One round trip

The personal appearance requirement to secure documents from the Securities and Exchange Commission provides one the opportunity to travel after doing the initial stages of the transaction on-line. Traveling does have its share of surprises and appreciating the new information adds to the happy experience. For the first time I had to pay a passenger terminal fee at the Dumaguete Port and as to where the money was to go was immediately obvious upon passing through the newly refurbished air-conditioned passenger terminal.

The tourist accommodations of the boat were as usual with some of the mattresses of the bunks already due for repair and/or replacement. One improvement was that the life vests were now already distributed to each bunk instead of being stored in one place. After requesting that the volume of the television be turned to a more considerate level, restful sleep was possible with the amihan wind blown waves gently rocking the passengers to sleep.

The Cebu port continues to offer a humbling experience of watching children and their mothers encourage passengers to drop coins for them to retrieve using their swimming abilities. The taxi drive to my sister's place was very pleasant over the South Reclamation Project road, which now made possible avoiding the traffic at the south highway. Manoy Efren, the taxi driver, commented that we should be grateful that the SRP road was opened despite the differences between the local government executives. In my opinion, this was a temporary peace in consideration of the Asean Summit, which is to begin this Friday. After complying with the personal appearance requirement, the experience of spending waiting-for-the-bus time at the South Bus Terminal convinced me that the Asean Summit delegates should also visit the facility so that it would be cleaned, organized and effectively regulated to promote enjoyable travel. The competition as to who had the loudest sound system was on-going between the stores and buses, the utility personnel where doing their best to sweep the garbage faster that the commuters and touts were throwing their refuse around and paying one peso to use the comfort room was a hold-up. The convenience of taking the bus was that it delivered me to the gate of the house.

The round trip gave me time to see the similarities of physical movement to that of some life developments reported in our newspapers. Former Secretary of Justice, now accused of extortion, Hernando Perez's trip for accountabilities is to end in justice. The battles between Erap and GMA have had two rounds and the third round may determine who wins the war. I still await the developments in the travel of former Undersecretary Jocjoc Bolante whose star was deemed to be one of the brightest as the current administration assumed power and watch as to the destination of the man when this administration may suffer power failure.

To close, here is one story that should encourage us to make friend as we move on in life and make one round trip. Supposedly George Bernard Shaw once sent Winston Churchill some tickets for the first night of one of his plays. Churchill then sent Shaw a telegram to the effect: "Cannot come first night. Will come second night if you have one." Shaw promptly replied: "Here are two tickets for the second night. Bring a friend if you have one."*