When I was in college I had the opportunity to travel to the Philippines with my friend Izzara, who was from Cebu. Our friendship started with one of those small world moments; it turned out that she knew one of my old friends Shuta from boarding school, and she had gone to boarding school where my cousin Nicola went (Suffield Academy, in CT), and after this discovery we became quick friends over curly fries with mustard. She invited me to come visit her over Winter Break, so after a quick trip through Amsterdam with my two older siblings, Sage and Gentry, and an even quicker stop in London for New Years with my mom, I flew to Manilla. It was a very exciting trip, especially because I knew nothing about the Philippines before going. I ate baby eel at a Spanish restaurant and learned about historical Spanish occupation of the Philippines, and how that was why it was a predominantly catholic country. I ate balut (fertalized duck egg) from a street cart. I ate freshly caught uni straight from the ocean on a catamaran. We attended Sinulog Festival, swam with whale sharks.
I didn’t get any great photos of myself with said whale sharks, but I did have the scare of my life while trying.
Before they take you out in the canoes, there is a mandatory training video which basically just entailed threats of imprisonment if you touched the whale sharks. It brought to mind the story of that American tourist that got caned in Singapore. Izzara had also cautioned me early on about the way things worked in the Philippines; for example, if a driver struck a pedestrian the incentive structure was such that it made more sense (fiscally speaking) to back up and finish the job and pay for a funeral, than to call an ambulance and risk paying the medical bills.
Anyhow I signed on the dotted line and slid my snorkeling gear into place. Having only been snorkeling once or twice before, I was struggling with a foggy mask, treading water, and preoccupied with my underwater camera gear. I was admiring a baby whale shark in front of me when my fin makes contact with something hard. Before I even have time to register that I had kicked a whale shark, that despite their massive size can apparently sneak up from under you, a set of brawny arm lifts me fully out of the water in a single motion, and deposits me brusquely back in the canoe. I don’t even remember what he said because sheer panic had started to over take me, third world prison bars flashing behind my eyes, but I know that it was curt, like “watch out,” but that I also wasn’t in trouble — thank heavens!
Sophie's External Brain 