Just as things were going swimmingly well the bottom dropped
out of my world, my laptop died on me. It didn’t crash, there were no simple glitches,
it just upped and died. I shut it down one night, the next morning it was as
dead as a doornail. Any other make of computer might have been repairable,
though I doubt it, the Mac needed a competent repair centre. Roused rudely from
my paradisiacal reverie it took me a day for the facts to sink in, during which
time I desperately kept trying in vain to kick some life into it. I’ve heard
tell that losing one’s computer can put one at a slight loss in their lives.
For me it was damned near a tragedy; bearing in mind the type of real life
tragedies that have beset me in recent years I can’t bring myself to compare it
with any of those, but it still left me aghast and more than a bit flustered. I
thought of continuing my travels, bugger the writing, but I couldn’t bring
myself to do it. Instead I had to tear myself away from Port Barton,
desperately hoping I could find a fix in Palawan. (Photo: Simple fishing methods - Port Barton, Palawan)
Despite only slim hopes of a local fix, I tried everywhere
in Puerto Princesa. Apple Macs are quite common there, so the premise was that
someone should be able to repair it, or at least give a diagnosis as to what
was wrong. Most did no more than shake their head at the sight of it, one was
amiable enough, but as I watched him try and force an inappropriate tool into
the special shaped bolts I thought better of proceeding. Not giving up hope I
tracked down every single possibility, and at my last hope found an up-market
repair shop in the plush new shopping mall out of town. As with anything
concerning AppleMacs, it didn’t come cheap, but they claimed they could let me
know in two to three days. Taking into mind the Filipino concept of time I
wasn’t surprised to find it took six days. 
So I had a week twiddling my thumbs in Puerto, with little
to entertain myself except good company at the Reggae Bar and a ream of books.
Days were spent lazing around in preference to sweating my cobs off walking the
streets. I did go for a dive one day, after being offered a virtual by Thadz, a
fairly newly qualified Divemaster, whilst swilling copious amounts of beer the
night before. I must admit, when I awoke the last thing I felt like was diving,
I felt awful. My hangover was so bad I couldn’t even put my own kit together,
which was embarrassing after declaring the night before you can tell a
competent diver by watching them kit up. But we got there, eventually, and
waded out until deep enough to don our fins and take the plunge. The water was
like pea soup, visibility was negligible, I had no timepiece and no depth
gauge. I felt anything but competent, and those first five minutes had me
wishing I hadn’t bothered. 
Head pounding, and nearly gagging into my regulator, I truly
was not fit to dive. But why go to the effort of getting it together and then
wimping out. So I stuck with it, you know, the glory of being a Brit and all
that, stiff upper lip old boy! Actually, for a shore dive it was OK as far as outcrops
of coral go. True, the colours looked diminished; constant rain tends to do
that. But there were decent numbers of fish and some I couldn’t remember seeing
before. We encountered a triggerfish, trying to give us hassle for encroaching
on its territory. In the muddy seabed we found a couple of bright nudibranchs,
one of the main delights of muck diving. And then I found myself alone, after
little more than a quick look at another interesting critter. I waited a couple
of minutes, then swam fifty metres in the direction Thadz had been going. Good
sense dictates you give it five minutes then surface to regroup. I guess I left
it a lot longer, eventually making for shallower water before surfacing. I
couldn’t have carried on any longer, I was desperately trying not to puke into
my reg by that time. 
After that experience I was a bit more conservative with my
drinking, and avoided what had been promised as a full-on night. Just as well
too, the following day I got the news the motherboard on my MacBook was
buggered. I’d wasted a week waiting around, my only alternative was a trip back
to Manila, a last ditch attempt to find an approved repair centre and have a
qualified diagnosis. Who could I blame but myself though? While in the Andaman
Islands I’d knocked a cup of coffee over, directly onto the keyboard. At the
time it amazed me it still worked, it had certainly picked the worst possible
time to die. So back to Manila It was, determined to sort it out one-way or the
other. I vowed not to hang around in the city, just to drop it off and get out
to more peaceful surroundings. If only things had been that simple, but of
course with me they rarely are. Arriving back in Manila I got a very happy
welcome back by the few people I’d befriended before. And here I’ve stayed ever
since.
The bad news is my MacBook Air is no longer, worst still,
there are no replacement Airs. Stocks have depleted, in my mind to bolster the
sale of the new Optic display MacBooks, which are 50% higher priced again than
the Airs. It could be worse, life I mean, at least I’ve been really enjoying
myself in Manila. Once again the company has been pretty good and the beer
flows freely. Actually the strong local brew is Red Horse, at 7% it is strong
and hits you like a steam train. The hangovers are horrid, and I can’t handle
consecutive nights pouring it down my throat. Entertainment has proved
interesting, ad-hoc pole dancing in the local bar, cat fights between the
street girls and the occasional tourist. A Belgian guy, from the kindness of his
heart, allowed one of the girls to use the shower in his room. She then
expected money, even though there’d been no form of contact or promise of it.
For some reason I got caught in the middle of the ensuing argument. My only
solution was to give her 50 pesos and tell her not to be silly, to go away with
enough to feed herself. It sort of worked, after plenty of caterwauling. 
My worst fear was to have lost the work I’ve done since
getting here, a lot of messing around saw my files recovered and loaded into my
new MacBook Air. I managed to track one down, so it’s all business again. It
will probably delay my trip to Borneo, because I’m a month behind schedule. As
I’m having such a good time it doesn’t concern me, life is about making the
most of each day and at the moment I’m enjoying it immensely.(Photo: My adopted son looking intellectually belligerent - Manila)
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