Haibun: Retreat ©

On the 29th of July, the seniors went on a spiritual retreat for a day and a half at Angels' Hills, Tagaytay. I was so excited the day before because I know I'd be going to my second home (I have Tagaytay blood) and it was a really awesome place. What made me more excited is the fact that we have to be in school at 5:30 AM and I just love to wake up really early.

When I got to school, I was surprised to see that I was one of the earliest people to arrive (I was usually a bit late) and the school looked kind of creepy before dawn. After waiting for a few minutes for everyone to arrive and for the preparations to be done, we hopped in the bus and headed for Tagaytay. In the bus, we were (forced into) watching "(Helen of) Troy" and no, it's not the 2004 version but the 1956 version. Yup, you guessed it. It's the type of movie that has that cheesy suspense music, people who talk in funny voices, and of course, the obviously fake special effects. I dunno about others but I watched only up to the part where...I dunno. We also watched Twitches 2, a pretty interesting sequel on Twitches. But of course, I didn't watch all of it for I was chatting with Seigneur Paolo and Lord Joshua. I'm pretty sure we had some stops somewhere in the trip but I forgot what part it was so...yeah. When we got to Tagaytay, some people were "bewildered" (<--new word for some of you people who haven't heard it yet) by the wondrous scenes in the glorious Kingdom of Tagaytay. There was more stuff that happened in the bus, pretty sure there was. Oh, oh! We also stopped to buy and taste some delicacies from the EPIC Kingdom of Tagaytay. We were offered to order some of these delicacies during our retreat in the monastery/convent/whatever. Some people were so excited that they DID order. HAHA! The ones, including me, who decided to buy outside of the monastery/convent/whatever got them for only HA/LF price so...FAIL.

On a long journey

As the sun travels with us,

trees, watching us pass

I'm pretty sure we all enjoyed what happened during the retreat. Our speaker was soo hilarious, especially with his abuse (jk) of the word "hello". A lot of interesting things happened in the conference room which was was called SM2 if my memory serves me right. We had done a lot of stuff that made us cry but also brought us closer together as friends. We got to know each other better and our broken relationships were mended. I thank God for such a great experience. My favourite part was the "Palanca" letter reading time. This was the time for us to read encouragement letters from our loved ones. The letter from my mom made me cry soo hard and I am glad to have such a wonderful mom. While my mom's letter made me cry, the one from my dad had strengthened me. I would like to thank God once more for them.

Away from my home

Opening my mom's letter

tears on my desk

Though we were about to leave Angels' Hills, there was still one thing I haven't done. I still haven't read the letter from someone very special to me (due to the fact that there were certian situations which kept on delaying it, perchance God wants me to read it later). I decided to read it on the bus. As I opened the letter, I was surprised to see it so decorated with a lot of really cute designs. It contained a lot of touching things which had really touched me inside. The letter was heartwarming and comfourting. I would like to thank my very special friend for it. She really made my retreat and my life worthwhile. Thank you very much!

Headed towards home

As I opened her letter,

my heart has been touched

Of course, there were still a lot of stuff that went on within the bus. That includes people (including me) being forced to sing or else be left on the road (jk) and the calling of "jejemon" at random people on the road. A lot more phenomena had occured within the wagon of eternal laughter but they are too......many to list here. Of course, we got home....safe, so...yeah....my blog ends.