Alona Wrap Up
I have wrapped up my third trip to Alona Beach. experienced Alona in a different way this time around. This was the first time that I had not traveled here alone. In fact this is the first time I have traveled alone a few years.
At various times I have Brendon and Katheryn from Uljin, EPIK Kory and EPIK Megan, EPIK Micah, and Willy also there on the beach. It was a different way to experience Alona and it was nice to share my favorite place with some good friends. It made me much more social. I hardly watched a single TV show or movie.
My friends also introduced me to parts of the beach that I didn't know about. One great find was Lost Horizons which had 25 peso rhum cokes until 10pm. We spend a couple of nights playing poker there listening to live music. We simply used the coins (1, 5, and 10 pesos) as chips. This was also the first time I saw Brendon and Kathryn drunk.
We can attribute the discover of the 25 peso rhum cokes to Brendon who went down to the CR between hands of cards. After what seemed like a long time he came back up and held up his hands and in his most serious voice said "Ok, everybody shut up". After getting our attention he explained "25 peso rhum cokes... how many do we need?"
As you might have guessed from the pics we went to a cockfight. It was my first time gambling at one. We made friends with a security guard named Micheal who was able to nagivate the confusing and rowdy bet making process. It works something like the stock exchange. One yells and makes hand signals until you fine someone with an opposite bet. Sometimes you have to give odds. For example you might bet 500 pesos but you might only get 400 pesos if you win.
I did rather well and started doubling my bets until I got to 2000 pesos. Before that match Michael and I disagreed on which chicken to bet on. I felt one was more aggressive than the other. Michael disagreed and I went with his experience. When the rosters where dropped mine simply stood there doing nothing. The opponent decided he wasn't having this and jumped up on the fence and looked like he was about to jump into the crowd... razor blade and all. Anyways I lost and that was the end of that. I was ahead over all and I bought Michael dinner.
I took three courses to upgrade my diving license. I got certified in CPR and I am now a Rescue Diver. Rescue Diver was tough and a lot more work than I had anticipated. I involved a lot of swimming around the ocean while dragging an unconscious diver, giving them rescue breathes every 5 seconds, and removing both yours and their equipment. The most difficult part was dragging them up on a boat.
Although I begged to use some of the 50kg girls from the kitchen, who I could probably lift with one hand, I was given Bod as my victim. Fortunately Bod is a rail-thin English vegetarian, but he fell ill during my training and I was forced to use Yoeri my instructor. Yoeri is a really big Dutch guy...
I had three fun disasters during my training. First we practiced tossing a flotation device on a rope. to a distressed swimmer. This is nothing new to me as I had etensive first aid and live guarding training during my days in the Boy Scouts. So I know that you need to take special care to hang on to the rope when you toss. Unfortunately I had to try again and again because of the wind (and a flimsy flotation device). My frustration led me to forget about the rope and my first perfect throw took the entirety of the rope with it.
I got the worst cramp of my life while trying to subdue a distressed swimmer. Before I could use my underwater judo, I lost the use of one leg and found Yeori on top of me. Fortunately I stayed calm, got away and directed Bod to save him, but damn it smarted.
On my final test I had to rescue Yoeri at the surface, and Subine underwater after a dive. I got to Yoeri and inflated his BCD and made ready to retrieve Subine... Only to fine out of was 100% out of air. Had to switch BCD's and come to the rescue.
The final word about the training is when I got the victim onto boat I was to switch to a CPR dummy. Yoeri suggested that I get help doing CPR as its really tiring. I remember that there was a doctor from Belgium on boat. I said "Doctor, can you help me give CPR?" and he simply replied "No". I was a little irritated by this.
Pictures from the trip have been sparse, because my underwater camera got water in it on the first day and broke. I used my phones camera, but it isn't very good in low light.
My new tattoo was a hit and got a lot of questions. I go a new new one from Owen at Baywatch. Its the inverted cross on my ankle that I posted a couple of days ago. It was high time that my tattoos also reflect my utter contempt for Xtianity.
The weather was hit or miss. Usually I have great luck with weather in the Philippines but I experienced some of the coldest weather I have ever seen there while on this trip. Also "El Nino" knocked down the water temp. a couple of degrees.
I stayed in a new room at Genesis. It had a balcony and it was awesome. The girls did a good job on changing my sheets and keeping things clean.
Jason had a cookout at his house. We all chipped in for some Australian steaks and they were quite frankly the best steak that I have had for a while.
At various times I have Brendon and Katheryn from Uljin, EPIK Kory and EPIK Megan, EPIK Micah, and Willy also there on the beach. It was a different way to experience Alona and it was nice to share my favorite place with some good friends. It made me much more social. I hardly watched a single TV show or movie.
My friends also introduced me to parts of the beach that I didn't know about. One great find was Lost Horizons which had 25 peso rhum cokes until 10pm. We spend a couple of nights playing poker there listening to live music. We simply used the coins (1, 5, and 10 pesos) as chips. This was also the first time I saw Brendon and Kathryn drunk.
We can attribute the discover of the 25 peso rhum cokes to Brendon who went down to the CR between hands of cards. After what seemed like a long time he came back up and held up his hands and in his most serious voice said "Ok, everybody shut up". After getting our attention he explained "25 peso rhum cokes... how many do we need?"
As you might have guessed from the pics we went to a cockfight. It was my first time gambling at one. We made friends with a security guard named Micheal who was able to nagivate the confusing and rowdy bet making process. It works something like the stock exchange. One yells and makes hand signals until you fine someone with an opposite bet. Sometimes you have to give odds. For example you might bet 500 pesos but you might only get 400 pesos if you win.
I did rather well and started doubling my bets until I got to 2000 pesos. Before that match Michael and I disagreed on which chicken to bet on. I felt one was more aggressive than the other. Michael disagreed and I went with his experience. When the rosters where dropped mine simply stood there doing nothing. The opponent decided he wasn't having this and jumped up on the fence and looked like he was about to jump into the crowd... razor blade and all. Anyways I lost and that was the end of that. I was ahead over all and I bought Michael dinner.
I took three courses to upgrade my diving license. I got certified in CPR and I am now a Rescue Diver. Rescue Diver was tough and a lot more work than I had anticipated. I involved a lot of swimming around the ocean while dragging an unconscious diver, giving them rescue breathes every 5 seconds, and removing both yours and their equipment. The most difficult part was dragging them up on a boat.
Although I begged to use some of the 50kg girls from the kitchen, who I could probably lift with one hand, I was given Bod as my victim. Fortunately Bod is a rail-thin English vegetarian, but he fell ill during my training and I was forced to use Yoeri my instructor. Yoeri is a really big Dutch guy...
I had three fun disasters during my training. First we practiced tossing a flotation device on a rope. to a distressed swimmer. This is nothing new to me as I had etensive first aid and live guarding training during my days in the Boy Scouts. So I know that you need to take special care to hang on to the rope when you toss. Unfortunately I had to try again and again because of the wind (and a flimsy flotation device). My frustration led me to forget about the rope and my first perfect throw took the entirety of the rope with it.
I got the worst cramp of my life while trying to subdue a distressed swimmer. Before I could use my underwater judo, I lost the use of one leg and found Yeori on top of me. Fortunately I stayed calm, got away and directed Bod to save him, but damn it smarted.
On my final test I had to rescue Yoeri at the surface, and Subine underwater after a dive. I got to Yoeri and inflated his BCD and made ready to retrieve Subine... Only to fine out of was 100% out of air. Had to switch BCD's and come to the rescue.
The final word about the training is when I got the victim onto boat I was to switch to a CPR dummy. Yoeri suggested that I get help doing CPR as its really tiring. I remember that there was a doctor from Belgium on boat. I said "Doctor, can you help me give CPR?" and he simply replied "No". I was a little irritated by this.
Pictures from the trip have been sparse, because my underwater camera got water in it on the first day and broke. I used my phones camera, but it isn't very good in low light.
My new tattoo was a hit and got a lot of questions. I go a new new one from Owen at Baywatch. Its the inverted cross on my ankle that I posted a couple of days ago. It was high time that my tattoos also reflect my utter contempt for Xtianity.
The weather was hit or miss. Usually I have great luck with weather in the Philippines but I experienced some of the coldest weather I have ever seen there while on this trip. Also "El Nino" knocked down the water temp. a couple of degrees.
I stayed in a new room at Genesis. It had a balcony and it was awesome. The girls did a good job on changing my sheets and keeping things clean.
Jason had a cookout at his house. We all chipped in for some Australian steaks and they were quite frankly the best steak that I have had for a while.