It Could Be Me

Photo taken in HK in August of 2009.

Last February 7, a devastating vehicular accident happened involving one of the buses of Florida Transport on a newly-opened route to Bontoc in the Mountain Province.

The tragedy had taken lives including a famous local artist and comedian Arvin "Tado" Jimenez, and a Dutch traveler named Anne van de Ven.

According to GMA News, the 26-yo Dutch planned two-month stay in the Philippines. She quit her job as a primary school teacher to devote her time traveling the world. She had traveled to South America, China, Laos, Cambodia, Nepal, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Borneo, and Indonesia, and was set to go to Australia after the Philippines.

When I first found out about the accident, about Tado, Anne van de Ven, and the other travelers and artists who were there when it happened, one thing went to my head, "It could be me."

I travel a lot and every single time I leave my home and pack my bag and step on that bus or plane, it always crosses my mind that it could be my last.

Every day, for every single thing we do in life, we actually surrender to the possibility of it being our last. So, like what I always, always say:

...so short a life, so many things to do, so many people to meet and love and hug, so many food to taste, so many places to explore, so many experiences to learn from, and so much of God's love around, I can't waste time.

And to the wanderlust in Anne van de Ven, in me, and all the passionate travelers in the world, everything is an adventure. Even death may not be an end.

Let me end this writing with a quote from Anne, which I got from the same source (GMA News),

"I walk around the globe, visit exotic places, meet new people, different cultures and live my own vision of freedom. I chose to be a professional dreamer," she wrote last Christmas. "And when I lie awake at night and think about all the misery in the world, I try to think of what I do like, because my sense says that it could go either way."