Part 44: Ride the High Country

Since the very beginning of Bishop Brent's Baguio School, outdoor excursions were an integral part of the curriculum. Santo Tomas, Asin Hot Springs and trips to the beach were regular parts of student life. On February 28, 1910, the first annual Great Northern Hike up into the mountains of the Cordilleras was undertaken. For the first few decades the entire school would take part in this adventure. Headmaster, teachers, students, the cook leading a pack mule loaded with pots, pans and supplies would head north on foot. On occasion even Bishop Brent would make the 250 mile trek; from Baguio up 2000 feet to Haight's Place, on to Suyoc, Cervantes, Sagada, Bontoc and finally Banaue and then back to Baguio.

After the school went co-ed in 1926, it was deemed to be unladylike for the girls to take part in the annual hike. Post WWII the Great Northern Hike had become a class activity, limited to those who signed up to go, usually Seniors and Juniors and now they went by van, bus or truck.

So it was that I found myself part of Mr Pettitt's field trip into the Mountain Province. We were to collect field research and write a term paper that would count as 25% of our final grade. Norman, Curby, CJ, Scott Jazynka and Lulie were just some of students who had signed up. We loaded up a truck with our gear and supplies, gym mats on the truck bed and a tarp over the back half to keep them dry and give those of us riding in the back a little shade. Canvas straps were woven between the end posts to keep us from bouncing out on the rough narrow mountain roads. The chaperones took turns riding up in the cab which was not as much a luxury as you might think. The roads were very narrow, at times one side of the truck would scrape the cliff walls while on the other the outside tires hugged the edge of the road. It was much more scary being inside the truck than in back where we could only see the road behind us.

Our driver was George Latawan, a mountain man who wore cowboy boots, a cowboy hat and US Army surplus coat. He drove fast in Baguio and drove faster on the open mountain roads. I don't think Pettitt or the other teachers on our trip knew it, but George always kept a bottle of Ginebra San Miguel behind the seat of the truck. Now that he was away from the school he was able to partake of his favorite beverage from time to time. Ginebra was very popular among the mountain tribes. We would pass villages where mounds of empty bottles were stored in fish nets, waiting to be taken down the mountain to be sterilized and refilled. The youngest member on this field trip, I got the distinct feeling that quite a few of them didn't like having an underclassmen along on the trip. Some of them complained to Pettitt but he had already made up his mind. So I spent my free time hanging out with George. I helped him each morning to get the truck loaded and ready to go; I became his "sidekick" during this trip.

We spent most of the first day driving, it was hot and dusty in the back of the truck and after a few hours we got used to the amazing scenery around us. But then the fog started rolling in, so thick now that we could only see the road thirty feet or so ahead or behind. Here and there the tops of the tall Benguet Pines poked out and then rock formations, looking like ghostly towers or parapets of castles appeared! Sagada. Home of famed anthropologist William Henry Scott. Clean, pristine, pine forests right up into the town; white and green houses and buildings that looked like Brent. The old church looked medieval which added to the mysterious atmosphere. Sagada was the second largest Episcopal mission in Mountain Province, older than the one in Baguio. Long before Bishop Brent opened his school, Fr. Staunton, another Episcopalian legend was at work in Sagada. He started schools, a lumber mill, acquired a printing press; later a convent was opened.

Dirty and tired we hurried up to unload the truck because it looked like it was going to rain; we were going to sleep in classrooms of one of the schools. Later, when it started to pour, Lulie and I grabbed our soap and shampoo and went out to shower under the downspout. It was wonderful to get the grime of the road off our bodies. Afterwards, we started work on supper. George went up to Mr Pettitt and asked " I need to go into town to pick up some supplies, can I take one of the boys to help me?" That meant me. We left and George made a beeline straight to a local watering hole. He bellied up to the bar and ordered gin with a water chaser and a beer for me. The bartender poured a tall water glass full of Gin and the same size glass with water in it. George drained the Gin and then chugged the water. Mouth open, I stared at him in horror, my stomach burning, beer halfway to my lips. Yikes! He had another, this time drinking it much slower while I drank my beer. Refreshed, we headed back to the school. This would be our routine when we hit a town. Gin for George, Beer for me.

That night as part of our class assignment, a village elder came and told us the old legends of his tribe, of their gods and how his people came to be. George was our interpreter, interjecting his own comments from time to time. The old man told us a story of how the luck of the village had changed when their sacred tree had been cut down. Many years before a group of young men came from a rival village and cut down their tree in retaliation for cutting down that village's sacred tree. Things went from good to bad to worse for the village after that. As we sat around the fire listening to the old man's story George turned to me gleefully and whispered "I was one of the young men who snuck into the village and cut down the tree! Better to cut down a tree than to cut off each others heads!"

The next day we pulled out, headed to the next town. At the next village the local shaman came to read chicken entrails. Apparently you foretell the future by looking at chicken guts. I got delegated to hold the live chicken while it's wings and body were beaten with a stick, something to do with forcing the blood to certain parts of the body. That's me being totally disgusted. Each village was different than the other, not only did the locals dress differently, but the architecture of the homes changed too. It was amazing that from one side of the mountain to the next things could be so different. We were to find that Sagada was an anomaly among the other towns we visited, cleaner, friendlier and more familiar to our Western eyes and tastes. We stayed dirty for days, stopping once at a river to wash. By this time neither the boys or the girls cared about bathing in their underwear, we just wanted to get clean.

The last stop on trip was Banaue, famous for the impressive views of the rice terraces. This time we would be spending the night at a hotel there, overlooking the famed rice terraces. We would have the use of our own beds with clean sheets, flushing toilets, showers and a swimming pool. Heaven. A few hours later, washed, a full stomach we were lazily lounging in the pool watching a single engine plane come up the valley. Thirty minutes later there was a commotion by the bar, and one of my schoolmates came hurrying up. "hey that plane we saw, it crashed! They say some Americans are hurt!" Some local farmers had seen the plane crash and had stopped a passing car to send word to get help. We threw on our clothes and ran out into the parking lot where a truck was getting ready to pull out. We climbed aboard and away we went. We drove a few miles and pulled up next to another truck stopped by the side of the road. There was a heated conversation going on between the local police, the farmers and the occupants of the other vehicle. Apparently the occupants were dead, they were Americans and being apprehensive about handling dead bodies no one wanted to touch them. "They have sent for the PC, they are worried about the dead spirits" someone said. Crude stretchers had been made from branches and blankets by the farmers. Norman and some of the guys grabbed stretchers and headed over the side of the road and I followed. We got to the plane and they were in fact dead and we were going to have to get them out of the plane and back up the mountain. I avoided looking at their faces. Where the seat belts were their clothes were torn and the bones badly broken. They were so heavy. I wondered how their shoes got off their feet. All of a sudden I wasn't so sure I wanted to do this. Fortunately for me there were twice as many Brent students as were needed. Norman took charge and in short order had the bodies out, strapped on the stretchers and mostly covered in blankets. As they filed past me I involuntarily looked at the foot of one of the bodies, it was grayish blue. I found myself wondering at how fast life leaves us; in a short hour the things that mark us as alive are gone. As we made our way back up we passed soldiers climbing down. The PC had arrived.

After we got back to the hotel we had a meeting over drinks, I know I needed one. We were supposed to spend another day there, but no one felt like hanging out. We took a vote and it was decided that we would head back to Brent in the morning. I went to bed early that night, though some Seniors were tempted by the hotel bar.

It was fairly quiet in the back of the truck for the first few hours, each of us lost in our own thoughts. Scott, Curby and I were leaning up against the straps at the end of the truck. It was a little tricky, keeping your balance and leaning back without bouncing out of the back of the truck, but we managed to get the hang of it. One of the girls turned on her cassette player and all of a sudden we were singing along to ABBA and then the three of us did an impromptu dance number to a new song by The Three Degrees called "When Will I see you Again", singing at the top of our lungs. Life goes on.

Part 43: Whistle Down the Wind

"People forget that when you’re 16,
you’re probably more serious than you’ll ever be again."
- John Hughes

In December of 1974 I turned 16 and I was terribly serious (when I wasn't being goofy). This generally was an impediment, girls like boys who are not so serious or too goofy. It was hard deciding on one or the other and the middle of the road seemed kind of blase. The Seniors were cool and seemed so mature, they were on their way to change the world and I, well sometimes I still wanted to be a kid.

Being a kid meant playing Frisbee or Red Rover on the Neutral and Capture the Flag in the Valley. It also meant doing the duck walk down Session Road arm in arm with my favorite girls. It meant sneaking into Paul Bowman's room every night to turn his electric blanket on high, then waiting for him to wake up screaming. Or helping my buddies Mike Kendrick and Tom Lowman build a secret hideout in the ceiling above our rooms. We opened up the recessed florescent ceiling lights to make a hatchway up into the attic of our dorm. We drug up a couple of mattresses and some throw pillows from the lounge and Tommy wired it up for lights and a fan. Tommy was a fun guy to hang out with, he loved The Beatles, martial arts, scuba diving and was something of a genius. The hideout didn't get much use, after all we had the entire campus to hang out in, but it gave us something to do.

Mr Pettitt was directing a play called Henry IV. No, not the one by Shakespeare, the one by Luigi Pirandello. It is an examination of the fine line between sanity and insanity. A wealthy man falls off his horse during a historical reenactment and wakes up thinking he is Henry IV of Germany. A lot of the characters had pages of dialog, Jaime was playing the title character and had a speech that was 3 pages long. We were all struggling to memorize so many lines, and Pettitt was getting really impatient during our rehearsals. He got fed up one day and issued an ultimatum: have all your lines memorized by next week or the play is off. We practiced hard, each of us helping the other work on their lines when ever we had a free moment. Finally, just a few days before the deadline we thought we had done it. Well, most of us did. A few were still having trouble. I had been working with Jaime and Kevin and they finally had it down. The rehearsal came and we went through our lines and a few made some minor mistakes but not too bad. But then Kevin did his part and forgot a few words of his last speech. That was it. I had worked with Kevin in Murder in the Cathedral and knew he could get it down, but Pettitt was like my dad and had no patience.
Pettitt said "it's off".
For days we tried to reason with him but he wouldn't budge. Months of hard work down the drain. Some of the cast were pissed at Kevin, most were mad at Pettitt for being such a hard ass.

A few months later some of us found it rather annoying that Mr Pettitt took a part in the play Oklahoma! Jaime was still pissed and didn't even try out. It was a big production, it seemed like most of the school was involved one way or the other in the play. Mrs. Tabafunda was real busy sewing costumes for everyone and Mrs. Villaba had her hands full as music director. Some of the roles had multiple actors which made rehearsals complicated and confusing. Leigh & Leeanne got the part of Aunt Eller, Kevin & Jim Evans were Jud Fry, Cindy Johnson and Noni Donohue were Ado Annie, Dayne Florence was Ado Annie's father Andrew, Dana Busse was Curly, Beth Wagner was Laurie. I had a tiny part as one of the cowboys, but I didn't mind, it gave me plenty of time to flirt (in the dark) backstage with Marie Strasser and Margie Molina. Kevin poured himself into the role and gave a memorable performance.

Life in the dorms at Brent School was a wonderful, transformative experience. A school within a school, our education did not conclude with the last class each day. Not having parents or a family to guide me, I put into practice the archaic things I picked up from old movies and novels: a gentleman always holds out the chair for a woman at dinner and always carries a clean handkerchief to present to a lady for those inevitable moments of tears. I learned to listen or at least to pick up on a stray word here or there, a look on the face. In spite of and because of my limited budget I learned to give thoughtful, insightful gifts.

We were a diverse lot, we all came from different social and economic backgrounds. We didn't watch much TV after school or at night, we usually sat on the student lounge steps and talked about the books we were reading and what was going on in the world.

Nixon had resigned, Ford took his place and in February we were let out of class to watch TV as a large group of recently released POWs arrived at Clark Air Force Base. Music was changing too. Something called "Disco" was infiltrating the airwaves. The times they were a changin'.

We didn't always agree and many a heated debate that started on the steps of the student lounge would carry on into the dining room, sometimes afterwards they would carry on late into the night back at the dorm. But in spite of it all, in some strange way, we were bonded together.

In a discussion about empathy, Rug once said that it was all relative. Everyone sees the same event slightly different. My worst or best experience could be minor in the eyes of someone else. "So how can we empathize with someone if we don't experience things the same way?" a classmate asked. You first have to admit that their point of view is valid. Then you have to try and learn what experiences may have formed and shaped them into arriving at that viewpoint.

The boarding students were my surrogate family and though the boys lived in one dorm and the girls in another, most managed to form close bonds. Some were to last a lifetime, some were lost, others found again.

"Whistle down the wind, let your voices carry
Drown out all the rain, light a patch of darkness
treacherous and scary
Howl at the stars, whisper when you are sleeping
I'll be there to hold you, I'll be there to stop
the chills and all the weeping
Make it clear and strong, so the whole night long
every signal that you send, until the very end
I will not abandon you my precious friend
So try and stem the tide, then you'll raise a banner
Send a flare up in the sky, try to burn a torch
and try to build a bonfire
Every signal that you send, until the very end, I'm there
So whistle down the wind, for I have always been right there"

Part 42: Holiday Road

The holiest of all holidays are those
Kept by ourselves in silence and apart;
The secret anniversaries of the heart,
When the full river of feeling overflows;--
The happy days unclouded to their close;
The sudden joys that out of darkness start
As flames from ashes; swift desires that dart
Like swallows singing down each wind that blows!
White as the gleam of a receding sail,
White as a cloud that floats and fades in air,
White as the whitest lily on a stream,
These tender memories are;--a fairy tale
Of some enchanted land we know not where,
But lovely as a landscape in a dream.
- "Holidays" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

While lowlanders considered Baguio the vacation destination, we who lived in the city on the other hand usually went somewhere else for our holidays. We got about a week at Thanksgiving and another at Easter, but the longest holiday was Christmas break, lasting close to three weeks. In my first years at Brent I spent the shorter holidays in Baguio with whatever missionary families my parents could pawn me off on. Sometimes I got to spend it at Camp John Hay at a classmate's home. Later, Jaime and I more often than not spent the shorter vacations together with his family in Baguio or at his house in Solano.

I was still nursing crushes on Leeanne and Lulie, but the former had a boyfriend in a band in Manila and Lulie was dating Jaime. But we were still friends and this year we took several trips together down to the lowlands where we'd spend a long weekend at Linda Schwartzendruber's home in Forbes Park or at Lulie Lawry's home on Clark Air Force Base.

Named after William Cameron Forbes (who in 1904 at the age of 34 became the Commissioner of Commerce and Police in the Philippines; 5 years later he was appointed Governor General), Forbes Park was a gated community founded in 1940's. The wealthiest families had homes there; Manila Country Club and the Polo Club were within its boundaries.

Besides the armed guards at the main gate, Linda's home had its own guards at their gate too. Situated right next to the Polo stables, I could see the riders practicing from the upstairs window. The house was enormous, the entry more like a hotel lobby, with a Chinese Rickshaw from Hong Kong under the curved stairway, an antique elephant chair from India and a huge Siberian Tiger skin on the floor. Our whole house in Tacloban could fit into the living room area (really a series of 5 living rooms)! The large dining room was circular and the table in it was too. and there were three kitchens back to back. Despite all the trappings that surrounded them, the Schwartzendrubers were a warm and down to earth couple. He was tall, looked kind of like Cary Grant but spoke more like Gregory Peck. She was dark haired and petite, she reminded me of Harriet Nelson from The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet.

When we went to Manila we would stop and pick up a dozen roses to bring to Mrs. Schwartzendruber. Our afternoons were spent shopping in Makati, sometimes we would catch a movie at the Rizal Theater. Leeanne and I saw Young Frankenstein and Earthquake there. In the evenings we'd meet up with other Brent students, congregating together at someplace like Italian Village or Shakey's for pizza and beer. Afterwards, we might go to a schoolmate's home. A few times it was back to Linda's home to swim in her pool, play billiards and take advantage of one of the many fully stocked bars.

Going to Clark was a totally different experience. It was like being stateside, albeit a tropical U.S.A. American cars and trucks, stores and shops, even the neighborhoods looked American.

Founded in 1902 as a US Cavalry post called Fort Stotsenburg, it originally was home of the 26th Cavalry and the 86th and 88th Field Artillery regiments. Eventually the Army Air Corps established an airfield there and Clark Field was born. A bustling air base at the height of the Vietnam War, Clark Air Base was at that time the largest overseas U.S. Military base in the world, covering 156,204 acres. While in the early days most of it was uncultivated grasslands and jungle, the base grew up and around the old army post, a small city surrounded by tall, magnificent trees. The 13th Air Force Headquarters occupied buildings that went back to the early 1900's. The base was an odd mix of American Colonial bungalows and modern track housing. The Officers' Club surrounded by the graceful old homes with large verandas, was a stark contrast to the modern rectangular block housing of the single enlisted men. There were shopping centers, bowling alleys, movie theaters, restaurants, clubs and schools. In the late 60's and early 70's there were around 8,000 American kids in the base's school system.

Lulie's mother Chloe met us in front of the house with hugs and kisses. A beautiful southern belle, she took a real shine to me and showered me with attention, which kind of annoyed Jaime because he was Lulie's boyfriend after all. But maybe she knew I was the odd man out and was compensating for the agony I was going through. She took me by the elbow and walked me into the house, completely ignoring Jaime. She asked me what I'd like to eat while I was there, she would fix whatever I was hungry for. So we had roast beef, ham, turkey and mashed potatoes, hamburgers and steaks, German chocolate cake, pecan and cherry pies, peach cobbler and ice cream. I was in 7th Heaven. On my second visit to their home she met me at the door with a big pitcher of screwdrivers calling out "Marky, look what I've got!".

One night well after midnight we were sitting around listening to music and talking when Lulie's dad came out in his uniform strapping his side arm to his waist and grabbing his automatic rifle from the closet. "We're on full alert. You kids stay inside till I find out what's going on" he told us. The next morning he called to say we could go outside but we had to stay on the base. Later that morning Lulie got her mom's car and we drove over to the Hobby Store to pick up some leather crafting supplies. She drove around the base to see if we could see what might be going on. The Main Gate was closed and they had big trucks blocking the entrance. The fighter jets were out of the hangers and they were all being armed. Base security trucks with .50 caliber machine guns in the back were driving the perimeter and even patrolling through the residential areas. Lulie and I were out sunning ourselves in the drive way when a jeep drove by slowing down to see if we were OK. It was pretty exciting but I never did find out what was going on.

It was at Clark that I had my first taste of good Irish Whiskey. One night Lulie's parents were having a dinner party for some of their friends and we were helping out in the kitchen. After the meal, it was time for coffee and dessert and Lulie's mom was making Irish Coffee. She carried a tray of cups into the living room but soon returned bearing a single mug. "Mark, taste this, it doesn't seem quite right." It looked delicious, whipped cream floating there with a sprinkle of nutmeg on top. I took a big swallow and choked, my eyes watering, the liquid burning it's way down my throat and into my stomach.
"Uhmm, There's no coffee in it" I sputtered and coughed, Jaime pounding my back.
"Whoops! I knew I forgot something!"

We went to the movies, sometimes to the Bobbit, other times to the Collin Kelly. One weekend we went over to the high school football field called the Bamboo Bowl, to see Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman in "Papillon". We sat on the field watching the movie; I was painfully aware of the couple snuggling on the blanket next to me and vainly tried to ignore them. But they were in love and their happiness and contentedness spilled over, enveloping me in the warmth.

Part 41: The Tempest

"These our actors, as I foretold you, were all spirits and are melted into air, into thin air... We are such stuff as dreams are made on and our little life is rounded with sleep."
from The Tempest by William Shakespeare


I'm sure there were school activities those first few months of school, some field trips maybe; my friends Leigh, Lulie and Leeanne had lead roles in Alice in Wonderland, but I can't really tell you much about the first part of the semester, because I was preoccupied, I had a girlfriend. For some reason it seemed to take up all my free time and I was neglecting my friends. I think they were sort of happy for me although they often appeared concerned. OK, so things got a little tempestuous at times. It was turning out to be an on again off again relationship. We would break up and then a few days or a week or two later we would get back together again. Things would be great at first, but then they would slowly start to fall apart and neither of us seemed to know why.

Mirroring my life, the 1974 Typhoon Season was a busy one, there were 35 typhoons or tropical storms between January and December that year. Not all the storms impacted the mountain provinces, but we had more than our share. Baguio had an early warning system, a siren located near City Hall which could be clearly heard around the city. It consisted of a single or a series of siren wails; the Mayor would determine the number of signals depending on what the weather bureau (PAGASA) would announce:

Typhoon Signal #1 - some elementary schools had the option NOT to go to school, or if during the day, have parents pick them up.

Typhoon Signal #2 - elementary and high school kids go home, universities and government still at work. Heavy rain coming within the next 4 to 8 hours.

Typhoon Signal #3 - no work, no nothing, get home. Emergency/disaster groups and utilities get ready. Heavy rain, strong winds expected within the next 4 hours.

Typhoon Signal #4 - Typhoon is here, don't go out, very dangerous conditions.

Brent didn't recognize the first two signals, it was only when the third signal would commence that school would be let out. I never actually heard #4, by then the wind and rain were so strong that the sirens could not be heard.

There were a few minor storms and typhoons the first few months of school, but nothing that caused the school to close. This all changed when Typhoon Susang hit Baguio one Thursday afternoon in October. I was in English class when we heard the first siren go off, no big deal we heard these often enough; then the second siren sounded and we all sat there pretending to be paying attention while listening with a cocked ear for the third siren. There it was! School was out! Susang struck Baguio on the 10th of October, bringing 30.8 inches of rain in less than 24 hours. A week later and we heard the sirens again, waiting with baited breath for that third siren. That typhoon was Tering and it was followed by Uding 6 days later. This was getting kind of old, it seemed my clothes were always damp. Typhoon Wening hit four days after that. On the first of November, Yaning blew through and Aning hit us a week after that. Each time now you could hear the classes around Ogilby counting out the sirens: one... two... three! The roar of cheers and the boarders would go running back to the dorms to fill the wood boxes with firewood, then to the canteen to stock up on snacks. The rain would start, then came the winds, eventually the power would go out; usually shut down by the power company to avoid injuries. We ate dinner by candlelight, later that night two raincoat clad houseboys would show up, one bearing a petromax lantern in one hand and a thermos of coffee and another of hot chocolate in the other; the other houseboy gingerly carried the inevitable tray of jelly rolls (we had the same snack every night for five years!).

Weekends during these typhoons were spent at Hamilton Hall (although the girls did surprise us a few times by showing up at the boys dorm), playing cards, eating snacks and listening to someone play the guitar while singing along. We would make the trek up the hill, leaning into the wind and by the time we arrived we would be completely soaked. There was always a roaring fire going and the girls would give us clothes to change into; we would line up our shoes on the hearth, hang our socks, shirts and jeans over the fireplace screen and watch the steam rise from our drying clothes.

Late one night during a typhoon we got a call from Hamilton Hall, Mr Pettitt needed some help boarding up a window that had broken in the storm. Jaime and I went over and on the way we picked up a piece of corrugated roofing that had come off the covered walkway. It was really tough trying to hang on to that tin sheet in the strong wind! When we got there we carried it up to the "4 L's" sala and helped Mr. Pettitt nail it over the window. While we were doing this Linda went to use the restroom, but came out a few minutes later screaming! There was a rat in the toilet! When she went to flush she noticed something wet and furry looking up at her from the bowl! Jaime grabbed the fireplace poker and I the tongs and while I held it down Jaime killed it! I was totally disgusted. From that day forward I always look in the toilet first...

Jaime and I were still in our sopping wet clothes, so the girls offered the use of their blazing fire to dry them out. We took off our clothes and I eventually found myself trying to get warm, huddled under a blanket with a pretty classmate in her room. How I got there or where the dorm master was I couldn't tell you. I was vaguely aware that we were both in our underwear (I can't tell you why she was because I never asked), but it never occurred to me that this might be an opportunity for hanky panky! Or at least it didn't occur to me till the next day when Jaime said something about it!

After Typhoon Aning we had a break in the weather and Mr Asiatico decided he had better take advantage of the situation and make his annual trip to 100 Islands. We got to the coast and it was still a bit overcast and the water was choppy as we headed out to sea. About half way out we heard a shout from the bow and Mr Asiatico was pointing out to a pair of dorsal fins a hundred feet or so from our boat! This was the first time I had seen sharks other than the dead ones brought in by fishermen. Two of my classmates and fellow boarders, Tommy Lowman and Michael Kendrick were with me, Tommy had brought along his scuba gear and two extra pairs of swim fins and masks. He had brought along so much gear that Michael and I had to help him get it all in the boat. That first night after supper, we helped him get geared up and he tested out his new underwater flashlight. I was swimming along side using a snorkel when Tommy poked a bunch of sea cucumbers which suddenly expelled their innards! This was totally unexpected and with muffled shouts we swam quickly back to the beach. I guess they were as startled as we were!

Later that night Tommy and I snuck out to swim over to an island that was a few hundred feet from the one we were on. There had been a concrete bridge connecting the two, but Typhoon Susang had destroyed it. Now there were just the supports sticking out of the water. We were about half way there when churning waves threw us against the the busted up bridge. I felt a burning pain on my thighs where I scraped against rebar and broken concrete. We climbed on to one of the supports and Tommy shined his flashlight on my legs, they were covered in blood! He had a bad gash on his hand and we looked at each other and said "SHARKS".
We couldn't stay there, so we once again swam as fast as we could back to shore. When we got back to camp, our classmate Marie cleaned our wounds and anointed us with iodine. Most of the scratches were not too deep, but my legs were a little stiff and sore the next morning. After breakfast we began collecting our samples and answering our worksheets. The sky was clear, it was warm and sunny and the water was calm. A couple of sea urchin fishermen showed up on a bamboo raft, they had long poles with a steel spike attached to the end. They would go along till they spotted a cluster of sea urchins, then used their poles to skewer them and bring them up. I was watching them from the edge of the water when I felt a sharp pain in the bottom of my foot. Thinking I had stepped on a thorn or a piece of glass I went up the beach and sat down in the sand to examine my foot. I was surprised to see a fish attached to my foot! I yanked it off and it left a little bloody hole in the sole. It turned out it was some small species of Remora, about 4 inches long, that used a sucker on the top of its head to hang on to sharks and would feed off the remains of whatever the shark was eating. A great specimen for our science class, but I was not happy that it had been collected at my expense.

We still had not learned our lesson about safe swimming practices because that afternoon while snorkeling alone on the backside of the island we suddenly felt ourselves in a strong current and were being pulled out to sea. After some desperate hard swimming we managed to catch hold of a coral reef. After several attempts at trying to cross the sharp antler coral barefoot, we ended up having to walk backwards in our swim fins.

Nights on the islands were a strange thing. There was no electricity, the only artificial light at night came from our camp fires and lanterns. When it was overcast it was pitch black, but when the skies were clear you could see fairly well. We kept waking up, thinking it was almost sunrise only to find out that it was one or two o'clock in the morning. On our last night I woke up knowing it must be hours till sunrise, but decided to walk down to the beach and watch the waves. I was sitting there, pondering my life, my relationship with my girlfriend that I knew was coming to a final end, when I heard someone come up behind me. I turned to look and it was a wondrous sight. Clad in a bikini, her waist length blond hair glowing silver in the starlight she came and sat close beside me, smelling of lavender and apricots and she was most beautiful. Jaime once said of her that she was the kind of girl his mother warned him about and accordingly gave her wide berth. I didn't see it, she was young and fresh, vivacious and alive. But I followed a code; I had a girlfriend back at Brent and this girl had a boyfriend there too and I felt honor bound not to break "the rules".

We didn't talk much, we shared a cigarette or two and she put her head on my shoulder. We sat and first watched the waves, then the sun rising up out of the water till we heard the voices of our waking classmates. Rising to her knees she kissed me lightly and went back to camp.

A lot has been written about living a life without regrets, but maybe you really haven't lived if you don't regret something. As I rode the bus back to Brent I know I was regretting my inaction, when my girlfriend broke up with me a few days later I really regretted it. Although mutually agreed upon, it didn't end well. Then, as if to put a final period (or maybe an exclamation point) to the end of our relationship, Typhoon Bidang slammed into Baguio the following Thursday, the 28th of November, knocking down trees around the city and on our campus.

Part 40: Routines, Rituals and Traditions

As per my annual routine I returned to Baguio a week before school started. Arriving at Brent things were comfortably the same. Crossing Neutral to Binstead, I peeked in the lounge to see if anyone might be there. It was empty, but it was a friendly expectant emptiness, as if the room was waiting for us to return and bring it back to life.

Yet to say that school was unchanged from the previous year was not true. Like every other year since I started going to Brent, the 1974-75 school year brought big changes. When I got to the dorm one of the first things I discovered was that I was now on the top floor on the east side of the dorm (as a sophomore I had expected to be on the second floor again). This was comforting in its own way, I had woken each day my first two years at Brent with the sun rise, from my high vantage point I could see the tree covered mountains in the distance. I went and collected my trunk and other belongings and then went to select mattresses for my room. My queen size from last year was no where to be found so I assumed some teacher had got to it first. After digging through a dozen or more I was able to find two kapok stuffed mattresses that were plump, firm and at the same time soft. I spent the rest of the day arranging, then rearranging my room. That night I lay in bed watching the lightning flashes on the distant mountains. It was good to be home.

The next morning I decided to take a shower and then head downtown to do some shopping. Knowing the dorm was empty I just threw my towel over my shoulder, picked up my shower kit and walked out the bathroom door only to discover another change. We had new dorm parents, the O'Neils, and there was Mrs O'Neil walking up the steps to introduce herself! Whoops! There I was doing the Full Monty! I think she was more embarrassed than I was, all she said was "oh, my...". I skidded to a stop and did an abrupt about face (in case she wanted a rear view) and went back into the bathroom and wrapped my towel around my waist. After a few minutes I decided the coast was clear and made my way to my room to get dressed. At dinner that night she turned bright red as I was laughingly introduced to them by my former dorm mother Mrs Pettitt. The Pettitts were now dorm parents of the girls dorm. After having them as dorm parents for two years I kind of thought of Mrs Pettitt as my surrogate mom and I wasn't too sure I liked this change.

The next few days were quiet ones, I replicated my yearly routine of collecting my school books from the book store, getting a head start on my required reading, going to the library, making a trip downtown for siopao or shopping. Along with a slew of other kids, Jaime showed up the Friday before school started; he had the room across the hall from mine. Jaime and his family had just got back from short furlough in the U.S. and I was eager to hear of his adventures. One of the things he brought back was a pair of brown leather work boots which he called "shitkickers". I really liked them and so we went to town to see if we could find me a pair in the "army surplus" section of the market. This section of the market was mostly black market goods that somehow made it from the bases at Clark or Subic to the stalls of the Baguio market. There you could find American candy, cigarettes, Army, Air Force and Navy apparel. After a hour of searching I found a pair of brand new black Navy steel toed deck boots with vibram soles and they fit perfectly. Jaime picked up some brown shoe polish and a bar of saddle soap and then we headed over to the Rose Bowl for some chicken fried rice. I tell you of these mundane facts because these items became part of our routine. If we happened to be in the dorm when the dinner gong sounded, Jaime would come to collect me saying "let's go Kid" and off we would march side by side, our boots beating out the time on the pavement, then drumming on the wooden part of the sidewalk of Binstead, our feet hitting the swinging doors to the dining hall at the same moment which would burst open with a crash, a half second pause at the top of the landing, then Jaime would step to the right and I to the left, ka thump, thump down the two steps, our grande entree!

The next day we went back into town again with Leeanne and Lulie to catch a movie and go to a used clothing store we had heard of, the forerunner of the ukay-ukay shops that are so prevalent in Baguio today. I picked up a black cable-knit sweater and an olive green zip up jacket like the one Clint Eastwood wore in "Kelly's Heroes". At the urging of the girls Jaime and I also purchased matching pairs of striped bell bottom Levi brand hip huggers. Now we were stylin!

There were a lot of new kids in the dorms this year, Michael and Susan Kendrick from Australia, Juli Tin, Margie Geronimo, Chris Fassnacht, Donna Stackhouse, Cathy Blowers from Africa, Cindy Hill from Saigon, Marianne Salvo from Laos, Paul Bowman, James Jensen from Liberia, the Lipka brothers from Indonesia, Chuck Wheeler and Joan Barber who came from Saipan, Tommy and Mary Lowman out of Vietnam, and a bunch of Canadians, much to the delight of Leeanne Colvin. There was Dana Busse, Pierre Sabourin, Garth Patterson, Cindy and Kelly Low. Garth came to the dorms with his hockey sticks, I am not sure where he thought he would be playing. I think this was our most culturally diverse year, with the Canadians, four British kids, three Australians added to our normal Filipino and American mix. The Brent student population really swelled that year, my class which in previous years bounced between 11 and 14 students, now numbered 22. Besides the high school students we also had that year for the first (and last) time Junior College students!

The first few weeks went by quickly, class and student council elections; the new Senior class president Norman Van Vactor quickly gaining huge popularity by securing Rug's old room off the dining hall as a private "Seniors Only" lounge. With all these new students, the annual Senior class fundraiser "Slave Day" was a huge success. The auction which normally ran about 30 to 40 minutes from beginning to end, dragged out to an hour and half. Relationships seemed to form quickly that year too, by the time Slave Day rolled around most of the "available" girls had boyfriends. Somehow I found myself with a girlfriend too.

Rituals. We all have them, the little things we do when we get up in the morning, when we go to bed at night. Humans are creatures of habit, we tend to like doing things in a certain order, step by step instructions, bullet points, map directions, the laundry lists of our lives. There is comfort in the sequence, a sense of accomplishment after completing a step. It is an unspoken acknowledgment: we can't control what is happening out there but we can control this. For some of us it is something more. The ritual of my annual return to Baguio and Brent is something I have written about many times; I am writing about it again to emphasize how much it meant to me. I could leave Baguio any way I liked, plane, car or bus. But I had to return exactly the same way each time now. I think subconsciously I was afraid to break my routine, as if it might jinx my new life. So I followed my routine: plane to Manila, taxi to the PNR bus station, bus to Baguio, closing my eyes and waiting for the scent of pine and the coolness on my cheek before opening them again. But there was something else I haven't mentioned before. When I stepped off the bus I experienced this emotional release; like the sensation a child experiences when they think they are lost and beginning to panic when suddenly they catch sight of their parents: the heart drops to the pit of the stomach and rebounds equally fast, pulling with it all the pent up fear and agony, the hiccup before the torrent of tears comes exploding forth with relief at being safe again. This is what I felt each time I returned, this is how much it meant to me.

"I'm back" I would silently whisper, wrapped in their warm embrace.

"... And like he told me, when she holds me, she enfolds me in her world."
from the song "Corey's Coming" by Harry Chapin

Part 39: Reap the Wild Wind

Mindanao has a rich and colorful history, the Moro natives there as different from other Filipinos across the archipelago as the natives of Kiangan or Bontoc in the mountains of Luzon were unique to their region. Upon the arrival of Magellan in 1521, Mindanao was Muslim (as was most of the Philippines) or "Moro" as the Spanish called them. The Spanish were only able to gain footholds here and there along the coast, building stone fortresses to protect them from the natives who fiercely resisted the Spanish rule. By the time the Americans arrived 377 years later they still had no control of the island. The Moros transferred their war from the old master to the new. From 1898 through 1913 the US Army fought the Moros with 4,234 US troops killed.

Then in 1915, Dr Frank Laubach arrived in the Philippines. Initially trying to work in the Lanao Del Sur region, it wasn't till 1929 that the US Army felt it was safe enough for an American missionary to take up residence in the Maranao area of Mindanao. With Camp Overton in Iligan and Camp Keithly in Marawi and a small floatilla of gun boats on Lake Lanao it was felt that they could balance the disruption that a Christian missionary would bring.

The word Maranao, means "People of the Lake", referring to the indigenous people who inhabited the lands around Lake Lanao whose principal town is Marawi. They are famous for their artwork, sophisticated weaving, wood and metal craft, and their epic literature. Realizing that he had to fundamentally change his western views of the Maranao and other Moro tribes he wrote:

"..I must confront these Maranaos with a divine love that will speak Christ to them, though I never use his name. They must see God in me and I must see God in them. What right then have I or any other person to come here and change the name of these people from Muslim to Christian, unless I lead them to a life fuller of God then they have now? Clearly, clearly, my job here is not to go to the town plaza and make proselytes, it is to live wrapped in God, trembling to His thoughts, burning with His passion."

Over the years he opened a school for Maranaos and he developed the "Each One Teach One" literacy program. It has been used to teach an estimated 60 million people to read in their own language. He was deeply concerned about poverty, injustice and illiteracy, and considered them barriers to peace in the world.
Laubach is the only American missionary to be honored on a US postage stamp.
(For a brief history of the Moro Wars: http://www.morolandhistory.com/00.Text%20Document/brief_history_of_america_and_moros.01.htm)

Summer Vacation. Again. In contrast to previous summers I was really looking forward to this one. Norman Van Vactor, a fellow boarder at Brent, had unexpectedly invited me to spend the summer with him. I had known Norman since my first day at Brent; our parents worked for the same mission board and my father had been to their home before. I had visited Mindanao several times, had been to the cities of Zamboanga, Davao, Cagayan and even Cotobato before but I had never been to Marawi.

Marawi was situated on the shores of Lake Lanao. The Van Vactors were old hand missionaries, Norman's folks having first arrived in the Philippines in 1948. They lived in Cagayan de Oro from 1954 through 1967, then they were reassigned to Marawi where Dr Van Vactor served as president of Dansalan College.(Established in 1950, Dansalan College was opened to provide an opportunity for the Muslim young people to gain a higher education. At the time there was only one other secondary school in the area, a trade school.)


So after sweating it out for a week or two back home in Tacloban, I was packed and ready to go when we received a telegram. Norman's mother Maisie had become quite ill and my trip to Marawi would have to be canceled. I had been struggling to maintain my sanity and composure, but now the thought having to spend the rest of the summer at home seemed impossible. Then a week later I got a second telegram telling me to come on down!

So I boarded a plane from Tacloban to Cebu, spent most of the day waiting in the airport for my flight to depart for Iligan, which like Baguio's airport was notorious for getting socked in by fog and bad weather. Unlike Tacloban's tiny provincial airport, Cebu's Mactan Airport was large, sleek and modern. They even had TV monitors scattered around the waiting area and I watched "The Man called Flintstone" while waiting. We didn't even get any television reception in Tacloban, so I thought it was great! Finally, my flight was called and I was on my way! Norman met me at the airport at Iligan which was about the size of Tacloban.

The first thing we did after being met at the airport was to head to a barber shop. Norman told me that the locals took a real dim view of long haired hippies and he didn't want to attract any more attention than was necessary. I wasn't sure if he meant the PC (Philippine Constabulary) or the MNLF (Moro National Liberation Front), but at this point I was so relieved to be there I would have gotten a military style buzz cut and was telling the barber to do so when Norman said No, that wasn't necessary. Funny how I steadfastly refused to give my father his wish and at the drop of a hat I was more than willing to shave my head at the askance of a friend. So this is the cut I got. I felt like Samson after Delilah had his hair cut, as if my hair had been my strength.

From there we headed up the mountain to Norman's home. Marawi is nestled on plateau, 27oo feet above sea level. It was a long drive up winding roads and over rolling hills surrounded by tall Cogongrass. Norman nonchantly mentioned as we were driving that on this very same road the previous week a PC convoy had been ambushed by the MNLF. It was a perfect place for an ambush and it brought home the fact that the civil unrest so far removed from my life in Baguio and Tacloban was alive and well here on Mindanao. Norman explained that as long as we were off the road well before dusk we would be fine. We had some autonomy of movement because of the services and good works Dansalan College provided and the way the Van Vactors and the Laubachs before them dealt with the Manranao people. Still, it was more than prudent to be careful. Norman's summer job was running errands and picking up supplies for the college, so we would be driving this road weekly. (On one such trip we headed back home late in the day when we were stopped by a column of PC. They ordered us to haul them back to the army camp in Marawi. I was pretty nervous, as were the soldiers in the back of the truck, keeping their eyes peeled for MNLF soldiers)

Maise Van Vactor was propped up with pillows and wrapped in a blanket when we walked in the door, but she greeted me warmly. A beautiful woman, she had sparkling mischievous eyes and a matching smile. She held out her arms and gave me a vigorous hug. I knew right then that I was going to have great time there. There was the sound of rapid scampering feet and here came their dachshund Willy at full speed sliding around the corner. He may have been 14 years old but he still had a lot of energy! Norman showed me to his room where I could stow my bag and pointed out the bullet hole in the wall above his bed, a recent addition. He had been reading in his room and his mother was hanging up some clothes in his closet when it happened. That night we were on the veranda and I saw flashes of light on the horizon. "Look," I said "there is a big thunderstorm over there".
No, that is artillery fire.
Another grim reminder of the conflict, for the first time I realized that there was a "real" war going on here.

We spent the weekdays plying between Iligan and Marawi, picking up lumber, building materials, groceries and other supplies for the college. Weekends we toured the town and its markets: shiny brass urns, pots, platters and gongs, wavy bladed kris swords, hand woven and dyed fabrics; I picked up some cotton batik for my mom. I thought about buying a Malong. Here most men and women wore malongs, a traditional "tube skirt" like the sarong worn by peoples in Indonesia and Malaysia. The most beautiful are made by Maranao, Maguindanau and T'boli weavers. They can function as a skirt for both men and women, a dress, a blanket, a sunshade, a bedsheet, a hammock; most of my friends used them to sleep in.

There were around 20 waterfalls in the Iligan area, I don't remember which ones we went to but I do know we went to Maria Christina falls, where we swam in the cold water. We also boated and swam in Lake Lanao. When Norman and his family moved to Marawi in 1968 he had to leave his beloved banca (outrigger canoe) behind. So he found plans for a English style punt in Popular Mechanics and the maintenance shop of the college built it for him. It was 18 ft boat powered by a Johnson 4 horse engine, great for the calm waters of Lake Lanao. I was in the water swimming when Norman crawled back in the boat and started up the engine, and took off across the lake. He was just a speck on the other side and I was beginning to wonder how long I could keep treading water when he began heading back towards me. I was pretty tuckered out by the time he got back to pick me up.

Besides the truck, we also drove his families Toyota Crown. Crown was Toyota's top of line luxury model, it came in coupes, sedans and station wagons. In Japan the sedans were used for limousines but for some reason Toyota never really tried to market the Crown very strongly in the US. The Van Vactor's Crown was only a lowly station wagon, but underneath the unassuming hood was a souped up hot rod! Due to the increasing violence in the area it had been decided that, in case of an emergency, the already large engine should be modified for quick get-aways. A Hurst speed shifter and a Holley 4 barrel double carburetor had been installed and that wagon could fly! We would drive the "old family wagon" when ever we could. Norman would depress the accelerator and you could hear the click of the Holley kicking in. It was quite a sight to see a plain old station wagon burnin' rubber! The 26 mile drive from Marawi to Iligan that normally took us around an hour or so in the truck could be be cut down to 20 minutes if there was no traffic! Norman really loved to put the wagon through her paces. He had been given some evasive driving lessons (including controlled braking and 180 degree spins) and was eager for any excuse to practice. Decades before the term Tokyo Drift came into common usage, Norman was busy on the mountain roads honing his shifting and braking skills. One night we flew down the mountain, reaching speeds up to 124 miles an hour! I swear I could feel the front end lifting off the road!

One of the services the College provided was a clinic. Part of Norman's job included driving the nurse to villages in the area. One night Norman, his brother Ross and I were parked in front of a Datu's (Chief headman) house, waiting for the nurse to finish her work, it was getting late and we were eager to get back home. It got darker and then I heard Norman hiss:
Whatever you do, don't make any sudden moves, keep your eyes straight ahead!

Then a dozen or so heavily armed men came filing by on either side of the car. We kept still and pretended they didn't exist. They went into the house and we continued to wait. Finally, Norman said I guess we had better go see what is going on. I had strong misgivings about getting out of the car but didn't want to sit in it alone either so followed him into the house. We were greeted and welcomed into the Datu's living area and were offered refreshments. As the servant went through a door way that was blocked off by a large batik curtain I saw an astounding sight: dozens of shiny new M-16s, a 50. caliber machine gun, rocket propelled grenades and box after box of ammunition. I quickly averted my eyes thinking to myself, "We're all gonna die", but half a hour later, we finished our snacks and were on our way home. I gained a lot of empathy for these people whom I now saw were just farmers trying to hang on to their land and way of life from the ever encroaching land grabbers and speculators. This did not necessarily make me feel any safer, but at least I was able to begin to see their point of view.

Then it was time to head back to Tacloban. It had been a wonderful summer, the best in so many years and I was so grateful to the Van Vactors for letting me come in spite of her illness and told them so repeatedly, but I was surprised to see tears in her eyes when Mrs Van Vactor hugged me goodbye.

Part 38: Mourning Becomes Electra

With conclusion of "Joseph", work began on Everyman, a medieval morality play, to be performed once again at Brent's St Nicholas Chapel. Rug surprised everyone by promoting Gordon Strachan from his role of archbishop (in the play Murder in the Cathedral) to the role of God in Everyman! This was definitely not a case of typecasting! Jaime got the role of Death, Elmer was the Messenger. There were new faces to our theater group as well: Paul Becker got the lead, his brother Mark was Fellowship, Fred Thomas was Kindred, Robert Rivera was Good Deeds, Norman Van Vactor got the role of Knowledge (Everyman I will go with thee and be thy guide); and as for me, well I was relegated to lying under the front pew, holding a flashlight to provide extra lighting at key moments during the play. But at least I got a front row view!

This play turned out to be a real crowd pleaser and was another feather in Rug's cap! And he didn't slow down; right after the last performance of Everyman, he caught a flight to Italy so he could direct "The Most Important Man" by Pulitzer prize winner Gian Carlo Menotti. He returned three weeks later with autographed postcards from the theater signed by Mr Menotti for us!

Time was moving swiftly. The mile posts that signaled the final days of the school year came and went: Senior Skip Day, the Science Fair, PRISAA Nationals, Field Day and the Junior-Senior Prom. Even at Brent, where a single school year could hold an eternity of lifetimes, another year was all too quickly coming to an end. Teachers and students, people we had loved, laughed and lived with, would be leaving. Most we would never see again. Growing up with a transient lifestyle I knew this and comprehended it. But I wanted an end to the constant changes and movement. I wanted permanence. I tried to extract the most out of each moment, sucking up words, memories and mementos, storing them away, as if that could somehow slow the march of time.

I wasn't the only one who felt this way, the little farewells were taking place. Cathy McAlister had just been reunited with her boyfriend Nathan and now they would be separated again when she left for college. Daily now, faculty and staff would approach and hug graduating seniors like Jean Clark, Ginger Hamilton and Michelle Woods, some they had known their entire lives; now they were about to enter universities in the United States, a country they barely knew.
Then one day before graduation, Peg appeared with a pasiking on her back. Peg Hamil. Always quick to put me in my place, to correct my mistakes, pointing out errors in my judgment and thought process. More than any other friend she molded and shaped me. Typical anti-establishment Peg, she was leaving, not waiting around for graduation day. Her friends gathered around for hugs and goodbyes and she turned to go. Beth started sobbing and turned away, but Renee and I walked with her to the gate. She gave us some last words of advice and a whack on the head for good measure. We watched her figure growing smaller as she walked down Brent Road; I turned to say something philosophical to Renee (whose eyes were streaming) and she slugged me. Renee hit harder than most guys, her punches always left huge bruises. It was just her way of telling me to shut up.

The Jenista's were moving on. Mrs Jenista full of life and laughter; standing me up and singing in the dining hall impromptu! Mr Jenista brought history to life for me. Connections, he would say, it was all about connections. Random acts strung together precipitating monumental events. He showed us how the actions of individuals and governments could affect events decades or centuries later. He taught me to soberly reflect and review, not to be so caught up in the emotions of the moment. I wondered how it would be to grow up in the Philippines, to graduate from and then come back and teach at Brent, then have to leave again. Was it what he thought it would be, was the experience diminished by the changes at Brent?

And Rug was leaving us too. We had a going away party for him one night, Leigh and I went to town and picked up a bottle of wine as his going away present and we made him a card put together from the programs of the different plays he had directed. Later that night, after the throng had left, there remained those closest to him: Leigh, Elmer, Jaime and myself. He shared the wine, shared some advice, shed some tears. Of all my teachers he affected me the most. Not so much with his constant strive towards excellence and perfection, but in showing me that before one can stand firmly behind ones convictions first he must reflect upon his own character, its weaknesses and flaws before passing judgment on others. This has always been hard for me because it runs contrary to my upbringing. But I strive for it everyday.
Then, just as suddenly as he came into our lives, Rug was gone.



"...And that's the end. He passes away under a cloud, inscrutable at heart, forgotten, unforgiven and excessively romantic. Not in the wildest days of his boyish visions could he have seen the alluring shape of such an extraordinary success. For it may very well be that in the short moment of his last proud and unflinching glance he had beheld the face of that opportunity, which like an Eastern bride had come veiled to his side. But we can see him an obscure conqueror of fame tearing himself out of the arms of a jealous love at the sign, at the call of his exalted egoism. Is he satisfied quite now, I wonder? We ought to know. He is one of us and have I not stood up once like an evoked ghost to answer for his eternal constancy? Now he is no more, there are days when the reality of his existence comes to me with an immense, with an overwhelming force and yet upon my honour there are moments too when he passes from my eyes like a disembodied spirit astray amongst the passions of this earth, ready to surrender himself faithfully to the claim of his own world of shades..." from Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad