A DROWNING CHRISTMAS IN SATUN, THAILAND
By: Maria Charisma P. Concepcion (Christined by Fr. Tabada, labored by Dr. Magpantay and Perla Apostol, Wombed by Mr. and Mrs. Gauttier and Delia Concepcion. All from the rustic boondocks of a town called Magpet, Cotabato).

I never expected that the spirit of Christmas should be the absence of gifts and frills.

I had nonetheless developed sensory experiences of several flashbacks of memories that had spanned celluloid masteries that had been rightfully earned among the exponential buffets only fit for the brave, the humble, the creative and the unselfish granting of self to the universal world.

That it shall be called superior is the understatement of the century. All works of the highest order must always remain anonymous and they travel through time capsules in graded variations and improvements, unfettered by technology, immune to disasters, numb to taunts, courageous amid any catastrophe.

I was invited for a fellowship gathering by the local church here in Yala, Thailand for a three-day Christmas event of bible talks and meditation.

I was, instead, brought to works of art that are forever evolving. To call it massive is almost a cough to the throat. It is a whole continent of possible dreams and experience.  I told a fellow gatherer:

"Given time, this should become greater than the Great Walls Of China or San Francisco's Golden Gate."  My inputs had been properly recorded, with waterfalls as the finishing touch.

The possibilities are all there: I had experienced the gathering of doing everything in a grandiose but classic manner when I was a child: food, clothing, cutlery, artwork, plants.  The delicate and fine details kept on haunting me lately; ripe at 44 years as a woman of boiling mythical realizations, still undaunting and excessively hopeful. This is a field of dreams becoming weird realities for huge and big visionaries  like myself.

I have seen finer ornamental grass in the past but nothing prepared me for the crawling of ground ferns that had welcomed me.

These are the fine ground grass of my childhood with its giant eggplants, melons, garlic, fish, onions and vegetables.  I never knew the uses of cascading grass until I saw that they were hung beside resort huts like the hanging gardens of Babylon in clay pots and are made ornaments to magnify and illuminate the Universe.  I had made the water sprinkle like an ocean of fountains which had brought smiles to the visitors in wheelchair wearing perfectly crafted shoes and classically sewed socks.

Suntan here are lumped together like bouquets in great burst of orangey red.  The wooden benches are smiling and the uses of wood in their various varnished state appear like hardened and cut fine silk from the ranges of the Orient.  The hall is biblical like Noah's Ark and the sweetest of oranges greet the spiritual revelers at the front desk.  No registration fees are needed. All you need is a pure heart and mind to energize scriptures, improve hymns and bond with decently-minded fellows with noble missions for the World.

It is not Nirvana but a universe built by selfless and pious people.

The gist is this: Technology should mimic the natural course of nature. Roads lined up in pine trees, flourescent road lights made like the leafy ferns and must mirror the swaying ornaments in wattage glare.Alternately, a fern plant enjoys a sparkling support when lit up by lights looking like its twin.

A day before Christmas, I took the heavy current of river rapids on a plastic boat with big paddles.  I drowned and floated like a fish using a paddle.  I discarded my rower for a man who is frail and sick-looking, who was then assisted by a huge man with gigantic protein nutrients inside his body.

In rowing for the heavy torrents of water, I discovered several things: a life vest is a dud, paddles make you silly as they obscure the tree twigs and could make your boat capsize.  All you need is a brave man in front with a superior supporting cast of rowers to win in this kayyaking event.

I could not swim but took on the heavy rapids like a pebble to a stone. A beautiful young lady and his brother were the only people who were crazy enough to laugh at the currents.

Friends, ladies and gentlemen, it was easy: I simply rescued myself. I balanced myself, allowed the water to sink halfway the boat and laughed with strangers who had jumped in to join me.

Oceans never scare me; I had a five minute scare that went comical in terrible fits of heavenly misarrangements of nature and had survived. Credit the above-mentioned people for this fortitude and foresight.

When John Updike had preached in his Nobel Prize style somewhere in his book, Roger's Version, that God is a verb, not a noun, I take the mantra as a tablet of peace for my creative process.

God is indeed a verb, with steadfast apostrophes, perfect commas and eclectic semi-colons. God and his disciples usually converge in stunts that convert rather than insult, spread cheer rather than stagnate in gossip and uneventful talks.  As a scripture in the book of Romans had articulated: if your calling be teaching, teach.

I am my father's daughter and he had imprinted my words in golden covers with sash as bookmarks, with letters and paragraphs immaculately astounding.

Thank you to my family and its extended appendages, my Christmas was an eventual searching of self that had finally come into a ripening with no bacteria rottening my self-actualization.

Thank you. Satun, Thailand; thank you Bara Resort (its wooden structures would shame any upholstery outlet in an upscale hole); thank you wonderful, wonderful, wonderful people for the education on the eve of our Savior's birthday.