Eternal honeymoon in paradise

Eight o’clock in the morning. That was the time my cousin Raymond was supposed to pick me up at Mercury Drug, Muñoz. Instead of taking the free ride with them to Concepcion, Tarlac, I decided to take the bus instead, mainly because I was too lazy to get up from bed and I just felt like traveling alone.

Five Star travel

Contrary to what I expected, there were relatively few people in the bus terminal last November 1. Perhaps most have already gone to their respective provinces the day before. Also contrary to what I expected, there were no more air-conditioned busses traveling to Dagupan last Thursday. According to one of the drivers, all of the air-conditioned busses were in the provinces; this means that the large volume of people I was expecting to see at the bus terminal has left couple of hours earlier and have taken all of Five Star’s air-conditioned busses. Not wanting to wait long, I bought food for lunch (a bottle of water, 2 Mister Donut twists and a siopao that is more of a mantao because it has more dough than filling) and boarded on the next ordinary fare bus leaving for Dagupan.



I found the travel along the North Luzon Expressway very relaxing. The songs playing on the bus’ radio plus the fresh breeze flowing against my face, while the bus was speeding along the Bulacan and Pampanga countryside, was very soothing. Moreover, the relaxing sensation feels greater the further I get away from Manila. Away from traffic, away from pollution and away from stress that work brings.

Eternal honeymoon

Besides visiting my grandparents’ tomb to show our respect to them during the all soul’s and all saint’s day, we went to Tarlac to commemorate the 40th day of Lola Metring’s passing. From what I understand, this practice of commemorating the 40th day of one’s passing was adopted from the Bible wherein Christ rose 40 days after his death.

All rose early so that we can attend the 6 a.m. mass for our departed lola Metring and lolo Baste. Everyone took turns in using the bathroom. If each of us were given 10 minutes to take a bath it would take almost 3 hours for all of us to take a bath since there were more or less 20 people at the house over the weekend. To avoid waking up early and queuing up for the bathroom, some of my cousins including myself strategize by taking a bath before we slept. By doing this we can sleep longer and we only had to brush our teeth when we woke up. Efficient!


Lolo Baste passed away 2 years ago and I remember clearly that he waited for lola to get to the hospital and to be at her side before he died. Both have waited a long time for them to be re-united. In lola’s passing last September, I am sure both of them are now enjoying each other’s company. They are eternally united and now, they shall be at their eternal honeymoon in paradise.