On The Road

The whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land; it is at last to set foot on one's own country as a foreign land. ~G.K. Chesterton

Legazpi City, nestled on the famously temperamental Mayon Volcano (from the Bikolano word, magayon, meaning Beautiful). I was there last May 17-20, and I was captivated by the charm and the appeal of the old-world feel of the city.

There is something sublimely attractive in traveling. In the unfamiliarity of a new place, you stand on the verge of two worlds. One world you intimately know – one that does not necessarily speak of a geographical location, but one that is in you – the you that you carry – your thoughts, your identity, you memory, your world. And then there’s the world that you behold in your travels. In that world you are different. You are taken out of your ordinary context, and what appears to be ordinary to the inhabitants of that place appears appealingly exotic, dramatic to you. Not just the way they eat, or wear their clothes, or the way they drive right instead of left, but more so, because things are different, yet hauntingly similar. You are dislocated, you could be a different person, a totally new creation, but you are still you. You carry with you your world.

The crest (or crater?) of Mayon Volcano taken from the Mayon Planetarium.

It is both a thrill and a disappointment. The thrill comes from the sense of being there, and a disappointment because you perceive that world as yourself. One hopes that in traveling you become a different person; that somehow you are transformed to a person fitted for that place, but you remain you. You have the same way of thinking, same way of perceiving things, with the same tastes, assumptions. One would hope that in some way you are transformed by that visit, by your contact with you alien surrounding, and I’d like to think we do indeed come out changed. We do not remain as we are.

All that remained of the Cagsawa Church is the belfry when Mayon Volcano erupted in 1814 and covered the whole region with lava, ash and debris.


In fact, to travel does not just mean covering great distances, or reaching far and exotic destinations, but more so, it is a learning process, a discovery. A pilgrimage of some sort, where we travel the byways and highways toward a goal, a destination, a place that God has told us of. Travel means being reminded of our own impermanence, of the challenge to discover more, to see what’s beyond.

My hosts, Gino Chua and his wife, Michelle. No hosts could have done a better job than these two. Thanks!