August in Spain 6

Our stay here in Spain/Europe has been a roller coaster of feelings and emotions, sensory overloads of sites and various sceneries.

We were coming home from our pretty satisfying trip from Fatima, Portugal when we found out about Imelda’s Mom passing away. There was a lot of joy and laughter from the trip and then we had to deal with a friend’s mourning.

Last weekend we visited Ronda, Spain, an indescribably gorgeous place. Here are some sample pictures after the fact. Did you notice the makahiya plants in pots? These we found in the former house of Saint John Bosco, which is now a museum.

But a day or so later we got a call from the States about Robert’s brother’s condition. Cesar has battled cancer for the last three years. He was in La Mirada with us before we left for Spain, trying to get treatment from the City of Hope. As you may have heard, his cancer has spread and he developed some infection.

Last night we went and watched the movie The Bourne Ultimatum. It was a great movie and we were talking about it on the way home when Robert got a text message from his sister saying Cesar has turned for the worse. When we got home he immediately called the US. It was heart wrenching to see him struggle to talk with Cesar who’s almost breathless in his effort. I can feel for them with my sister Atching Auring just passing away a couple of months ago. Robert was going to wait for a military space-available flight but with this latest news, both he and Mary decided to go via commercial flight. They’re just waiting for confirmation of their booking right now and the earliest they could go is tomorrow morning.

This morning Donna and I went with Robert on base to drop off Mary to work. We had breakfast and I immediately went on line and sent eMails to everybody informing them of the latest news. I was chatting with Leda’s daughter Lera and told her to tell my father-in-law the news about Cesar. Robert received the letter sent by Cesar's doctor saying ‘His prognosis is not good”. Robert cried again when he saw the letter. He was going to present it to the base Red Cross.

These may very well be my last chance to go on line on base since Mary and Robert, our sponsors to come into the base, are leaving. She won’t be back till early next month before the group goes to Fatima and Robert will probably stay in the US through November.

On our trip to Germany, I ran out of room on my 512 MB digital camera memory stick not realizing it can only hold 300 pictures at a time. I was in a panic mode for a minute till Stacy said she had an extra memory stick with her that I can borrow. I sent Ed an eMail showing him the 111 GB portable hard drive that I got from the base exchange to which I’ve downloaded all my pictures. These pictures have started to overload my 32.5 GB lap top hard drive. I told Ed he can get the same thing so he can download his Europe pictures through my lap top.

When we were in the Philippines, Donna and I barely watched any of the local TV shows but since we got here in Spain, we’ve been watching almost every night, Pinoy Big Brother, Game Ka Na Ba?, Deal or No Deal and especially Wowowee. These are those VHS tapes sent to Mary by Rose from Japan which she records off of her TFC. That’s short for The Filipino Channel. The other night we watched the Wowowee show recorded in Chicago the night after we flew back to California in July. We saw friend Patrick Mangulabnan in the audience. Our kompadre Rudy Gomez, husband of Eph’s Ninang Jane was supposed to be with the Bigatens but there were so many of them we didn’t even see him in the crowd. We heard he got eliminated in the first round.

We've Just Seen...

BOURNE ULTIMATUM!

Dang good movie!

August in Spain 5

I'm hoping my cough is on its way out because I had a good night sleep. The phone ringing woke me up this morning. It was Robert's sister Mila calling from Las Vegas. Robert has already dropped off Mary to work so Mila gave me the message to tell Robert about Cesar.

He started feeling bad last Friday so he rested up all through Saturday but developed a 104F fever by Sunday. He was taken to the Carson City/Tahoe hospital yesterday morning. After Robert's phone calls, he found out that the fever was due to a urinary infection. With Cesar's condition however, a slight change in body temperature is never good. Let's say a little prayer for him and his family.

Donna and I decided to get up and walk on the beach. It was a little past 8 in the morning and the beach was by no means deserted but the usual crowd's not there yet. The sand was cool and so was the water. There was hardly any breeze and yet there are fairly big waves crashing on the sand. The pictures below were actually taken at a different time. I just want to show you how beautiful this place is.

There were some dog lovers playing with their dogs, a couple swimming with one and another tossing a ball on to the water with his dog swimming and retrieving it. It made us heart sick for our dog Indo in the Philippines.

I took a nap when we came back. Robert arrived from the base around noon, we had lunch and then he drove us here.

He's looking into transportation by rail to Granada. Donna and I are thinking of visiting during our 'free days' before our friends get here towards the end of the month.

I still haven't figured out how to post pictures into my blog. I've uploaded most of them to http://www.flickr.com/ so you may visit the site if you want to check them out. Since we're not quite done with our extended European vacation, I have not uploaded my European pics yet.

August in Spain 4 - Ronda, the 1st Time

Saturday, August 18
Mary was reading the book A Mighty Heart a few weeks ago. When she was done, I started reading it since I’ve been done with my niece Mina’s Cold Eyes. The fate of Daniel Pearl was a known fact. The book was still an interesting read with his wife Mariane Pearl talking about her life with her husband and detailing the efforts for his rescue after he was kidnapped by Pakistani Islamic extremists.

We went to church this evening at the 5 pm mass. We try to go when Robert plays guitar and sings with the choir. Then we went on line to book our flights and accommodations for our trip to Barcelona next month. Once we’re done with that, we had pizza for dinner and then we went to the movie theater on base to watch A Mighty Heart with Angelina Jolie. As expected, the movie was pretty predictable. I would have rather watched Bourne Ultimatum but they won’t show it till Thursday evening. It’s showing tomorrow as well but, we’ll wake up early to go to Ronda.
Cool.

Sunday, August 19
My cough got worse overnight. I had very little sleep but I was still excited to get up once Mary knocked on our door for us to get ready on our trip.

We drove out around 9:30 towards Ronda. Mary and Robert have all kinds of books, brochures and leaflets regarding European travel. Based on what I’ve read about Ronda and the pictures I’ve seen, it’s a must-see-place here in Spain. He loved the place so much that Orson Welles’ ashes were supposed to have been scattered there. Ernest Hemingway had a lot of good things to say about the place. Our friend Alicia’s daughter Jane has asked if we’ve been there as well. They live in London but her dad is Spanish and I’m assuming she’s known of Ronda from previous visits, perhaps?

It took us about an hour and a half and it was pretty hot when we got there. Robert parked by the bull ring and we walked from then on. Reading about it and looking at pictures on travel brochures is nothing compared to experiencing Ronda in person. It seems as if the town was constructed above sheer cliffs. For me, its main attractions are its bridges. Of course it has a number of pre-historic churches as well. There was quite a bit of uphill and downhill walking through streets of cobblestones.


Check out the ancient Arab Baths below.


I slept all through the drive back due to lack of sleep from the night before. We got back at around 5. BourneUltimatum was showing at 6 on base but we’re all pretty beat so I didn’t even bring it up.

Monday, August 20
We woke up around 9 today, grabbed a quick bite then we went out to walk on the beach. It was fairly early so there weren’t too many people on the beach yet. On the way back however, was a different story. In a matter of about 45 minutes the number of people has almost doubled with a lot of them walking from their cars trying to stake a spot. I noticed there were quite a bit of elderly people and really young kids. While Donna and I were walking, I couldn’t help but think how fortunate we were to have the chance to be soaking up the sun on a beach in Southern Spain on a WORK DAY!! How sweet is that??!!

I’ve been chatting with a friend of mine on line and he’s been voicing out his frustrations in life in general. I try to tell him each one of us has his own cross to bear. Mine may not be as heavy as his, or so he thinks anyway, but I, nevertheless, do have my own cross to bear. And I put the emphasis on the fact that no matter how it seems so difficult on whatever it is we’re going through, some bloke out there is in even much deeper sh*t than we are. We just have to step back once in a while and count our blessings.

Robert calls Romar and Girlie quite often. He was saying Girlie is almost done with her masters. She’s supposed to graduate next year. I can tell how proud Robert is on her accomplishments. She’s all happy when he told her he’s staying a bit longer this time when they visit the US in October.

August in Spain 3 - 1st JASHSians Leave Spain

Thursday, August 16
Donna woke me up so we can say goodbye to everyone. They were almost ready to go and I just helped out a bit by taking some of their suitcases outside to be loaded into the trunk. Mary has already arranged for a cab to be out front by 5 am and it came right on time. She gave Stacy her Starbucks Germany coffee mug as a replacement for the Starbucks Frankfurt mug that broke. It was sad to see them go and that we’re going to be by ourselves again, at least for a couple of weeks until the last batch of friends arrive towards the end of the month.

We went back to sleep once they were gone. Robert had some bad news when he came back. At check in, Stacy and Daniel didn’t have their flight from Madrid to the US.

I immediately sent Nestor an eMail informing him of the situation. He’s actually inquired from me through eMail and a phone call last night if their flight was confirmed. I got an acknowledgement from him through his reply.

While on line I posted our London adventures.

Friday, August 17
We’ll have several ‘free’ days before the last batch of friends arrive so Donna and I were thinking of looking on line to see if we can find some cheap flights and accommodations for Barcelona so we’ll have a chance to check out Sagrada Familia (Holy Family Cathedral), the church designed by famous Spanish architect Gaudi. Construction was started in the 14th century. It was so extensive that it hasn’t been completed.

We found some reasonable rates but not till mid September. When we came from Tenerife, our Spanair flight got delayed for more than three hours. For our troubles, the airline gave us a couple of 25% discount coupons. We’ll have to find out how to go about redeeming those discounts.

Nestor sent me an eMail saying Stacy and Daniel called from Atlanta and they finally got their flight from Madrid to the US. The bad news – Nido eMailed and told us they’re missing one piece of luggage and in it is his most priced possession, his old sure-shot SLR camera and yes it still utilizes FILM! Mary sent him a reply that whoever finds it will surely give it back to him because the camera was so old along with the proliferation of digital cameras nowadays that they wouldn’t know how to use it!!

I posted my Germany blog but was unsure of most of the places we visited so I sent Lilibeth an eMail asking her exactly where we went. In the next couple of days I’ll probably have to go back and make some corrections on my Germany blog.

Note: I've already added Lilibeth's corrections. See bottom of 'Germany' post.

While on line I was able to chat with a few people from the Philippines. Our friend Bishop Mallari who was just assigned as President of Assumption University will be going to the States for the Coronation of the Virgen de los Remedios in September. I told him it’s too bad we won’t leave Spain till October 4 so we won’t get to meet. Another friend, Apung Sito (he’s the one who officiated our 30th Wedding Anniversary celebrations in the Philippines last year) is also getting transferred out of his Pilar Village parish of the Holy Trinity. But he may also go to Canada for the coronation. Apung Bobet (as Bishop Robert Mallari is affectionately called) and Apung Sito were the two priests who blessed our home at our housewarming ceremonies on December 23, 2006.

In the meantime my niece Mary Jane said a typhoon is currently wreaking havoc dumping a lot of rain in the Philippines and creating land slides in some areas. She also said that Kong Naring has seen Kong Orling in Guagua since they’ve been back from the States and that he’s doing pretty well on his heart bypass surgery except for some pains on his leg.

On our flight from London to Germany there were quite a few people coughing so Donna concluded I must have caught the cold virus because I developed a sore throat before we left Germany and I now have this nagging cough from a chest cold.

I’ll just have to say it here that we owe our friends Ric Bondoc and Roland Canlas a bundle of thanks for showing us around London and along the same line, new found friend Lilibeth was so gracious in giving us a tour of Wiesbaden, Mainz and Frankfurt. We wouldn’t have seen all those nice places without their assistance.

When we got home Robert prepared a lot of food for dinner. They invited a bunch of their friends. Two of them are the couple (Mark and Flor) that Imelda and Dan met on the plane on their flight to Jerez and another was Rey, he’s the one with the BMW SUV who helped us pick up Emy and family from the airport. After dinner the guys occupied their time playing various games on Robert and Mary’s Wii. One of their guests, Gary liked it so much and said he’ll get his own Wii from the Navy Exchange first thing in the morning!

Saturday, August 18
We just came from church and Robert has already booked our Barcelona flight and accommodation for September. The discount coupons, by the way, aren't as legit as we thought. Donna called Spanair and found out the tickets are more expensive using the coupons. It's less expensive to book Spanair flights on line. I think they gave those away to make passengers feel a little better for their delayed flight.

And we might go to Ronda tomorrow!

Woohoo!!