. Mano a mano, neither the one giving in.

We wake up early today, the darkness permeating our tiny room. Even Woog, for whom sleep is infinitely preferable to food. The boys are excited to be getting on a plane for the first time. We are heading for Manila today, with cheap promo tickets bought online the month before. Our birthday presents for Woog, who is 7 toady, and Eli, who will turn 3 in July. And for Yaya Rose, who turned 19 last month.

It is June. In a week, my gapped-tooth older boy will be in first grade. The years are speeding by (oh be still, my racing heart), and I haven't the foggiest idea of how to slow them down.

I console myself by thinking of the month that has passed, and the many highlights that seem like mere flashes in my consciousness. Events that have made me, in equal parts, laugh and fume:

My Tatay, after gurgling half a case of beer with his brother, Ninoy Toto and my Atch, then attempting to turn off the overhead lights with the tv remote control.

Samantha, the Indian neighbor kid, slamming in and out of our apartment with impunity , and raiding the refrigerator while complaining of hunger. The things people need to teach their kids. I ought to have a few words with her mother.

Yaya Rose, coming home tearfully after a vacation. Her father refuses to let us send her to school. He prefers to pay for her tuition himself in their small pastoral community school in the hinterlands. When he can't even manage to put enough food on his family's table. When he is possessed of such small-minded maliciousness that makes us want to chew him up and spit him out.

The kids, building a castle out of Debbie-Does-Dallas and other Playboy Playmate video tapes that my uncle has sent over from the States. My uncle emails my father: you can watch these now you're a retiree. Tatay doesn't mention that VHS machines have become obsolete.

It is June. Woog is 7. That magic age, the beginning of the end of his wonder years. I look forward to the future with mixed emotions.....

Woog's Tooth

A little boy with grin so wide
Ran down the stairs all full of pride
“I pulled it out, so there,” said he
“It did not hurt a bit, you see.”

He showed me chompers shining white
And bottom center was the sight:
A gap so dark I barely saw
the yawning chasm of his maw.

“Another one is coming loose,”
He tiptoed up and showed me thus
While pinched between his fingers two
The milky peg, that calcium'ed clue.

For weeks he'd worried with his tongue
The wobbling stalk, a stubborn one
I'd oft pull grimy hands from tooth
As absently, he'd pull the root.

So now that clinging tooth is gone
And in its place, a sunken gum.
A teasing glimpse of winking bright:
A rising tooth behind the site.

He prances up and down, this boy
My gapped-tooth son, my pride and joy
He hides the tooth ever carefully
Away from the greedy tooth fairy.

Say Baby

He sidles up to me while I work, quiet-like, a sparkle in his slitty eyes.

“Say 'baby'!” He squeals, hugging my arm to his face and giggling. I look down at him and smile despite the interruption.

Eli and I have a running argument. I am trying to get him to give up the bottle. He is digging his heels in, attempting to delay the inevitable.

“You're not a baby anymore, you're a big boy,” I tell him. But he laughs up at me, both with his eyes and his triangular smile, while he squashes his nose into the soft part of my arm, breathing. With big snuffling noises and little growling sounds, he continues to look up at me sideways, wriggling like a frisky puppy, “say 'baby',” he urges.

It is times like these I am hard pressed at denying the very baby-hood of him: the chubby cheeks, the soft plump limbs, the remaining infant scent, and the special sweetness he employs to get his way.

“Mommy! Mommy!” He chirrups.

“Pet-a-poo! Pet-a-poo!” I reply.

But at night, just before bed, when he asks, “Peas...gimme...miiik...”

I tell him: “'Pet, you're a big boy. Big boys don't drink from the bottle.”

He runs to his cupboard and hands me one of his empties, “Miiiiik!” He yells mutinously, “MIIIIIIK!”

And after he drinks his fill, he crawls over to where I am frowning at him in disapproval. “Miss-you, Mommy!” he sing-songs placatingly, “say 'baby'!”

I am tempted to keep the status quo, just to have more of his hugs and squeals and sweet clingy softness, but there is his mouthful of teeth to consider, and I am sorely torn.

In the morning, he reaches over from his bed to feel for my arm, “'morning, Mommy....miss-you! Say 'baby'...”

I look down at him, and he is still half-asleep, but there is a quarter of a smile on his face where the morning sun is beaming, and his fat sausage fingers clutch at my arm as if never wanting to let go.

And neither can I.

Blown Away

Woog and I couldn't stop watching this. We're looking forward to their next installment with bated breaths.

This Day...

Celebrate mommy-hood, all ye who have... nursed, spent sleepless nights with newborns and feverish children, changed thousands of diapers, shaken millions of bottles of formula, gotten peed and poo'd on, rubbed salve on diaper rash, kissed boo-boos, gotten spit on, screamed at, vomited upon, attended countless tedious PTA meetings, done homework with disinterested tantrumy kids, and generally spent so much time as uncelebrated maternal slaves.... HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!

The payback? Priceless!

Atch Does 41

Atch celebrated his 41^st birthday yesterday running after his rambunctious sons at the mall. And then he dragged half a burlap sack of garden soil home so I could experiment with the heretofore unexplored regions of my dubious green thumb.

I got him a litre of Carlos Primero, and a litre of Johnny Walker Black, plus a bottle of Carlo Rossi Muscat for the both of us. He scolded. He frowned. He complained. He flexed his well-defined skinflint muscles. So expensive, he said. Three bottles! Too much.

He finally shut up when he opened the Johnny Walker box and discovered it came with two personalized whiskey tumblers.

Say thank you, I urged.

Thank you, he finally said, giving me a smooch and an unsuccessfully disguised pleased smile.

Earlier, the bank's HRD department had ordered him to take a vacation leave. They complained that he was present everyday, in all sorts of weather, eschewing his leave credits to loom over his stressed employees with his dark frown and watchful slits.

In typical Atchbund fashion, he choose his birthday week to take off so he wouldn't have to treat his co-workers to a birthday snack. My husband, the cheapskate.

Still, he channelled his bank manager personality over the household, harassing Woog as the boy lingered over his meals, growling at Eli for being so stubborn, and telling me off for being late for work.

Relax, L'Atchy-poo, I told him, you're on vacation. He glared at me, glancing meaningfully at the clock. It seems the only time he has ever relaxed is when he snores in deep sleep, or right after spilling his seed. When I come to think of it, one is synonymous with the other.

Today, the three bottles remain untouched, still in their boxes. I've texted him to chill the Carlo Rossi, and to pick me up for work so I could treat his thick unglamorous toes to a much-needed pedicure.

He is going to complain about the expense again, I know, all the while trying to keep his mouth from lifting at the corners – my very own “Oscar the Grouch”.

Happy birthday, L'Atchy.

Edited to add:

Grrrrr....

He picked me up after work and had to reverse a couple of times to avoid hitting the curb, drunk out of his mind.

He had taken it upon himself that morning to visit one of his old drinking and pot-smoking buddies a couple of cities away (I'm on vacation, Aifee!). That answered my question about why Woog called me at work earlier, looking for his Tatay:

Maybe he's in Greensville at Auntie Inday's house, Mom. Do you have the number?

Go check, Woog. Take this down. 708_ _ _ _

Maybe he's at Bata with Manong Kylot?

Try and call Bata, Woog.

Ok, Mom. Dubby!

But no. The dearly beloved birthday celebrant had gotten himself good and sloshed, celebrating his birthday with friends at a corner sari-sari store, even before celebrating with his family. I practically had to steer his feet in a relatively straight course to the salon to have his toe nails done, where he plunked himself down into the lounging chair and went straight to sleep.

Mouth ajar. Leaking alcoholic ectoplasm, and loudly vibrating with drunken apnea.

The girl who did his nails did try mightily hard to stifle her giggles (he sounds like an outboard motor, no?)

And of course there was no chilled bottle of Muscat when we got home. No intimate and mildly inebriated conversation over sisig. He went straight to bed, leaving his Aifee fuming, fuming, fuming....

Post-Holy Week Guilt

Spending what was supposed to be a summer holiday under the sun has left me, not only with browner skin, but a muddy-stained conscience, as well.

Growing up, Holy Week was observed with much piety and reflection, partly influenced by the stiffling dictates of a rigid Catholic school, but mostly because of parents who believed in old folks' tales of evil spirits who freely walked the earth immediately preceeding the Good Friday of Christ's death. As a consequence, we were raised believing in rather stiff spiritual absolution mixed with a good deal of fearful superstition.

University came, and with it a mini-renaissance. Let out to run free in the world, or at least a world as big as our financial resources would allow, my siblings and I eschewed most things religious and embraced with abandon all things hedonistic. This included leaving out the “holy” in Holy Week, and cavorting in beaches, under waterfalls, or beside rivers, as soon as this long Catholic holiday hit the calendars.

Lately, though, as I get on in years, and my own children frolic in waters I vowed never to taint with fanatic religious fervor or superstitious belief, I feel a gaeity that is shallow, and a happiness colored in a new shade called empty.

Afterwards, I seek out the churches of my youth, and sit staring at the altar wondering how to get closer. Because I have been feeling so far away, and so out of touch. Perhaps, I should reflect more? Or finish my prayers before I fall asleep? Abstain? Fast?

I read somewhere that guilt is the sole province of a vengeful Christian God, or at least the God His Church professes He is. No other religion inspires so much flagellation of back and conscience, particularly for Catholics during the Holy Week. Enlightened and very much aware of the world, I still fall prey to this blight of consciousness.

An ex-boyfriend once regaled me of his family's tradition of doing the stations of the cross at several churches during the Holy Week. This struck me as fairly restrictive at the time. Why relive scenes of pain and suffering, over and over and over again, in the repressive first heat of summer, when the siren call of the sea and the inviting whisper of tropical palms beckoned. Ever a creature of the sun, I heeded each call.

I look at my children now, eyes and teeth shining white in their newly browned faces, and I wonder if the road I am paving for them will eventually lead to a hollow spiritual core. The same core now echoing my teeny voice in a cavernous dark, over and over and over.

Summer And The Sea

It was bound to be chaos. Nineteen adults, five children, four cars, and one mother-in-law in a wheelchair. We drove 178 kilometers from our home city all the way to Sipalay, partly because we had never dipped our toes in its famed waters, and partly because there was nowhere else to go. It was the Holy Week, after all, and everywhere else had been booked months before by other irreverent beach-loving bodies.

The proponents of this four-family outing had a noisy alcohol-filled evening appointing committees and drawing up a budget. Then there was the matter of finding handicap-friendly accommodations for Nanay who was still suffering from the effects her second stroke over two years ago.

While the driving committee guzzled their beer, the budget and food committee argued the merits of organic versus imperishable, plastic utensils versus metal, tankinis versus maillots, and whose monthly period was on the verge of gracing the much-awaited four-day weekend. In the midst of all this discussion, the fun-and-games committee scurried in and out of the house, chased by one or the other.

Maundy Thursday dawned bright and early. After several mobile phone arguments about the correct rendezvous place, we sped our way southwards, making only a few stops along the way to buy several large watermelons, and to make water by the side of the road, hidden amongst the tall sugarcane stalks.

By ten o'clock, we arrived at sunny southern Sipalay.

Eli and Wowo, Artistic Diving Resort

Starfish Troopers

Kylot: My starfish can carry the most shells.
Woog: No, mine!
Ia & Eish: Wanna bet?!

Sweet revenge: "death" by starfish

Achieving starfish zen

Isle hop

Atch at Campomanes Bay

DeeDee & Kylot's service de luxe

Yoohoo...! I broke your snorkel...!

Coming up for air

Corals

No Tatay! No Tatay! Noooooo!

Comforting the hydrophobe

"Swimming". With a life vest. By the seashore.

Atchbund & Aifee, Campomanes beach

Family at Campomanes beach


Tito Sam: Get me another bottle, Eli?
Eli: No! Gimme...coral!

HRH, Queen Mama of Langub Beach

Wowo, aboard M/V Spongebob, Langub beach

Pirates of the Langub-ian

Beach belly-boys

Atch & Aif, Langub

Sunset in the shallows

Beached mermaid

Stoned

Caved

The family that "rocks" together....

On the way home, via Mr. Sandman's sea

By Black Saturday, we dragged our waterlogged and sandy selves into our respective vehicles and made for Hinobaan, where we visited distant relatives, and scouted Happy (not-the-brothel) Valley's white stretch of beach, marking it for our next seashore foray.

And then we headed home. But this is not the end of summer...