We had to set up a new operation in Mindanao to support mainly the Muslim population in the hard to reach areas of the island. Mindanao is a very nice island and could be a tourist paradise but it is instead notoriously known for all the kidnappings of prominent people or foreigners. Either the Abu Sayyaf or some of the other rebels are making sure of this. Most of the time the people were released after paying a ransom. Most of the time!
The UN office in Manila had assigned one of the security officers to join me on the mission as I would not be allowed to travel alone or with a driver only. The risk for kidnapping was too high. After looking at a few of the maps I had identified some of the potential locations for our communication systems and one was Makilala. As most areas are off limits for anyone let alone visitors we made arrangements with the commander on the island to get access on the mountains.
So me and my security officer arrived early in the morning to the local military outpost close to the mountain and greeted the commandos. they were just about to finish their morning briefings when we arrived. They invited us for coffee and we sat just chatting with them. Being all in uniform they wondered if we really planned to climb the mountains. But of course that is what we have to do. Hmmm....
They all looked at me, then at my security officer in despair. Me in my safari vest, shorts and sneakers. My normal field outfit :-) a tad overweight ;-) and with an orange T-shirt. then they looked at my colleague. A retired general still looking fit, but retired.
hmmm.. They did all their calling around to check if we would be allowed on the mountain but found out we did have permission.
We jumped into our car and drove ahead to the meeting point. After about 30 minutes we see two military trucks coming over and stopping. 20 soldiers jumped of and again we were told to wait. They needed to send some troops ahead to clear the tracks for us before we could start climbing.. It was clear that there was potential for threats in the area.
After a few minutes we started walking up toward the mountain in a nice tempo.. I started to remember the trip up the mountain with the Karamojong in Uganda and the speed they walked at... Guess what? The Philippine commandos seem to keep the same speed or maybe it is me who has gotten slower ;-)
We walked and walked and the scenery was spectacular. Village people coming out greeting us on the way. Living very simple in their wooden huts. They for sure did not have a lot of money but their smiley faces would not go away. Most people on the mountain lived on harvesting the rubber from the rubber-trees. After 10 minutes we needed to slow down..again after another 10 again..... It continued like that and our faces were full of sweat. It got steeper and steeper and the track smaller and smaller. We could hear the commandos signalling between each other but we could only see the 6 that we had as close escort. The rest was moving in a very different way.
After almost one hour the retired general was slowing down and could not keep my pace even so we split our group also and I continued. After another 30 minutes of struggling I finally reached the top to the amusement of the commandos who was already preparing their lunch. It had taken just about 3 hours for the climb.
We got word that the general had fainted and been taken to a small hut to rest. But he was ok. He did arrive to the top 30 minutes later.
I did my work and then we just sat there taking in the view. It was spectacular about 1500 meters up. We could see Mt Apo the highest peak 2954m in Mindanao and about 100 km away. The skies were clear and the forests around intensely green. Unfortunately no picture taking in this area for security reasons.
After a bit more checking the site we headed down again. It was more difficult to see the tracks coming down. We also noticed that we had basically gone around one mountain to go up on the next one. Once down we met up with the commander again and then headed back to Davao. Once we reached Davao it was dinner and then straight to bed. It was fun but we had both reached our limit,that day:-) The next morning we drove to mount Malalag and started all over again.
1 comment:
Well written article.
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