Some friends and I were headed for a "Triple The" destination: The Philippines in The Pacific in The Orient. We were going to two locations: an area two hundred miles north of Manila, and the southern island of Cebu. A scant three days before departure, wire services began running stories about apparitions of the Virgin Mary that were being seen at two places in the Philippines. Guess where? A town two hundred miles north of Manila, and the southern island of Cebu. Coincidence? Hardly. Every journey is created by the journeyers. On this trip, I was traveling with a friend who had a rich background in the spirituality of Mary, and who for many years had lectured and led meditation groups about Mary's message. It was no accident that the dates and locations chosen over a year earlier just happened to coincide with Mary's appearances. C. G. Jung first used the term "synchronicity" in his forward to Baynes and Wilhelm's 1949 English translation of the I Ching. He felt that people experience synchronicity when they are aligned with the underlying harmony of the universe. As a traveler, I'd advise travel in good company, and you will always be at the right place at the right time. The day of our arrival in Benguet Province in the mountainous rural north, we rented a coaster (Filipino for "minivan") and headed off for the coastal town of Agoo, where the vision of Mary was being seen. We were ten degrees north of the equator in March and should have had hot weather, but the day was beautiful and mild beneath a cloudless blue sky. We shared the narrow palm-lined road with the occasional slow-moving carabao (water buffalo) as we descended toward the coast through a succession of small farming villages. Above each community, the region's fabled rice terraces (shown in the photo above) stepped up the hills in graceful curves and multiple shades of green. Every town seemed to be having a market day, and we were happy to be seduced by the friendly chaos. Bamboo pens of speckled gray chickens clucked and squawked, competing with vendors selling fresh vegetables on green mats of woven pandan leaves. A pair of children played with a coconut husk while their grandmother sold fresh mango juice and buko, a drink of sweetened coconut juice rich with thickly shredded coconut. There were also lots of other freshly squeezed tropical juices such as mango and calamansi, which tastes like honey lime. Before leaving, we purchased brown oblong loaves of warm kamote (sweet potato bread) along with perfectly ripe papayas, mangoes, and pineapples. As we drove on, a warm tingle at our crown chakras told us when we neared Agoo. We parked away from the vision site because we wanted to approach on foot as pilgrims. The Virgin had appeared on the crest of a hill on specific days, but our intuition had told us to chose a day when her image would not be present, and we would still be rewarded. The open, hilly land was mostly pasture and cultivated fields, with a few dwellings and a scattering of tall coconut palms. We were alone as we walked, but thousands had been here before on the days of apparitions. As far as we could see, acre after acre had been flattened by the multitudes. We were drawn to a low swale beneath a tree's sheltering branches, where a family of four knelt and prayed the rosary in the Tagalog language. We couldn't make out what they knelt before. When they left, we saw that it was a statue of Mary, and as we crept closer, we found our miracle. The statue had shed tears, and the fluid revealed them as tears of blood. We stood there in awe of what we had been called to find. The statue glowed with a calm, golden energy. In the presence of the radiant figure, it was as if we each us was able to lean forward into an undiminishable warm, supportive breeze. We closed our eyes and let the soothing balm wash over us and through us. It was like coming home, and we felt safe and cared for. Each of us received a message. I heard a combination of muffled ocean waves and distant singing. Several others heard a clear voice with the same message: "Lay it down. Just lay it all down." Some in our little group cried when laying down old burdens of doubt and self-judgment. Time felt suspended as our release and forgiveness continued. Most wondrous of all was being there just days after these miracles and apparitions were first revealed. Filipinos arrived on foot in small family groups, not aboard the diesel buses of package tours. This is how Mary appears: to ordinary people in an ordinary field. This was Fatima and Lourdes before they became certified religious tour sites. This miracle still belonged to the people. Where are you drawn? Is there a healing site near you where you find solace? A favorite beach at sunset, a hidden cove in the San Juans, a Native American ritual site, a retreat center that somehow feels just right? What presence draws you there? Send it an acknowledgment the next time you are there. Send a greeting to the presence and see what call you have answered. At Agoo, there were no crowds, and we remained as long as we wanted, but as we silently walked back to the van, we found we were surrounded by people. Had they been there before? It didn't matter. We had released what we had come to lay down, and we departed saying "Mabuhay. Salamat po" — "Farewell and thank you." Something had called us to the right place and time. When you travel, proceed in the expectation of the miraculous, and you'll always hear the call. And don't forget to choose your traveling companions well. As the Asian explorer Hugh Swift often wrote, "When you travel, what you see depends more on who you are than on where you go." • Entry Documents No visa is required, and a valid passport will suffice for a 21-day stay. • Weather or Not Life in the tropics presents three seasons: March through May is hot and dry, June through October is wet and rainy, and November through February is cool and dry. • Getting Around Forget the taxis, because the Philippines has several unforgettable ways to go. The elaborately decorated Jeepneys began as surplus army jeeps, stretched and embellished in Folk Baroque style. For the adventurous, there's the Combination, a motor scooter in which the passenger skims inches above the ground in a low-slung sidecar. • Money Matters The currency is the Philippine peso, which currently trades at the favorable rate of 45 pesos to the dollar. |
Consider the "The" places: The Congo, The Yukon, The Amazon, The Sahara. They're all exotic. It's a law. For a place to have "The" in front of its name it has to be exceptional. Other places, alas, will never merit a "The". The Renton? I don't think so. The Redmond? Nope. The Kenmore? Sorry.