IT
DOES NOT MATTER IF I had been here two days ago. The opportunity of
working out myself on my sweat room without walls is welcome anytime.
I do not mind the monotony of it. Maybe I am sick or it could be
you but, I am sure, it has to be you. The YOU that have had no time
for moments like I loved doing all the time or, if you do have time,
you may be dreaming of those faraway spectacular places where the
purse makes a difference. And how did you fared after that? Or how
many times can you do it in a year?
Yeah...yeah...yeah...blah...blah...blah.
I have heard that before.
No
matter. There is hope after all. You have not mastered your own
self and you are there on the fringes of your daydreams. You should
shift paradigms and dig down into your roots, past that veneer of
Western-style education where you are taught conventional thoughts,
and that corporate hum-drum which generates so much stress on your
body, your thoughts, your emotions and on your spirituality. You can
escape all that and reinvent yourself every weekend and learn to
accept the mother of all monotony by being unconventional for just a
day.
Try
the Babag Mountain Range in Cebu City. IT IS just THERE!
Elevation
does not matter, my friend. It is the effort and, conversely, there
is so much freedom of movement and access, that effort seems to be
just a footnote, to include your expenses. You can not spend so much
just to climb over your fears. Ask some of our friends from Metro
Manila and they will tell you how they have wished they were born in
Cebu or were working here. You are so fortunate that this mountain
range is right in your backyard yet you disregard it for somewhere
else.
Explore
your own backyard instead. Learn the game of Monotony.
Start
with just a few friends. When I begun to reclaim my place in the
outdoors in 2008, I hiked from Guadalupe to Napo to Mount Babag (752
meters) and back each Sunday of each month. FOR ONE YEAR! When I
have gained enough stamina, I roamed confidently the Babag Mountain
Range and beyond. Even beyond that very moderate monotony of one
weekend day for it increased into four Sundays of each month.
Anyway, when you start being adventurous, you develop good relations
with local residents first for they know their places very well.
Fast
rewind: A look at the past.
You
know, I used to climb mountains in faraway places during the ‘90s.
After Mount Apo (2963 meters), you have to cross international
borders to feed more your ego of chasing dreams and higher
elevations. For an ordinary laborer, that would be extravagant and
unthinkable. Running a household and providing education to your
children are more important. I admit, I started on the wrong foot
but, at that time, climbing peaks were bohemian. It was years later
that I am no mountaineer after all and no desire to be. It was just
the wrong choice of words.
Remember
this: Big mountains demand big pockets.
The
word mountaineering has a special ring to it. It is associated with
the legendary individuals who made their living off the forbidding
peaks of the Himalayas, the Denali, the Karakorum, the Andes, the
Alps, the Caucasus and the massifs of Antarctica. All above 4000
meters! All technical climbs requiring all fours, experience, more
time, coils of ropes, gears and special equipment and they were all
appropriately dressed. All can afford it because they were backed by
big industries who loved to plaster their names on every inch of
space of synthetic fabric and by paying clients.
Forget
mountaineering. Be realistic. Just be an ordinary outdoorsman.
That
is what I am doing now. It is September 4, 2016, just another long
sequence of monotonic Sundays. Working out with my fellow
outdoorsmen belonging to the Camp Red Bushcraft and Survival Guild.
Another dirt time. We are above Camp Xi and are in a low ridge that
goes up to the Babag Ridge but we do not have to walk all the way
there. We stop whenever we find a good place to enhance our cooking
skills and, of course, to indulge in a quiet feast. A real fire has
just been started and soon we will have coffee. It is good to be
just a lowly bushman.
Monotony
is sweet but it will not be forever.
While
access to places in and around the Babag Mountain Range are very much
free, why go to places where entry fees and all other charges,
invented or not, gave you so much stress instead of escape from it.
I can always read people ranting in Facebook about these things and I
could not understand why these same people keep on going back to
these places and rant again? I rather choose monotony. However
soon, I expect stupid foreign-sounding subdivision names claiming the
foothills here and make access difficult for us. Possibilities like
these are just around the corner. It happened in many places.
The
great outdoors workout.
The
mountains and all that is found in nature nurtures the mind and makes
it sharp. It expands its curiosity into nooks where you had not been
to yet. That could have been alright with you in your expensive
treks but you are restrained by time. In the Babag Mountain Range,
you are not and you could do it anytime you wished. I just
discovered today a small waterfall and a surviving marang tree
(English: Johey oak) which the oldest locals never even knew of its
existence. A possible heirloom species. Then there is a cloud rat
that has no fear of my presence. These are small discoveries yet it
ensures my workout of mind and body is going perfectly.
What
lies beyond?
The
Babag Mountain Range is the seed of where my great exploration of the
whole backbone of the Island of Cebu which metamorphosed into the
Cebu Highlands Trail. These often-ignored mountain range developed
me into someone which, twenty years ago, I could not have even
comprehended. When I stood on that ridge of Babag in 2008, I looked
beyond the other side and saw my dreams unfolding before me. There
was bigger country out there and there were more mountains and
trails. And then there was me.
Post-euphoria
remedy.
Why
go to these spectacular places just to be seen in your social
circles? I know how you feel when you open your Facebook account and
you are reminded of a memory of your impressive trip of three years
ago. Most of us go to places only once in our lifetime and,
sometimes, twice but, I am quite convinced, you can do it many times
as you would wish as long as it is realistic, achievable and cheap.
Sometimes, it takes just common sense. Monotony is part of that.
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