The Hike to the Tower

I live in the baranguy of Cabolutan (a baranguy is like a little town) which has houses, little stores in people's houses, a Catholic church and a couple of schools. To get to "town" which is San Agustin it takes about 10 minutes by a tricycle. My baranguy is flat near the ocean with lots of rice fields (I love the irrigation for the rice fields, it's a pretty slick system) and we live higher a bit higher up the mountain than the rice fields. Surrounding us are lots of mountains (not like the Rockies though, they are covered in palm trees and do not have rock on top.) There are a couple of cellphone towers at the top of some of the mountains.

Anyway I told my family that I wanted to climb one of these mountains and they told me that I could go with my host brother JB who could guide m. I was fine with that but our only option was to go Thursday afternoon, sleep on the top and then hike down on Friday morning. It wasn't an issue with my volunteering because Friday mornings at school the students have their weekly test and I don't have to be there for it.

So we had a plan to climb up the mountain and I was told that this other girl was coming which was fine. JB dropped off 2 loaves of bread on the table but we didn't talk about what we would eat at all. Anyway the long and short of it is that we didn't have near enough food, he seemed to expect me to pack food for our hike for 5 people and I had absolutely no idea there were 5 people going or that he thought I would bring all the food! Just cause I'm a girl.... lol and he was shy so he wouldn't talk to me.

So I ended up going on a 4 hour hike with JB and his friends Jason, Loren and Edith. Now I have discovered that I have no idea when these people are lying to me even though it's just a joke for them. For example I was told that when we got to the top there was a spring and we could go swimming. I beleived it, the water for the rice fields had to come from somewhere! But at the top all there was a big tower and a house for the tower operator to live in. Before I left my family was talking about leeches falling from trees but they were also talking about seeing fairies so I had no idea what to believe (being easy going is essential)

I was afraid when we started out that I would be the person least in shape and asking for breaks all the time but that wasn't the case which was nice. We climbed through people's "yards" on our way up and tried to follow a path. The path was not clear further up so the guys had to take out their knives at times and slice the vegetation so that we could get through. It was difficult and hot (we were completely soaked by the time we reached the top) but that wasn't the worst of it.

Us girls stopped to take pictures in this beautiful pathway through the forest near the top of the mountain when I discovered something on my arm and promply yelled. It was a "alimatock" a little leech like thing, about an inch in length which bites your skin and hangs on. Loren grabbed it for me and extracted it from my arm. Needless to say I was soooo grossed out. They really do fall from the trees. Suddenly getting out of the trees was the number one priority. Alimatocks are truly discusting creatures. They will grasp your clothing and burrow through to get to your skin. I had one burrowing into my backpack too. Ew!

We had a good time when we reached the top, well relatively that is. We realized we didn't have enough food so we went and talked to the operator who supplied us with rice and sardines. hahah, climb to the top of a mountain with no food. Then.... 4 of us slept in the tent and none of them brought blankets so they were all freezing. I brought my malong (a long tube of cloth good for traveling in etc) so I was fine. I taught them how to play janitor which was a good time too. Our tent was under a tree so every time we got out the tent we would yell "alitmatock!" and screech and run to the house. It was rather entertaining.

In the morning the operator supplied us with food again (we owe him our lives) but we didn't leave until 9:00 because the alimatocks are the worst early in the morning. JB, Jason and I climbed the very tall tower and you could see almost the whole island, it was amazing! Nice and windy and cool at the top too which I loved but they were cold of course.

The climb down was great, I did much better with the alimatock mentally as well. I wore capris so I could see if I had them on my legs instead of worrying about them getting under my pant legs. I even took one off of someone else, yay for me! I don't plan on complaining about moths or spiders even again after this hideous creatures. How can you enjoy camping?!?

My hiking companions all wore flip flops on our hike, I thought they were crazy! Climbing down the mountain in runners was definitely better. On the way down we stopped near a family who started talking to Jason. I had no idea what was going on so JB inturrpreted, the family wanted Jason to climb up a palm tree and get them some coconuts. So he did. It was amazing!! He knocked some coconuts down and the family shared some coconut juice, it was great. I told Jason he was the man.

All in all it was an amazing time. I think it was nice for the Filipinos to have 4 of them and only one of me because they could speak Tagalog together or work on their English with me and help each other out with their English. I didn't mind at all, they all made an effort to talk to me, even JB who is no longer scared of me. They continually complimented me still and I try to tell them that all colours of skin are beautiful but I have my doubts that I will be successful. Loren wants my nose apparently. lol.

The one hard thing for me was that as the foreigner sometimes I get treated like I am 12. Only some people treat me that way though but, as most of you would know, I don't respond well to that. lol, I am not their play thing to take care of! But in general that is not the case and everyone is respectful and nice. I hope some of my new friends will make it to Canada where I can take them camping in the mountains and we won't have to worry about alimatock!