A very close encounter

I took the bus right after work, it was around nine in the morning. I knew it was going to be a short trip compared to that Cagayan de Oro-Zamboanga city land trip I endured a couple of years ago that took only fourteen hours but felt like a week without aircondition, without flat roads, and without normal road dusts, only dusts that seemed to feel like sharp pebbles.

It should be a short trip, especially that I was about to meet some very important people. I needed to make it a short, productive and positive visit. I told myself to stay calm and promised to come back in one piece. I wasn't going to make a false impression, but I wasn't planning to NOT give an impression either.

This trip first sounded like a walk in the park, but I know now it wasn't. There wasn't any time in the past that I had to to it, and I think I don't want to and have no plans of doing it again of course.

The trip began approximately two hours from the city to the province's remote port, I lined up to eat at a designated carenderia for all passengers to eat like there's no other option, took the ferry with the bus for another two hours to the other province's remote port. I was then on the same bus for three more hours to the other province's city, something like that.

That totalled to about seven hours, including the time everyone spent eating at strategically placed eateries, the abrupt stops for chicharon, mani, water and delicacy vendors to step inside the bus to sell, if fortunate, and if fortunate still, out of the bus to get off. Though I thought the stops were more significant for people to take a leek.

I've always made sure to spend my time travelling doing something fun and productive like sleeping, but the relentless thinking prevented me from doing so. Just hours away from a very close encounter, the immininent talks on joyful subjects like labor, change and marriage, perhaps gave me more reason to keep awake.

So I sat on the bus, sat on the ferry, ate chicharon and forgot to buy water- thinking of everything else but those, while looking at the mountains or goats.

Interesting how I noticed the evolution of landscape from one remote port to one main city and vice versa.

All sorroundings change from point to point. For example, population increases as you near the city. If you place a mid point from the remote port and the designated city, in both provinces, population increases away from that midpoint.

Though there should be less population and pollution in the remote port than its city, one can see how people's use of wood, straws and nipa decreases, and how people's use of concrete, plastics and metal increases.

So I guess the more people there is, the more chances of overpopulation, and most likely, pollution.

Interestingly, the size of public transportations decreases as you near the city too, as you've noticed. I knew I was about 60-70 kilometers away from the main city once I saw a mini public bus parked along a nipa hut. Maybe it goes something like from those huge yellow aircondition buses to a mini bus, to an supersized jeepney, to a regular 16 seat jeepney, to a smaller 12 seater multicab, to a taxi, to a tricycle, to a motor habal habal, to a pedicab, to an elevator and to a button on a computer mouse.

This looks to be turning into a very long post, given that i've already skipped writing on how it began, to where it ended, then again started. The how it came to be, and how it was made to be, and how it was known, and how she did and reacted.

I'll just name this part 1, mami.