too late

I saw photos today. Full color photos of what is now a sea of muck. Did you know it was blue?

I was two decades too late. In the 1960's the Manila Bay was blue. Blue. Blue like the sparkling sapphire. Blue like the San Francisco sky. Blue. Real blue. I cannot say enough of how blue it was. It was so blue I was amazed that no one was swimming. How can people not flock to the water when it was so blue?

In 2000 I joined a dragon boat rowing team and we trained in Manila Bay. On my first day they made me jump off the boat as some sort of initiation right. I did not jump off, I stepped off. I was afraid that jumping will stir up too much muck. Instead I inhaled deeply (so as not to sink too deeply), shut my eyes (so as not to get dirty water in them), stuck as much of my lips as I could between my teeth (to avoid getting water into my mouth), pinched my nose tightly and then stepped off the boat gently. It has to be the single ickiest moment of my life. The water was slimy and it felt like it took forever for my head to break the surface once more. And when I surfaced I felt sheer terror. Fear of the germs and disease and what was clearly the city sewage that I was swimming in. I almost panicked at the thought that my unprotected girly parts were in the water. Ah but I went rowing for an entire school year there after. Talk about insane.

It is so sad to see the blue that once was and sadder still to have such a bad memory of the place that used to be so beautiful. In the books Manila Bay was described as a long beach. I wonder how the sand disappeared. And I wonder how many other places like that were destroyed by idiots like us. Compared to this destruction, my anger pales......Tags: anger, beach, manila bay, 1960, philippines

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