Another Rainy Day in Paradise

How’s everyone? I hope you guys are staying safe and healthy out there.

Just popping in real quick to share my thoughts and feelings.

August marks the real rainy month here in this region. Fortunately, there haven’t been any typhoons yet but the days have been gloomy. The sky’s gray and muddy all around. Life goes on as usual for the rest. And thank Gawd I am now staying here in Puerto Princesa City where rain showers are a bit moderate compared to the north. 

It’s not only the changing weather that’s affecting my mood overall. The doom and gloom of this pandemic is taking its toll. Since the lifting of our community quarantine restrictions, we’ve been getting more positive cases of COVID-19. Mostly locals returning from other cities. The plan to reopen some of Palawan’s tourist destinations is still very unclear at this point. And probably won’t even make sense, because duh, pandemic.

Society’s been really slow. I am jobless at the moment and have been constantly looking for other means to support myself and my cat (I just adopted one). Hopefully, it doesn’t have to be a grueling 8-5, a part-time online job or anything with a decent salary would do. Anything decent. Anything to ease the pain of uncertainty. Just no MLMs, please. I see MLMs are targeting the most vulnerable and unaware in this region lately. Anyway, I’ve got a variety of skills I’ve learned over the years so I hope someone or some company out there would need me.

Lately, I’ve sold a lot of my personal stuff just to get by. Even though it is fairly cheap to live here in Palawan, I still got to pay the rent and the bills. Nevertheless, I am still thankful that I don’t have to pay office rent or let go of staff – because I don’t have any of these since the beginning of Palawan Alternative. Home is my workplace. I mean, I had been planning to get my own office in El Nido town or something, and I thought that would eventually happen in time. I was still in the early stage of business then COVID-19 happen. So yeah, it sucks. But I know I am not the only one trying to keep my head above water.

I’ve been blogging a lot lately on another platform which lets me earn some Bitcoin. I’ve already amassed some followers there over the years so I know that my posts are actually being read. My posts on this platform are purely personal and have nothing do with Palawan Alt. I figure that it would be better to separate my personal life from business. I mean this WordPress blog has become personal too and it’s still new. But knowing that people I know personally could read it just makes me feel a bit uncomfortable with opening myself up and sharing my unfiltered thoughts.

Perhaps in time, when I am dead or something, they’ll get to read those stories too.

Blogging has been a way to cope with overabundance with time. I just moved to a new apartment here in Puerto Princesa and luckily I have a decent wifi connection. The Internet is like oxygen these days and I can’t imagine living without it. I mean, I live off it. And it’s my outlet too.

Other than blogging and caring for my rescue kitten, there is really nothing much exciting going on in my life. As much as I want to travel around Palawan and buy a proper camera phone that’ll help with promotion, my financial situation is preventing me from working on my dreams. And I wish I can talk about how I am hanging out on the beach with good friends but some meaningful connection is lacking in my island life. Perhaps if I learn to trust again, I’d probably find “my people” around here. Because something inside me is saying that not everyone has “ulterior motives”. To be honest, this thought has been preventing me from enjoying life and seeing the good in people. Perhaps time will heal these wounds.

Life has been tough here on the other side – and unbearable at times. But then I thought, maybe living is not as boring as being dead. So, here I am, giving everything in my life a try one more time. 

Your Thoughts?