Dumaguete for travelers

You know what,  writing this down induces electricity down my spine.

Cutting to the chase, Dumaguete was a beautiful place. I admired the distance (167.0 km) and the cultural remnants which are photogenic and charismatic. Surely, yes.

But the memories I've had? An eye sore. I've put the holy red flag in that place that never will I ever go back again. NEVER AGAIN.

Being a traveler makes you bubbly and you make the best bubbly words in town. You can raise the dead and you can surely water the plants practically.  In my own little way, I've managed to write this post amidst flashing montages of a failed relationship.

Yes. A failed relationship and a failure to step on the break. Breathe in and out. Think. Meditate. Drink coffee. Wander once and for all what the next 5 years will be without that TOTGA (the one that got away).

Pain and disappointment were emotional registers of Dumaguete. 

YEAH you're right. The Boulevard makes you dine in and out and the luscious pastry shops never failed me an inch. I have loved the place in a span of a 100 meter radius. The old churches and the elliptically swiveled long chairs were picture-perfect spots. 

When you travel, you will embrace anonymity. Being a nobody mattered a lot to the genetic make-up of a traveler. I have never dreamed to be a public figure. Not in my wildest dreams. 

In Dumaguete, it became evidently true. My presence became a minuscule. The crowd was too hot to handle being the last one to know that it was the Buglasan Festival. A simultaneous event with Bacolod's Masskara Festival made me floating. I could've booked a flight for the next day to Bacolod and bathed in the remaining hours--then go back to Cebu the next day. 

The good days were expected but the bad days fought for its glory. My two-year relationship was vigorously shaken. We yelled at each other at the middle of a long queue of vehicles wanting to park near the town center. I called it 'quits' since I walked out the car, and walked furiously far from the epicenter. 

It was a first time. I acknowledged my ego and refused to communicate with them. My anger got the best of me and it opened my eyes that I was indeed that lone molecule trying to find my way back to the hotel where we packed up. I lacked the time to put scrutiny with geographical cues and good thing it was near the port to Cebu. 

At that instant, I stayed long enough in the middle thinking all at once what life would be by traveling solo. The tricycles, the primary mode of transport in Dumaguete, were moving only to one direction and I may have the language advantage but it did not sway them to deliver me back to Cebu or to the hotel.

I was in a completely different place with a soul filled with anger and disappointment. Calling my mother would be also futile since science limits teleportation and wormholes. 

The loud music coming from the town center made me reflect at how loneliness felt. The entire province rejoiced with each of its amenities and delicacies and I was staring blankly amidst Bayawan City's tarpaulin (where my mother grew up and where I spent childhood years happily). 

The night was young and it tempted me to think of riding the best bus to Bacolod and forget everything. It made me scatter and think of a midnight train to a distant planet where my presence will be too tiny to notice. I wanted to shrink and forget the moment. 

A brokenhearted traveler and a loosening wanderlust made me decide to go back home the next day. All the party thoughts of traveling to Bacolod diffused in a glance and the night was enjoyed with a deep slumber in a boat labeled 'homebound'. 

Dumaguete remains to be a vicious contestant in the middle region of the Philippines--but not for me emotionally.