Day 30 - My good deed for the day

Hey all... I'm feeling SIGNIFICANTLY better and more relaxed. I was able to sleep well last night, but it probably helped that I went out for cocktails and tapas (and then more cocktails) with my Dive Crew.

I overslept today... got up at 9:30am, and I had a dive at 10am. Oops.

No worries. I made it once I was able to get my act together. Granted, I was a late, but hey... its vacation, and I'm on Filipino time.

This morning's dive was pretty cool. There are these starfish-like pests, called "Crown of Thorns" that destroy the coral. Every dive shop is responsible for meeting a weekly quota of gathering these little monsters from the coral and delivering them to whatever environmental office that keeps track of these activities.

Absolutely monstrous! Vermin of the deep!

So how does one go about gathering the Crown of Thorns? Well, very carefully... you shouldn't touch their spines because it can cause you to swell up. We were armed with sharp, long, bamboo spears and a sack. You literally stab the starfish, and then pry it up from the coral. If you leave a single piece, or if a piece of the starfish breaks off, it can regenerate into a new starfish.

Anyhow, it was a lot of fun... reminded me of my Adopt-a-Highway days in college with my fraternity... picking up trash along a section of road. Except the road was a coral reef, and I used a bamboo spear. I did my part to maintain the ecological balance of the area :-)

I've really bonded with my dive crew. I'm glad that I came across them... again, its serendipity in action. Its a very cool experience to meet complete strangers from distant places and hear/share stories and experiences with one another.

This week has gone by fast... only a couple more days, and I'll be on my way back to the States. I really love it here. Can't believe I just said that after weeks of trashing the other parts of the country. Boracay reminds me a lot temperature/environment-wise of the Caribbean. The people here are extremely diverse as there is a large expat population... each with their own stories/reasons for coming here.

It makes you think to yourself, "hmm... could I ever do this?" Funny enough, the question I asked the expats last night at dinner was "... so what are you running away from...?"