Malapascua 2002 - Playing with the Tresher Sharks, Single Adventure Tours 2002 - part three, CEBU

Jenny's father marveled at all my equipment and half jokingly said I would look like a professional Abu Sayyaf Hunter. He said that Calbayog is a very quiet place and that I could relax now. I soothed him, and informed him that I would only carry a photographic kit along. Obviously, my fears were limited to the possible loss of my photographic kit; at this time anyway. I intended to take my aluminum-case full of photo equipment with me for my first tour through the village close to Calbayog City. Jenny was disgusted, because my case would be safe at her parents' booth. She ripped the case from me and put it back in the booth. I thought, that is just Jenny, and turned to her father who casually mentioned that he works as a professional photographer.
He takes photos at weddings and other occasions, which he then offers for purchase. This fact gave us prolific topics of conversation at the nocturnal campfires, mixed with enough rum and much humor (I got a feeling for this typical Filipino lifestyle). Such discussions you will never forget in your whole life, even if the significance is confused by the rum and late hours. A mosquito net was hung up specially for me over our sleeping place. We slept on the floor, which was no trouble for me (even it was a little bit uncomfortable) as I could save the money for an overnight stay in a hotel. From this money I bought enough provisions for all of us, especially as Jenny's father was a fantastic cook.

One morning as I checked on our rum-supply at my favorite kiosk, a youth came in from the field dripping blood, swinging the severed head of a Carabao buffalo over his head. This sight quickly supplanted my indisposition or hangover from the night before, and the memory of our nocturnal feast flickered in my mind. Someone had mentioned last night that there would be buffalo meat at the birthday party today.

Yes, you have read right! On that day the daughter of a respected local-politician celebrated her 18th birthday and I was invited. Unfortunately, my form decreased progressively through the day, due to the numerous rum and Cokes I was offered. All day long villagers came over to chat and drink with me. Jenny's grandfather was also among them (he could also have been the grandfather of someone else). He was over sixty years old and luckily married to a 17 year old young girl, which had nothing to do with his financial background, because he is very, very poor. I know, we Germans booze a lot, too much during our vacations; but we also learn opinions from the other side of the world of what is important in life, if we spend awhile drinking with simple and frank Persons. As one who has passed the thirty years mark, I felt some uneasiness as Jenny's father levelheadedly said that my calendar in comparison with Jenny's 21 years is already full. From my point of view, the sober statement that someone can not love a 20 years old girl because he has achieved a certain age, is complete bullshit. But with this big difference in age of almost 50 years between Jenny's grandfather and his 17 year old wife, I can only join in the opinion of Jenny's father, which basically was: "love makes blind". That seems to be true in the Philippines. Maybe this is one more reason why we men love this country so much.

After that short reflection on the trepidation of getting old, it becomes merrier now again, as we were on the way to the aforementioned birthday party. I was surprised, and marveled as I was honorably invited and brought to the table of a local ruler for political discussions. In this moderate political frame I was treated like an official delegation of my country. The solemnities took their course and it became more and more difficult for me to sit upright at the table. A red rose was handed to me with the hint that soon the birthday congratulations would take place. After a sentimental speech by the father of the birthday girl, the people were asked to make their compliments with the red roses. I heard through the loudspeakers: "And now Henry Wedekind from Germany...". It sounded as if I had come to the Philippines just for this birthday party (What's all this? Everybody becomes 18 years old some day). As I handed over my red rose,I saw a young girl in a red gown touched to tears, who surely at that moment was the most respected and privileged girl far and wide. Everybody could see that this was a totally special birthday for her, which will live in her memories forever. Do you still remember your 18th birthday? I spent my 18th birthday together with my girlfriend and a bottle of claret in bed all day long. Sorry that I can't still remember the details of that night.

Finally on the 4th day after my arrival in Calbayog, it was time to continue our trip towards CEBU. On this morning, 31.12.2001, we started unsuspectingly with one of the bicycles with a sidecar to the harbor. Luckily, our driver (knowing more than I) stopped a bus headed towards Leyte island. Of course, as I was sitting in the bus it was not clear to me if this was bad or good fortune because the bus-driver drove as if a doctor had told him yesterday that he had an incurable tumor. We drove through whole provincial villages without him taking his foot from the gas for even a moment. As we passed by schools the speed never decreased. Only when an heavier vehicle blocked a crossing did he brake, and precipitously, so that some passengers fell forward from their seats and my camera was ripped from my hands.

The trip was extremely tiresome and Jenny fell asleep very soon after the street improved enough for our speed. I did not want to miss the San Juanico Bridge and tried to keep myself awake with cokes and some very sweet tennis balls sized buns. My heavy case was placed at the front of the bus. During a stop in Catbalogan the moiety of the passengers got out of the bus and suddenly I could not see my heavy case. Could such a thing have happened to me? I had to awaken Jenny and sent her to the driver to inquire after my case. She came back with the cheery news that they had stowed my case in the baggage compartment down in the bus, because they had more space there now. In Tacloban they let us out at a service station and ensured us that the bus to Ormoc would be stopping here. After I had photographed some Jeepneys, I felt slowly my needs to visit such a thing like a toilet one more time, and it became clear to me that no bus to Ormoc would ever stop here. If you ask a Filipino after the lavatory inside a bus, you will find the following: Instead of giving you an answer he will cut a old plastic bottle of mineral water for you. I'm sure you are familiar with that, if you have ever had to spend some days in a hospital.

In the meantime Jenny had learned when the buses to Ormoc left. We stopped a trike and drove over to the weekly market. The Mix of odours and strange scenes, whizzing past my sense organs in just a second had made me confused. I tried to retain as much as possible from these scenes on my camera (Do not try this by yourself, because somebody could grab your camera). I did not know when I would be landing again at a New Year's Eve at the Tacloban market, so that I took pictures everywhere!
The next piece of our bus-trip led us through peaceful villages and the usual palm trees. Again and again I saw fields of sugar cane. The seaport of Ormoc (what city in the Philippines has no seaport?) seemed to be very complex and it teemed with "helpful" luggage-handlers who will happily overcharge you later. Suddenly a strong rain set in. By good fortune we had achieved the harbour building already and I bought our tickets for the passage to Cebu City. The only drop of melancholy was the fact that I had forgotten to buy some cans of San Miguel in the excitement, and here it seems, that they had none to buy.

A kindly staffer from the shipping line declared that he would go to fetch some cans of beer without any surcharge. I do not know of any country that offers such a service, do you? We set off towards Cebu around 18.00 o'clock of the New Year's Eve in 2001. Evidently Jenny became bored during the long journey and therefore I had to serve as the source of her entertainment, with a lot of tickling, nagging or beatings in my side. There was absolutely no way to make her stop it. Thereby her eyes glittered so impishly that the fun jumped out of her face. If some day your doctor diagnosed a cerebric tumor in your head with minimal chances of a cure and you have never been in the Philippines (my humor is black as today), you go straight ahead to the Philippines and you will feel again how it is to be twenty and enjoy your remaining time with the funniest and most beautiful girls on this planet. Go with God my son and have fun. By the way don't worry if some of them are whores, you do not will notice that aside from the fact that professionals do their job more enthusiastically. Sure the best thing will be to find true love, but a newcomer will have to first learn some lessons and he will be notice quickly that "bola bola" (lies) are widespread amongst the younger girls. Prostitution is everywhere in the world where poor peoples live, but in the Philippines prostitutes take care of their customers and mostly the costumers treat them like a real girlfriend. I wonder that a movie like "Pretty Woman" is so successful all over the world when such a dream, like the Julia Roberts character, has only a chance to become true in the Philippines. Here in Germany prostitution is still legal, but this service is the worst all over the world. Don't worry Philippines, if they point at you on this topic. It is no disgrace to offer the best service in a thing which you will find in every country all over the world.

In Cebu City it is not very easy to get a Taxi around the pier, but sometime in the night we got one and went to the Golden Valley International Mall. Jenny was hungry now and wanted absolutely to go to Kentucky Fried Chicken right away. We noticed immediately that nothing exciting at all happens in Cebu City during New Year's Eve. Every restaurant, cafe -- simply everything was closed. Some private Filipino parties mayhap took place somewhere in this night, but for us tourists it meant having to snack with much courage on a doubtful street-barbecue in the area of the Fuente Osmena. After that, the best deal was to go to sleep early. Luckily the atmosphere in the Firehouse Bar was as good as a normal day (still the best girlie bar in town).
On the next day we were on the way to the bus station very early. Oh my God, what bus were we driving on this trip? The next 4 hours it traveled along the coast line towards to the north, directly to Malapascua Island. A tiny rowboat brought us to a larger Banka, which appeared convenient for the passage. Then the weather brought an end-of-the-world atmosphere to us. It was raining, flashing and thundering from an almost black sky, truly scary weather, doubly so on the ocean. I was sure that the weather would change for the better during the next few days. Malapascua island is actually a beautiful place, like Boracay 20 years ago. A superb beach hemmed with palm trees, bungalows and restaurants. Now all the drawbacks of my heavy case became evident. I was afflicted with almost an hour with all our luggage on the beach and the sand seemed to just get deeper by the minute. Our bungalow was situated directly on the beach. Jenny criticized all the great windows without curtains (for persons in love, not very convenient). It did not matter, we remedied this situation by covering the windows with some cloth. A larger pail was obtained to wash the cameras I had brought, and Jenny saw this pail as an auxiliary container for washing goods. I could hardly wait for the diving base to inform me about the Tresher Sharks. I was so inquisitive that I left Jenny sitting in the restaurant so I could chat with the Sea Explorers (dive shop). They were telling me that 5 Tresher Sharks were seen on almost every dive at Mona Shoal (a plateau at a depth of around 22m). Sometimes they come very close to the divers. This plateau drops off to 600 metres all around and a school of hammerhead sharks revolves this rock permanently. A first class big fish district. I found out that they dive on this place each day at dawn but unfortunately the visibility was very bad at this time. Obviously I registered myself immediately in the participant-list for the next day. The most bitter pill was that we were to start at 5. 30 AM in the morning. In the evening I had to prepare my camera thoroughly, as we had no electric energy and no light in the morning until the early afternoon. I could prepare everything on the eve before the dive except the cable connections, which I would handle at dawn. I chose a film with ISO 200, which was right I found out during the dive. I had never used such a film in the Philippines. My Niconos V was fitted with a 20 mm wide-angel-lens. Mucks, I had forgotten to ask, how close the sharks would come. The sharks would look much too small in the photo if they were photographed with a wide-angel-lens. They told me the largest sharks would be 4 metres long. I practiced peeing in the dark in the eve so as not to miss the toilet the next morning.

As the alarm clock rang on the next morning and Jenny nestled close to me, the decision of getting up or staying in bed was very hard. I was thinking how it feels to swim in the face of a 4 metres long shark while walking on the still totally dark beach towards the diving base. Bill, a Canadian English-teacher who used to live in Korea, said he'd never seen anything bigger than himself in the water. During the briefing for our dive we heard that these sharks would not become aggressive, which reassured me a lot. The sea was rough and we were going down on the achorline. It was dark and the visibility was really bad. On the seafloor I tried to figure out the aperture which would be right for the daylight. All around was so much plankton and a lot of small things floating in front of the lens, that I was not sure if it would be right to use the flash. Maybe the flash would only light the plankton so it would look like a snowstorm in front of the lens and the shark in the background would be covered up by the "snow flurry". I opened the aperture to 4.0 and the measuring system of my camera was showing that the exposure time would be too short with 60 seconds exposure. So I had to use the flash to get any results. The two pictures above should show you a tresher shark and were not taken to win any contest. I did seven dives at this place, but got only two pictures and only a silhouette is seen. This was the only dive where a shark came so close that he was lighted by the flash. The visibility was always under 5 meters, but it was always very exciting to see when a shark came close. Sometimes you could see the long back fin over your head only. I saw sharks at every dive. Most of the other dive spots could not be reached during this bad and stormy weather. Most of the places had suffered from dynamite fishing. The hard corals are blown away every place. What you see are soft corals only. Some areas looked completely dead and not many fish were found. These fishermen had destroyed the foundation of their very existence, especially for their kids. Fishermen might be thinking: why should my kids go fishing if they can become prostitutes? When you see what dynamite has done you will hate the thoughtless people who used dynamite for fishing and wish them to be bombed out like this lost underwater world.

There are some interesting wrecks here. Malapascua island is a good place for those of you who want to see sharks, big stingrays, wrecks and if you're lucky hammerheads, but make sure to be there between the end of February and June, when the weather is much better. One day we tried to dive at the wreck of the Japanese "PIONEER", but the sea was too stormy. We found the wreck with the help of a local fisherman who used to fish on the wreck every day. He was able to place the anchor directly in the middle of the wreck. He found the wreck by estimations. There were only some small elevations on the horizon to guess roughly. Don't ask me how he could find it, but it was unbelievable. We had checked his estimations with GPS and he was right. Continuously the anchor was unseated by the big waves. I jumped into the waves and tried to reach the anchorline to go down, but the current was so strong that I could not get away from the boat. I saw how the stabilizer of the boat always came down toward my head through the water. I could not surface because of the stabilizer. Finally I tired out, I surfaced beside the stabilizer and held on like a drowning cat. I could not get to the boat and they hauled me in with a line. The other two of our group were waiting for me at a depth of seven meters holding themselves on the anchor-line until the anchor was unseated again. To undertake a dive with safety stops for decompression at a depth of five or three meters was suicide on such a day. That was our unanimous conclusion on the way back to Malapascua island.