four years later ...

it's not like i know anyone from leyte. except imelda marcos, i suppose. but everyone knows imelda, right?

so when i first went there in 2007 for a leaders' training for my catholic community, i never thought i'd utter the words, "i shall return," general douglas macarthur style.

{leyte landing! finally}

but somehow, four years after my first ever domestic flight (i've flown international before but never domestic so it was such a big deal for me then!) to leyte, i came back.

the plane left at 4:20 a.m. which meant that just about the time the sun started to light up the world, the plane was landing on tacloban, leyte.

{tacloban runway}

it was a full day. left tacloban at 6-ish (bag took forever to come out of the plane!), slept the entire two-hour drive to ormoc, ate a quick breakfast and changed from wee-hours-of-the-morning traveler self to i-am-so-competent-i-can-do-this-in-my-sleep labor lawyer self, did an 8-hour lecture to the businessmen of ormoc, so 12 hours later, my feet were killing me, the smile had melted off my face, and all i could do was gaze out into the beautiful hotel-scape that holds so many memories for me from four years ago.

{sunset at ormoc villa hotel}

just like macarthur, i did return. and as all the memories came flooding back, i've realized that it's not only good to be back, it's great to realize how far i've gone since the last time i was here.