AND IT'S TIME TO DANCE TO THE JIG. My phone, Serendipity (don't ask why), which happens to be the most wonderful phone in the world (at least to me) is now in good working condition. Yahoo! It gave me a scare yesterday, since I couldn't turn it on. It wouldn't be the first time that happened to me. The last time it did, I had it checked and I found out it was beyond repair. So imagine my consternation yesterday when it wouldn't start!=( Anyway, I'm really relieved that it works!

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McARTHUR'S ISLAND. Yesterday, me and ma went to Corregidor, and it was an interesting experience. My friend, Ma'am Celine, invited me about a week ago if I wanted to go with her friend's group to Corregidor. Her friend was organizing a tour that was exclusively for girls and Ma'am Celine in turn texted everyone who wanted to go with them.

Seeing new places always interested me, so I invited every female close to me who might be free on that day. Needless to say, only my mom was free on that day, and so we found ourselves boarding a ferry to the island yesterday morning.

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Before going there, all I knew of Corregidor was that it figured prominently during the Second World War in Philippine history. But I didn't know where it was, or what could be found there. I've always thought that it was just one of those provinces somewhere in the north. The 'island' that was connected to the name of the place didn't even register to me!

So it made it even more fascinating to learn that it was a small island strategically located at the mouth of Manila Bay. To the unfamiliar (like I was before I came there), it was a tadpole-shaped island at the center of a 'C' that was Manila Bay. At the upper part of the 'C' was Bataan, and at the bottom part of the 'C' was Cavite. Corregidor, which meant 'corrector' in Spanish, was named such because during the Spanish era, cargo ships had to pass by the island before entering the Manila Bay. Later on, it became a military fort (Fort Mills) for the Americans when they occupied the country. They installed barracks, ammunition storage rooms, offices, hospitals, and canons scattered all over the island.

Since it was a military settlement, naturally it was targeted by the Japanese as one of the places to be occupied during the start of the Second World War. And much of the history of the area was rooted in those years of the Japanese occupation.

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I learned that the whole island was declared a war memorial, and so only few people were actual residents of the place. They weren't even permanently settled there. The government imposed restrictions on the mode of occupancy in Corregidor; caretakers and other employees which have to work in the island have to leave the island once their work was finished.

Virtually, the place was a ghost town, because all you can see were carefully preserved ruins of American settlements.
Honestly, I thought that whole place was creepy. It was somewhat disconcerting to see ruins of a bombed out cinema, especially when I saw pictures of what the whole place used to look like. There were also other reminders of chaotic scenes in the area. There was this rusted door that would have blended with the rest of the ruins' weathered, aged effect if it hadn't been riddled with bullet holes. And we also saw a crater 3 m away from one of the canons that showed how it was narrowly missed by a bomb.

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The site where thousands of Japanese soldiers commited hara kiri, the Malinta Tunnel, has been reconstructed by the government and converted into a lights and sounds museum. (FYI: The tunnel was an underground complex dug underneath a hill located at the center of the island.) Since we were already there, my mom and I decided to pay the extra fee to watch the show. And it was well worth the fee. The whole show was a retelling of the history of the Malinta Tunnel, which used to be a hospital and later on an underground hiding camp. It was the perfect place because it was safe from all the bombs falling on the island during the Japanese war raids.

Anyway, the authenticity lent by the actual site added to the whole experience, though I couldn't help but feel freaked out since, after all, it was a massacre site! In fact, the reason why the whole tunnel caved in at the end of the war was because the soldiers commited suicide by strapping explosives on their bodies. But there was no denying that the show was good. It really brought back the memories of war, as if we were really in the place when it all happened.

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There were also places in the island that were constructed during the postwar era. Most of them were memorials dedicated to all the Filipino and American soldiers. But others, like a garden we passed by, was dedicated to Filipino-Japanese friendship. These were places in the island wherein I didn't feel so freaked out, because everything seemed peaceful.

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I think it would be great for kids to go here. Like, for field trips. Probably history would be more appreciated when one could actually see and feel the horrors of war.

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And all along I was thinking of that movie, 'Pearl Harbor'. Goodness.