There is a beautiful island called 'Palawan' in Philippines. It's famous for El nido, Coron and Underground river. Unlike the other famous places in Philippines, it's much more peaceful, natural and beautiful with its own beauty.
I had worked in the capitol city of Palawan, Puerto Princessa, for a year. The place where I worked was 1 hour away by bus from the downtown. Once in a while, I visited downtown for buying some materials. Due to the hot and humid weather all the year, it's like a war to come back to my office in a bus from downtown.
Now, the bus called RORO with air-conditioner is available but when I started to work, I couldn't imagine air-conditioned buses. Even buses didn't run on time. They usually left the bus station when all seats were occupied.
For many times, I had to sit and wait in a hot bus for almost an hour and it was a good thing for me to sit and go. While going back, I had no choice but to open the window as it was too hot. With the window opened, my hair got all messed up and sometimes, I used to have a headache with long exposure to wind. Either going downtown or coming back to my office from there, it was always an unwelcome job for me and I always complained.One day, as usual, I was going back to my office from downtown in the bus and I found the sight I've never seen before on the road. What I saw was one big jeepney(Philippines typical transportation converted in their own way) with full of young students.
There are not many jeepneys in Palawan. The most popular public transportation is 'Multicap', which is a remodeled small van. The jeepney in Palawan is usually used for a long distance travel with low cost or loading all kinds of materials. It's very old and noisy.
I supposed they came back home after school. The jeepney ran at 50~60km/h. Students sitting on the top looked comfortable but most of young girls put their feet on the edge and grabbed anything. They even smiled at me. When I saw this for the first time, before saying safety, it was a kind of culture shock to me. Even after, I saw this kind of situation several times. It might be their own natural way of living.
Inevitable situations, instead of complaining, they seem to have learned how to adapt to the situations since early years. We, strangers, could judge them by many different ways but truly, it is nothing but one aspect of the life to them. One muggy day, a smile rested on my lips in a jam-packed bus as I saw them living in accordance with what they had.
Happiness was not over there. At the moment, I was as happy as they were.
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