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I never thought I would end up a traveller. When I was younger, I used to have motion sickness whenever I travel more than 30 minutes. I would usually get sick by merely travelling in an air-conditioned taxi from our house to the airport. So, when my family and I spent a vacation in Baguio, they decided to take the ordinary bus as they thought it might help me from our 6-hour trip. It didn't. I was asleep most of the time. And if I was awake, I was so sick, I ended up v_m_ting. Ugh! Yup, I was that bad! I never really knew when or how I lost my "travel" sickness. All I remember was I joined all the field trips during high school and there weren't any occasion then that I got sick. Maybe, all the junk food I ate and the chit-chatting with all my classmates helped. By college, I was already going out-of-town with classmates and friends, travelling almost 4 hours to Morong, Bataan, to spend an overnight by the beach or to San Juan, Batangas, to hunt for a private beach resort for a school activity. By the time I was working in a production house, I was already able to travel to and back from Calatagan, Batangas within a day. And travel to and back from Mariveles, Bataan the next day. Yup! Before I knew it, I was travelling to distant places, sometimes without even sleeping during the entire road trip (I was trying to draw a crude map!). Travelling was not such a sickening and exhausting activity anymore. Even pregnancy did not hinder me from travelling. I was 3 and ½ months pregnant then when my friends and I went to Camiguin Island in Northern Mindanao. We flew via Cebu Pacific for 1 ½ hour to reach Cagayan de Oro, rented an L-300 van for a 1 ½ hour road travel to Balingoan, Misamis Oriental, boarded a ferry for 1 hour to reach Camiguin and finally rented a multi-cab for a 30-minute bumpy ride to our resort. It was one strenuous trip especially for someone whose pregnancy is in its first trimester, the most delicate stage of all. But I was as bubbly still as my friends when we got to our resort. (For the record, nothing bad happened to my son… He's perfectly normal and he's now 2 and ½ years old.) Yup! I can travel now. By air. By sea. By land. Sickness (or even pregnancy) has not stopped me from going to places and discovering beauties not seen by many. I have been to the islands of Batanes, survived the caves of Sagada, tasted heaven by visiting the churches all over Bohol and Iloilo, went back to the past in Vigan, enchanted by Siquijor, bewitched by Capiz, and fell in love with the beaches of Panglao Island, White Island, Apo Island, and Boracay Island. I am a certified wanderlust. |
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