Island-hopping with a stormbringer

I should’ve been spooked. My daily horoscope forewarned: “(This is) not a day to be traveling whether for business or pleasure, for things are not likely to go well..” Especially while reading those words strapped in a plane bound for Puerto Princesa, Palawan. Flying into the gathering gray. But — hell’s bells! — bits of horoscope mumbo-jumbo rarely do come true for me. One astrological reading proclaimed, “What a wonderful month to be a Sagittarius! A large chunk of money is on its way!” Along with it “real true (sic) love,” I presume. Stepping out from a paisley dream. Farting a trail of rainbows.  Cue Robin Thicke singing a stolen song.

I start tossing the phrase “holiday by mistake” (see the sublime Whitnail & I) to the dustbin of memory when I get to the airport. It’s a beautiful damp day. The hotel van driver (whose name is Faizal Matsam) is courteous, friendly and extremely proud of his home city. Damn right he should be. Puerto Princesa is nicknamed “the city in a forest” and Palawan is the “last ecological frontier.” Reports of an incoming storm are quite worrying, though. Ah, but I am here and I’m determined to take a breather from Manila, the city that I love and hate in the same sentence.

At the hotel, everyone else I get to meet raves about the Underground River, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the new 7 Wonders of Nature — which I won’t get to see. Or the Kinabuchs Grill and Bar which serves tamilok (shipworm) and crocodile meat (sisig, if I’m not mistaken) — which I won’t get to taste. Or Port Barton in San Vicente. Or the Tabon Cave Complex. All of them in a Palawan I won’t get to experience.

A prediction: Instead, I will do a lot of waiting, of beer-drinking at the wet hotel bar beside an empty pool, of riding in tricycles in a torrential paradise. Are we having fun yet (Interlude)?

Yes, the rains haven’t let up, comin’ down in sheets. The saving grace is how cool and comfy my hotel room is (see box article about Hotel Centro) as well as the Thrill TV network that exclusively shows horror movies and sci-fi thrillers — from hair-raising Asian to asinine Hollywood. Speaking of scary stuff, allow me to digress.

Me: I adore horror movies. I collect scary movies on DVD and Blu-ray.

The Girl I Used To Date: Really? Wow!

Me: Ikaw, do you like horror?

The Girl I Used To Date: Horror, no eh. Gusto ko “Suspend” lang.

See? What did I tell you about that horror-scope? Anyway, I meet up with a friend at Itoy’s Coffee Haus, along Rizal Ave. I can stay here all day — the cappuccino (“Kape ni Itoy”) is frothily delicious and the interiors are ideal for picking up a good comic book on a bad weather day. Next time I will try the Charlie Brown Frappe and bring Days of Future Passed. Divine Sweets at the Robinsons mall is another cool joint. My friend Yayoi arrives, we head for a restaurant to plan my Palawan activities (“the best-laid plans of mice and men often go…).

Awry, er, alright… We are here inside Gypsy’s Lair Art Café at Mercado de San Miguel, another excellent choice. The only “failure” in the itinerary is a chao-long joint in the city. Better would be the highly recommended Rene’s Saigon. Yayoi tells me of the once-thriving Viet Ville which was set up by city government for Vietnamese asylum seekers.

The décor at Gypsy’s Lair Art Café is outstanding. The artworks, the dolls, the horse figurines, palm readings, Spanish guitar playing — all screaming boho chic. The food is reportedly inspired by the “gypsy trail” fare. I can just quaff ice-cold brew the whole night in this red caravan of a restaurant in Puerto Princesa… which makes me kind of glad I’ve made the trip. 

COME SAIL AWAY

On my third day in Palawan, Yayoi, her friends and I go to Honda Bay, 30 minutes away from the hotel. Here be the station where you can rent boats (with a choice of 3- or 4-cylinder engine) with the attendant boatmen to head for the cluster of nearby islands and islets. 

Tourists can visit Dos Palmas, Tagbariri or the Bacungan River, go scuba diving, snorkeling, fishing and — I kid you not since this is what the blackboard offers — “trolling.” We get the island-hopping package: Cowrie Island, Pambato Reef, Luli Island, Starfish Island and Pandan Island. Each island has an entrance fee from P75 to P150. Not bad for a piece of paradise.

We make it to Luli and Starfish Islands. The sun is out; the gray clouds are kept on the periphery. Yayoi’s friends are determined to jump from the diving board of a lifeguard station near the Luli beach. “Come, Victoria, come!” they yell to one of the procrastinating divers, referencing the cliff climax in Mama. In another island, one of the peeps (a showband vocalist) will start singing a reggae number.

That is until trippy Bob Marley needed give way to gloomy Marilyn Manson.

At Pandan Island, the skies start to go really gray. We finish lunch and then walk briskly to the beach. The ocean is startling. Green near the beach, it dramatically gets blue to forewarn deeper waters. A poet would describe it as “moving between waters.” And it’s the first time I’ve experienced how warm ocean water is; the downpour cold and cruel. (A caricature: The tourists getting massages from the manangs are caught in the maelstrom of wind and sloshing rainwater — hydro-massage, anyone?)

Yayoi turns to me and says, “It wasn’t raining before you got here.” The storm brewing in her eye. The end of the beginning? She would tell me a week later that it got sunny in Puerto Princesa the day after I left.

I must be the stormbringer.