- Shuffle, Bombay Bicycle Club
Destination: Baler, Aurora
Date: October 30, 2011 - November 2, 2011
Road trip # 6 playlist:
- A Different Kind of Mix - Bombay Bicycle Club
- Boyfriend - We Are Trees
- Girlfriend - We Are Trees
- Nightlife - Phantogram
- Four More Years - Teen Daze
- Dive - Tycho
- Mylo Xyloto - Coldplay
- Mesita
It has always been a habit of mine to create a "road trip" playlist whenever I go on a trip. This way, it enables me to listen to new bands/songs and, you know, for nostalgic purposes as well. So it's like whenever I listen to a certain playlist, it brings me back to that particular trip.
Well for this trip, I actually find it ironic that my current "road trip" playlist contains 156 songs. It is, by far, the longest playlist I have on my iPod. (Well, except for one playlist, which I call my GV or good vibes playlist, wherein I accidentally hit the "Add all songs" option. Now it has 2,506 songs or simply my entire iPod for that matter.) Incidentally, this trip, was also the longest bus ride I've ever taken. Not to mention, alone.
Last week, my thesismate asked me if I wanted to come with him and his friends to Baler to surf. Long weekend. First week of work. Hell yeah of course. I need this! No question asked, I said yes at once. He told me to call Genesis Transport and to get the first trip on Sunday to Baler. He even told me, there were a few seats left so I had to book at once. Luckily, I got the 12MN October 31 trip to Baler.
Saturday evening, around 11:00 P.M., my friend, his sister and I met up at the Genesis station in Cubao. We had to claim our bus tickets at the ticketing office but the girl couldn't find my name in their list. She checked the next day's trip and, voilà!, my name is there! My ticket was for later that day, October 31, when I was supposed to get the first trip for October 30. It would be a total waste of time if I took that bus trip. JoyBus, the Executive Coach of Genesis, normally takes 4-5 hours to get to Baler while, the ordinary Genesis buses take 8-10 hours since, there are stopovers.
Of course, it was the long weekend, all of the bus stations are packed with people eager to come home to their respective provinces. All the JoyBus buses are fully-booked and yet many people are still taking that chance to become passengers, just like me. My friend and his sister had to leave already so I decided to get a number for the ordinary bus, which was on a first-come first-served basis. My number was for the 6th bus and the guard told me that it usually leaves around 6:30 A.M. and it was around 1:00 A.M. during that time, I still had 5 hours, so I decided to go home and take a nap.
I left the house around 5:00 A.M and arrived at the bus station 30 minutes after. As soon as I arrived, I showed the guard my number and he told me that the bus left already. Good thing, the last bus to Baler was still there! It's very different compared to JoyBus, where you travel in comfort in their La-Z-Boy-like chairs, Wi-Fi on-board, comfort room, good morning kit...it's like flying first class and more importantly, no stopovers.
Since this trip will take eight-ten hours, I made sure that I got two seats so that I could lie down and sleep during the course of the trip. I have so many questions with regard to the trip and while waiting for the bus to fill, I was observing, eavesdropping and secretly trying my best to identify who among the passengers take this trip regularly.
It was my first time to go to Baler and likewise, traveling alone. When the conductor of the bus started asking for our payments, this woman who was seated across me, transferred to the vacant seat beside me together with her two children. She asked if it was fine with me if she sat beside me for awhile while her children sat on her lap since it would be too expensive for her if she paid for the three of them. Of course, I said yes knowing that they will go back to their old seats as soon as the conductor is done collecting our payments. We left Cubao around 6:30 A.M. and minutes have passed, hours for that matter, and we remained compact in a two-seater. The four of us sat still a two-seater chair for ten hours. Wow.
I completely understood where she was coming, but the position of my body was starting to get uncomfortable. Plus, I really wanted to doze off. Hence, I took this chance to ask her about the details of this bus ride and since I started the conversation, I felt like I had to keep it going. Would it be impolite if I just simply wore my earphones and forget that there is a family, literally, seated beside me and since all the snacks I brought with me were candies, gummy bears and whatnot, I knew that I had to share it to her kids. Maybe it is also a mere social responsibility for an individual to do such things to a person who you've spent some time with even just for a while. But seeing how their faces lit, the huge smiles on their faces when I gave it to them...I knew it was not an obligation. I just did what is right.
I got to know the woman on a deeper level. She told me the story of her life and I really felt touched because we've only known for a few hours and there she was, sharing her personal life. It was enriching and saddening at the same time because her story was really inspiring that at a certain point, I felt that I was about to cry. It was saddening because her situation is one of those I only get to see on documentary shows. There are things that only hit you when you, yourself, have experienced it.
There were three stopovers and in those stopovers, I would always spend it with them and in that moment, I am a part of their family. It was very moving and sweet that before they went down of the bus, the mother reminded me again and told me not to forget where to go down. It is when I realized that most of the time, it is the people that you encounter that makes your trip worthwhile, interesting and memorable. Though the profound effect these tiny moments of happiness can have on all of us are often lost in the shuffle of life and its myriad injustices, you deserve to look at them and see them for the victories of compassion and simplicity that they are.
After ten long hours (3:00 P.M), I was finally in Baler. I went down at the Aurora Wet Market and took a tricycle to Sabang Beach. Incidentally, that weekend also happened to be the Surf & Music Festival, which explains the thick crowd! Also, the free beerssssss!
The only pictures I have from this trip are these pictures of me, Ache, Gene and Biggel with actor/surfer/singer Jericho Rosales.
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