EDITOR’S NOTE
Editor’s Note
Editor in chief Roel Hoang Manipon at the coralstone church of Danao City, Cebu (top, right); at the Dambana ng Kagitingan on Mount Samat, Pilar, Bataan (top); at Francisco’s Cafe of Galeria Orlina in Taal, Batangas (middle, left); at the historic Macahambus Cave in Cagayan de Oro City (middle, right); and on Marcela Agoncillo Street in Taal, Batangas (above).
I am here in Bohol. It is supposed to be a vacation. As usual, I lack sleep. I wrote, edited articles and emailed them the night before the flight. As soon as we landed, we went through the usual tourist routes, visiting the famous attractions. It is time to rest but I can’t sleep. I want to sleep well to be able to function well, to experience well, to imbibe well, to sense well when I wake up. But the urge to explore is more attractive. My curiosity is of the throbbing, urgent kind. Then, there is the need to write, write down what I’ve seen, experienced, thought; to record; to share. There goes my vacation. Most of the time, travel, for me, is everything except a vacation. Maybe because it is work, and work is passion. I have a hard time answering questions on work hours, on what I do for leisure. Leisure to me and work
time often overlap, often are one. Leisure is work, and many times work is leisure. I am paid to do what vacationers do and more. What I do is not different from what I am. Indeed, how can one stop being traveler, being a writer? How can you stop being you? Everything is fodder to a writer. I cannot quantify the amount of work a writer does. Simplistically, it is by the words he or she writes. But there is much, much more going on before and during writing. Anyway, if I want a vacation, I usually stay at home. The past weeks, I have been constantly on the road—Taal, Batangas; Lubuagan, Kalinga; Bohol; Malolos, Bulacan. This Christmas season, I will take a vacation. I will stay home. The work doesn’t stop though. The travel doesn’t stop. The journey will be inside.
Roel Hoang Manipon Editor in Chief
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EXPERIENCE Travel and Living Volume 8 • Number 5 • 2012