I used to despise Sundays when I was younger. To me, it was equivalent to doomsday. Back then, the only thing I feared, aside from being whacked by a brook stick (or hanger), was to have my tooth extracted by my father. Whenever he finds out about a loose tooth, he’ll eventually say that I have until Sunday to extract it myself, or else his mighty fingers will pluck it out of my mouth.
My faith developed at such a young age that every night, whenever I pray, he’ll forget the ordeal. On some weekends, it worked, but most of the time… it didn’t. Now that I have grown older and my toothaches are now taken care of by health care insurance, Sunday has become nothing but a typical rest day. Not until our recent hike to Baloy Daku.
It took a lot of pondering before I was able to chronicle Baloy Daku because sharing such a four-day experience meant delving into the backstory of how and why it happened. And of course, acknowledging the people who made it such a success. Hence, the purpose of this entry
For the past two months, my Sundays have never been the same. Ever since I signed up for the Baloy Daku climb, I have been forced to wake up early every Sunday to hike the infamous Spartan Trail.
At five, we were expected to have started the slow ascent from Banawa to the construction site of Monterraza’s to avoid the scorching heat of the sun, for such is an open trail. Instead of feasting on Sundays, I ended up having an apple for breakfast, bihon (or sometimes nothing) for lunch, chocolates for trail food, and a lot of water (and soft drinks) in between. I have learned my lessons the hard way: full stomach, full ascent.
And to be at par with my pseudo-trail runner comrades, I befriended the roads and started walking home from my workplace (approximately 7 kilometers passing through highways and nine skywalks) every day. For someone as lazy as I am, breaking the daily routine was difficult. In the words of my father: no one signed me up for this, so I had to face the consequences. Ginusto mo, panindigan mo. It was the first time I took pre-climbs seriously.
But when you are with people who get excited when Sundays come, I begin to question the value I once placed on such a dreadful day. Spartan trail allowed me to witness kindness among strangers, responsibility towards each hiker, fun amidst exhaustion, and perseverance in reaching a certain goal.
Most of the time, I would be trailing behind them, but they never left me, even though I had long convinced myself that it was better to quit. They celebrated with me every milestone that I made until, finally, I was able to complete the Spartan to Spartan trail (Banawa – Pamutan – Manggapares – Napo – Babag – Bocaue – Pamutan – Banawa). The support was overwhelming, and for that, I’ll be forever indebted to them.
They say you have to look backward in order to move forward. Now, it finally made sense why I met Chabs on Sambawan Island, Epifanio on Mt. Talinis, and Sir Mark on my initiation climb in Argao—all on a weekend. Everything has been perfectly laid out for me to realize that Sunday can become the best day of my life, especially when it’s shared with the best people.
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