How I Spent My Summer Vacation

How My Brother Spent His Summer Vacation. Pigment ink 8"x10" on 11"x14" Bristol Board. Click on image to enlarge (this time I posted large) to illustrate the hidden wonders but only for those who see...do you see my brother?

For My Brother:

My brother, the electrical engineer, Mathematics professor, recorder of flora,

Went all over the volcano mountain island 

filled with wonders and came back with nary a souvenir,

not even a pebble.

I am very proud of you. 

I wonder if I could have restrained myself 

and risked smuggling a seed or branch...just kidding.

No oak. No quercus. No cyclobalanopsis.

Ah! But we have passiflora,

platycerium superbum and alocasia macrorhizzos to start with a few.

Thank you my dearest brother for sharing your summer vacation escapades,

of mountains, streams, rivers, waterfalls and seas,

of forests, parks, preserves and gardens,

rice fields, farms and jungles,

of cities old and new, large and small,

of roads paved, rugged, steep and dangerous,

as if the land and rocks are protecting something by avenging the invasion into

the inner sanctum,

react with vengeance, 

kill and maim those who dare to drive recklessly and naively

in their luxury cruiser.

I see views majestic, awesome, bothersome, wholesome,

Of gatherings with friends old and older and best, 

while I, 

stuck at my desk with a total of seven hours of vacation time

lived vicariously through you.

Thank you for your meticulous capture of plants rare and strange,

with names Latin, Ilonggo, English all equating

to one word and for my lack of eloquence

I filled your wall with - "Wow!"

Thank you for not banning me even though I complained about the technicalities

and for publicly fussing about you and your eyesight

which you continue to ignore.

You really should take care of yourself!

Thank you for reminding me that the island I dismissed long time ago

as boring, hot and dull

is full of wonder and awe.

Filled with trees pregnant with berries on their trunks,

With shape that define the horizon and make it so Ilonggo, Negros, so familiar

I have flashbacks in sepia tone and black and white

 and I am a young girl running, running, running with a stick in my hand,

Whacking the bushes, here and there and I stop,

 for once again I see the flowers and

LEAVES!

I close my eyes:

I climb a tree, 

cradled by its branches and have fallen asleep 

as I envision everything around me:

PRESERVED, 

UNTOUCHED, 

LET ALONE, 

FREE, 

NOT OWNED.

These are leaves,

gigantic and wide as the widest umbrellas or fans which

as kids we propped over our heads when there was a sudden downpour!

Ah yes, leaves so familiar,

caudate, crenate, cordate, dentate, lanceolate.

With surfaces so glabrous, this one glaucous

and that one farinose - is that even natural?

Yes it is! 

Of strange-shaped plants and flowers  

with ties and ribbons, bells, tails, fangs, fins and teeth,

thorns, warts, weeping wounds, 

dripping with sticky liquid trapping prey and invaders.

Of monocot and dicot,

Polymorphous.

Richly taunting our imaginations

of passion, cock's comb, cat's tail, jock strap, stag horn

until we ran out of words we simply called them

body parts that will make me blush.

So many flowers and plants I have, never before in my life, seen until now...

Because you clicked your camera...

while you prostrated yourself on the ground to capture the tiniest flower, the eyes can see.

Will you please stop the car once in a while so I can really see the details of that

mucronate one with intercalary veins along the canals?

Or that elliptical...

(Look out for leaves-of-three!)

Never mind, I see the plants and flowers so strange, so different, mysterious,

bulbous, umbelliferous, velutinous.

I should be happy.

I am happy.

Thank you.

Yet I feel an aching, nagging sensation

Of anxiety and sometimes fear and

my heart sinks...

We never saw them before because they were in the JUNGLE!

But now I see they paved the road and in the midst

a concrete swimming pool.

Maybe they will domesticate the wild flowers and plants

to please the vacationers

and those who come from abroad and buy the wild lands.

Perhaps they will think of some grande idea

and consider themselves worthy for doing something for humanity by

exploring the jungle and fencing it in then turn it into a "Preserve!"

"Fifty pesos admission fee please." (To help preserve the jungle)

 (We have airconditioned rooms and swimming pool)

How grande indeed is man's folly.

And thus begins a new taxonomy of plants:

This one will cost more than the others, we keep.

And cast some as more desirable than others

and label this "precious" and that one "weed' we kill.

I see these words so prominent throughout the island:

DEVELOPED

PARK

RESORT

No no no no no no no no no...

NO!

You and I long for

WILD

FREE

FOREST

JUNGLE

MOUNTAIN.

EARTH.

Let it be...

Thank you for taking me on your summer vacation.

I hope the plants and trees will still be there next year.

I love you.

Happy Birthday!!!

Ah wait a souvenir indeed - the revenge of the shy plants. :)

I hope you are feeling better.

Tsup!

Hehehehehe!

Did you find the rat, the dragonflies, the beetle, the ants, the bees, moths, snake, butterflies, catterpillars...whew!

Now you have poison ivy!

My brother's birthday is not until later this month but since he was the first one to greet me on my birthday (he is 12 hours ahead of our time here), I want to be the first one to greet him, weeks in advance!

A Puzzling Secret Fishing Trail, I Mean Fishing Tale, Maybe a Fishy Tale...

When I was in the Black Hills, I met an old man at Wall Drug Store who told me a secret. Tall tale perhaps. We were high up there in the mountains, after all...

Secret Fishing Hole. 10"x13" archival ink drawing on 11"x14" Bristol Board.

This is one of five drawings I started almost four years ago. This one was inspired by the Black Hills,where there is a little known tale about Trout Lake. It's not really Trout Lake, the real name of the lake is some obscure Indian name which translate to "The water hole below two mountain witches."

According to the old man, the mountain witches were once two beautiful sisters who constantly fought and bickered and did not want to do anything with each other. One day they were fighting so loudly, it irritated the mountain god who turned them into stones immortalizing their angry faces. Now they look at each other day and night unable to say anything to one another. They are surrounded by their posses of even uglier friends. But telling that legend is not my intention. Instead, I am going to share a secret. You see, according to the old man, Trout Lake cannot be found anywhere on a map. The only landmark is the humpback tree by the road after the second Needle in the wildlife circle. There are no entry ways. Cars cannot park on the side of the road because there are no shoulders and so the fishermen have to walk for 45 minutes from the nearest parking lot. By the humpback tree, the fishermen have to descend from the main road by climbing down the boulders. I think there are snakes...

There are no trails. However, one fisherman's clever wife left a Fiesta carafe along the path pointing the spout towards the right direction. Sometimes, some mischievous fisherman would point the spout to the wrong direction, so instead of going down the river, the other fishermen end up in a campground by the First Elephant Hall. When they see the rock walls, they will understand why people call it such. Very few fishermen ever find this fishing hole. Everyone wants to be the lucky one.

Sometimes there are Boy Scouts hiking from a campground farther west. When the canopy becomes thin and the sky is visible, the lucky fisherman knows he is near the lake but dangers abound. There are wild animals living in dens, one wrong turn and he ends up in their territory.

Worse, he gets in the middle of gunfire during hunting season. When he finds himself in the hall of the second elephant, he can start relaxing for he is well on his way...

But all is not clear. There is another den just off the Calavera. Otherwise, congratulations to him. He found the perfect fishing spot.

Now, I cannot really vouch for this story because we had to leave the next day plus I did not want to spend on a fishing license. Plus that old man kept on referring to the masculine gender. Hmph!