The rooster took the centre stage. It stood, raised his head and commenced yelling amidst the silence of the dawn. Its sound ripped the ears of the village because the other roosters soon started doing their own screaming. The event was well-received. People got up and offered standing ovation. Each villager picked up the pace and caressed the dark surroundings with their own starter task.
“Wake up, Ben. We have to go.” His voice cut through my consciousness. I slowly opened my eyes and figured out the images in front of me. I reached out for my eyeglasses usually placed at a small bedside table. I got out of my bed and started prepping up. We were scheduled to go to the city to buy supplies for the whole week. Activities like these make me forget what I am really going through.
Argh! The pain that I need to forget.. the pricks of loneliness that I need to ignore. It has been two weeks since I arrived at this small village in the mountain. I volunteered to be part of a literacy program of a non-government organisation. The group goes to far-flung areas and teach the local people of various things: English language, disaster risk reduction and management, livelihood and income-generation, and others.
Volunteers are not required to go to the city and buy supplies. The host villagers do that for us, as agreed upon during the planning stage of the whole project. But I insisted to go. It’s a Saturday and we have no scheduled activity. Together with the head of the village and two assistants, we walked up and down the hills and mountains to get to the city.
At the end of the trail after six mountains, we were greeted by a dirt road. People wait here for the local buses and jeepneys.
This is the first time I am going back to the city after two weeks in the mountain. Sometimes, you reach that point when you crave for a little chaos to get your sanity back from being secluded and monotonous. For me, I need to do it to break the pattern. I easily get familiar with things and go to that level where bad memories proliferate. I don’t like reaching that point where I need to deal with the same pain and heartache.
The noisy traffic jam made me smile. I stood at the corner of the street where I could see everyone and every vehicles moving in and out of the city. I was busy smiling with the roars and honks. I never noticed that they had been calling me. I turned to them when the head of the village tapped my shoulder lightly. We needed to move to another place to buy the other things.
At the last leg of our stint in the city, I saw her walking at the other side of the road. Of all places, I saw her here again. What is she doing here? A sight of her brought back everything to me. All the fear came rushing like a fed river. All the pain popped out like mushrooms surfacing from the ground after the rain. My heart became a black hole once more to suck all the life in me.
You must be logged in to post a comment.