We were heading on the next leg of our trip to the province of Zambales. The Bishop and his wife were planning to stop by and bring a few treats for breakfast. What we didn't realize was that they were going to bring enough that it could have been our breakfast. We had just ordered our pancakes when the Bishop and Nekki arrived. Ah well, we would eat it all. We appreciated these kind people so much. We chatted with him and his wife. They both spoke English very well and were a lot of fun to boot. We were able to get a few pictures together before they left. We then hurried to finish our breakfast as well as to finish packing.
We had arranged to have Normita's brother-in-law, Jun, be our driver today. We had quite a lot of distance to cover, and it would be nice to have a dedicated driver for the day as well as air conditioning. Jun was picking us up at the hotel at 9 am. He, along with Normita and Arcadio, were waiting for us out front as two hotel employees hefted our luggage down the stairs at 9 am.
We drove back to Normita's to be able to spend a little more time with their family and to say our goodbyes. The kids were really going to miss each other. Kristen was so thoughtful and gave her favorite Barbie to Allyson. The kids played UNO while the adults talked. I hung around with the kids in the nipa hut where a fan was blowing and took some more pictures. It was just too hot otherwise.
Chris was able to reconnect with another friend from his missionary days--Elda Aquino. She has since become inactive, so Chris was hoping to help motivate her to come back. Bishop Lazatin even dropped by to meet Elda. We took more pictures and decided that we needed to be on our way. We had at least a three-hour drive ahead of us.
Our first stop along the way was in Subic Bay, a former US naval base. It was a very nice area. We even stopped at the mall for lunch and so that Chris could try and activate his iPad. That took for.e.ver. (And it turned out that it wouldn't even work throughout the rest of the trip). We even found a Wendy's for lunch. They had a little bit different selection, but I think the girls were happy with the choices they made. As a side note, I stiffed the young lady in the restroom twice. I didn't realize I had to pay, and she didn't say anything to me. It wasn't until Chris talked about having to pay in the men's restroom that I realized my mistake.
Before leaving Subic Bay, Chris reminded me that we needed a few groceries for our stay in San Antonio. We would not be close to any major cities, nor have the convenience of Jun's transportation to help us out. That took a little more time and we still had a ways to go.
Our next stop was the mission home just outside of Subic Bay. Chris had been exchanging emails with the Mission President in hopes of finding out information on another family he had baptized in Candelaria. Even at the mission home (where the meeting house was also located) a guard stood ready--finger on the trigger at all times. The Mission President served us delicious mango smoothies, showed us around the mission home, and had Chris talk with the missionaries in Candelaria to arrange a meeting time.
As we were leaving the mission home, I asked Jun, "Can you drive fast?" He was actually quite a skilled driver. I'm not sure that I would ever survive if I had to drive in the Philippines. But it wasn't as though he could get on the highway and just go, he shared the local roads with trike drivers, some jeepneys, some motorbikes, some big trucks. The custom in the Philippines is to give a brief honk or two as you pass someone just so they know you are there. You have to slow down, pass, speed up, slow down for the next one, and so on. It was never ending. I tried to doze but it was a jerky kind of dozing.
We finally arrived in Candelaria around 6:15 pm. We picked up the missionaries from a roadside bus stop. Chris' local phone came in very handy. We drove about ten more minutes until we reached Marilyn Escalica's home. As we exited the van, Jun joked with me, "Was that fast enough?"
Jun waited for us with the van and Chris, the girls, the missionaries, and I took off in search of Marilyn. She knew we were coming, but it was not the reunion that Chris had hoped for. Her husband had died about three years ago, but both of them had been inactive years before that time. Apparently the husband had been offended while serving as the Branch President and immediately stopped going to church. So sad.
Marilyn used to live in a shack by the sea, but now lived in a "nicer" shack a little further away. I thought it interesting as we walked up to her house that a big screen tv dwarfed their living room. She was standing on her front porch next to a washing machine, swinging her grandson in a crib that hung from the rafters. Marilyn and Chris hugged, but she was very stand-offish with Chris and the missionaries. Add to that, Misha got a bloody nose, and Kristen had to use the bathroom. The bathroom was an eye-opening experience for Kristen, and Misha's bloody nose just wouldn't stop. We had to ask for tissue, but didn't want to use very much of their supply.
We spent about an hour and a half with Marilyn, but she didn't soften at all. Chris was pretty disappointed. He had felt strongly that there was a reason for coming half way around the world to visit her. At least she was on the missionaries' radar now.
Jun was more than happy for us to return to the van. It was getting late, and he still had a long drive back to Manila after dropping us off, and we still had about an hour and a half to travel until reaching our rental. Chris found it online, Craigslist maybe. It was a beautiful American-style home in the middle of rice fields.
As we got closer to San Antonio, Chris tried to interpret directions that were given as though you were coming from the other direction. We were truly blessed to be able to find this location. Chris said to Jun, "We need to find Barrangay Antipolo." (A Barrangay is a neighborhood.) Not fifteen seconds prior to that, I had seen a sign announcing Barrangay Antipolo. We stopped to ask directions of two young men. "Do you know where Barrangay Rd is?" (In Tagalog, of course.) They answered that it was right here. We had stopped at the exact spot we needed to turn. We bumped down the road until we turned into the driveway. So nice to finally be there. Jun didn't spend much time lollygagging but helped us unload, received his payment, and was off.
Analyn, the caretaker of the property, had been in contact with Chris and was kind enough to have made dinner for us. So nice after a long day of travel. We got settled in with the girls. The house had two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, living room, and laundry area. I helped the girls put sheets on their beds, made a bed for Kristen in the living room, and once again we all fell in to bed exhausted.