The Conqueror

July 5 – 11, 2004

So this blogging has become a weekly thing now huh ;-). Anyway, this week is my “conquering fear” week. How I wish my daughter left her digicam, the images captured this week would have qualified for the “most embarrasing pictures” award.

Fear is defined in the dictionary as “An emotion excited by threatening evil or impending pain, accompanied by a desire to avoid or escape it.” Swimming or trying to stay afloat in water without swallowing half of it has become an obsession to me. I don’t exactly fear the water, I love the beach, but my greatest fear is drowning and I don’t relish the idea of being pulled out of the water while half of the population of the island is watching while I’m being revived. Of course, if my lifesaver looks like one of the guys in Baywatch, I would not mind drowning every now and then and besides I know my family and friends would disown me if I become an item in the Bohol Chronicle. I could just imagine how it would be reported - “Near drowning in Panglao : Nimfa Virtucio of the Department of Trade and Industry nearly drowned in one of the beaches of Panglao while trying to swim. Eye witnesses accounts reported that the sea is calm and the water is just knee deep. Investigation is going on to discover if foul play is involve. A good Samaritan who happened to be nearby pulled the victim out of the water and revived her. As of press time, Ms. Virtucio is unavailable for comments.” Yukkk! I could never live that down. It’s enough being called a mermaid who could not swim. It’s not that I can’t swim, I can do a dog paddle but as my instructor, Boboy, told us, dogs do not belong to the pool. Besides, I have an excuse, I grew up in Tarlac, a land-locked town somewhere in Central Luzon, where the deepest part of the river is just knee deep and only used for washing clothes before the advent of the washing machines. And when I last visited my town, the river was no longer there, it has been reclaimed to give way to a big shopping mall. I also had two near-drowning experiences, one was when I was seven years old, when I fell in a big hole on the ground during one of the big floods Luzon is so famous for. Luckily, I was with my brother and a cousin when that happened. The second was when I was in my early teens, this time in one of the beaches of Cavite, I had cramps while a friendly neighbor was trying to teach me how to swim. Oh, there was a third, but this time I was supposed to be on a boat that capsized, thankfully luck was with me at that time, I refused the invitation to join the merry boat riders. I was told that one of the passengers, who is the son of a friend, was so traumatized by the experience, he refused to even step into the water for months.

When we moved to Bohol, I could no longer put off learning how to really swim. Bohol is an island and the beaches are beautiful and the dive sites breath taking, I was told. I often tell visitors that we have the best dive sites and yet I myself have never even seen them. So, I resolved to learn scuba diving in this lifetime, but it would have been ironic if I dive even if I can’t swim. Obviously, I need to learn how to swim! So with firm resolved, and with two friends, Inday and Nelin who like me have been longing to learn how to swim, I am now taking lessons, and I’m proud to say that with just two lessons, I now can swim across the pool free style hehehehehe. As my swimming buddies, Inday and Nelin told me, I’m an A-1 student. Well, bragging aside, I do learn quickly, I learned how to speak fluently the Visayan language within a year, I learned how to drive practicing in a rickety, Jurassic, Wily’s jeep, I learned ballroom dancing with only a few lessons, singing? Well it comes naturally, Filipinos love singing as evidenced by karaoke and videoke bars you find in every “eskina” (corner). I don’t sound like Celine Dion but at least I can carry a tune and I pronounce the words correctly unlike the guy who was in the news a few years back. He was killed by the guys in a nearby table who were so tortured with his singing “My Way” which he pronounced “My Wi”, that they decided to get rid of him permanently. Anyway, being a Gemini might have helped. Geminis are notorius for starting two or more projects at the same time without losing track of any of them, however, most of them don’t get finished. Classic examples, I have started to sew a dress, make a cross stitch picture of mine, grow bonsais, raise gold fishes all at the same time. Result? The dress is in the cornermost part of my closet with one shoulder strap missing, the cross stitch is finished except for the background, the bonsais are growing on their own, and the gold fishes are………… not dead of course, I’m not that cruel……. I gave them to a friend. Anyway, my mother (bless her soul) used to give me hell everytime I start a project and in deference to her and to show my gratitude, I make it a point now to finish each and every project I started. Besides, it gives me greater satisfaction when I do that, overcoming my baser instinct, and treating it as challenge and not as barrier (nobody has ever accused me yet of backing down from a challenge). I also realized that the first step or move is the hardest to do when overcoming a fear, when you’ve done that, everything falls into place. As the saying goes, it’s all in the mind. It also helps of course that I am good friends with my swimming buddies from the Bohol Investment Promotion Center (BIPC), Inday and Nelin. They are both cute ladies, who can almost outlaugh, outtalk and outeat some of my friends at DTI and they are as adventurous as I am. The night after our first lesson, we went to the Pier where the Sandugo Trade, Agri and Food Fairs were held and bought rice and barbecue to bring to Inday’s place to eat.

Back to the swimming lessons. The first lesson was to learn how to kick properly in the water, with legs stretch out and feet flexed. So that’s how I can’t float that long, I’m kicking the wrong way! Once we’ve learned that properly, we were then forced/cajoled/motivated to float and kicked from end to end of the pool and that was in Day 2 of the lesson. We were told that the next lesson would be to use our arms and do the free style, but since we were all too pumped up with our success, we proceeded to do just that and VOILA! We were swimming, baby! We were so excited, we decided to treat ourselves by buying new swim suits, but unfortunately it’s almost 9 pm and all the stores are closed except for the Sundry Shop of the Metro Centre Hotel, but unfortunately the parking lot is full and we don’t have enough energy nor inclination to park on the street and walk to the shop. As luck have it, our friend Edik called and we decided to invite ourselves to his pad, buy some food and eat our dinner of balut, crackers, sodas and chips in his pad. Edik is unlike any other guy I know. He is funny, thoughtful, malambing and very artistic. His pad is decorated according to his mood, this time it’s Mexican, with the walls painted in blue and yellow, even the bed sheets and the pillows match and he has an extensive collection of CDs and wines! We had a grand time raiding his refrigerator and cupboards, I believe we consumed his week’s supply of junk foods. The night in his pad capped the end of a very beautiful day. Oh, by the way, Edik my labs, I forgot to list the CD of Andrea Bocelli on you borrower’s list ;-)