I am on the island for 13 days now. Time flies. If one were to imagine time here as if truly winged for it to take off and soar, then it would be one of the many rangkong birds, the Oriental Pied Hornbills, in Cempedak—beautiful balletic avians with beaks that jut out with so much local pride. Some friends in my country can learn a thing or two about flaunting their natural features, to be honest.
I first came to this island that is named after a fruit, just one of over 2,000 islands in the Riau Archipelago, with only the familiarity of being from another island province in a tropical country.
Any thoughts of trepidation navigating life as a transient here—that means, being a writer-in-residence for four weeks that feels like limning the line of being a host and a guest in seclusion—soon ebbed away like waves pulled back into the sea. The kindness and generosity of the people make you feel at home, feeding you with dishes prepared with the freshest local bounty the island has to offer, as if this were home.
Aside from just writing eight-to-five (I had to treat the whole thing as a regular work schedule, lest I get my tasks derailed by so much beauty around me), I set off blocks of time, twice a week, to connect with the people around me. Even when they say writing is a solitary act, one cannot detach oneself from the essentiality of listening to another person.
I got to join in nature walks, too, with Atoy, Roy, Pian, and Jaslan, winding through nooks and crannies of the island in the past few days. I soon learned these were not just exercises of the cardiovascular kind, or opportunities to learn some of Indonesia's flora and fauna, the culture and traditions within this archipelago, and to get to know more of the island's visitors, but also windows into the matters of a community.
Despite our differing dialects, Bol-anong Binisaya and Bahasa Indonesia, the similarities in beliefs and practices were expected and easy to point out. It is in this common ground that truly connects us all, and to some extent, that we can work things out for the betterment of this world through awareness of respect for life. It is all evident here, how the natural world coexists peacefully with both man and man-made.
From Singapore to Sydney, from Brussels to Boston, guests were also generous in sharing what was from their hometowns—the bugs they saw, the trees they used to climb, and the beauty of flowers that left an imprint in their minds. Some even shared their fears about what's going on in this world. These walks and dialogues literally expand the breadth of your knowledge and empathy for one another.
I already have so much to write about, and I have two more weeks on the island. Obviously, I am taking this opportunity to write poems about this living pocket. I believe in the strength of poetry as a genre capable of being exacting and sweeping in the same breath, to be able to say two things at once, or even more. I am already the fifth writer-in-residence in the Tulisan Nusantara Writer's Residency program, and I am aware of the possible retread of topics made by prior authors, but I am taking it all in stride. My glossary of emotions and observations is growing.
What this residency means for me is the possibility that more writers from the Philippines, especially from the Visayas, and as a Bisaya myself, will find the space even for a short while to explore the intersections of culture and environment through literature.
I am excited by what a new place does to the mind's eye, the new ways of seeing that it gradually opens, and what I can carry back to Bohol and Dumaguete. With the many crises happening on this planet right now, stepping outside the comfort of one's own ground makes us better participants in the politics of care.
If you allow yourself to connect with your surroundings, to tune in deeply to the earth, your ears will take in even the most minute of sounds. One afternoon, as I was working on a poem for the residency's monograph, I heard a crackling behind me.
Was it the Nicobar pigeon? Another hornbill? Was it the clouded monitor lizard this time? No. It was just a large crisp leaf gently rolling down the side of a sea-smoothened boulder.
Day after day, I am thankful to be reminded there is still room for wonder in this life, and that gives me hope.
[ more photos here ]
No comments:
Post a Comment