John Romiel

Panic in the City

Hong Kong, August 2 to 6, with my sister and cousins. Our first international trip outside the Philippines 🧑‍🩰. We were go go go from day one, running from one landmark to the next, trying to see as much as we could like the city would disappear if we blinked too long.

Budget was tight, though, and we woke up late the next morning, so we ended up missing a few spots on the list. Turned out to be a good thing. Missing stuff meant we finally slowed down a bit instead of rushing the whole time, and looking back, maybe that was the trip trying to teach me something I wasn’t ready to hear yet: seeing everything was never really the point.

I also got them to ride a ride with me at Disneyland, in the Frozen world. They thought it’d be chill, some cute little ride, but it turned out to be a kinda roller coaster. Their faces after we got off said everything, no one wanted to go again. After that, I was on my own for every thrilling ride, did it by myself the rest of the time, and honestly, I didn’t mind.

Then Macau happened.

We were already on the bus when I noticed something was off. I carry two slings, my bag and my camera, and I tried to feel for both without looking. I only felt the camera. That’s when it hit me, my bag, the one with my passport in it, wasn’t there. There’s a very specific kind of panic that comes from realizing you might not be able to go home, it’s quiet at first, then it’s everywhere.

I told my cousin and my sister right away. My cousin was kind of pissed, understandably, careless move on my part. I just told them, okay, I’ll pay for the fare going back, and we got off and backtracked to the bus stop where I must’ve left it. My heart was racing the entire time. Found it though, thank God, my cousin and my sister spotted it first. I don’t think I said much in that moment, but I remember thinking, so this is what it feels like to almost lose the one thing that lets you belong somewhere.

Ever since that day, I never carry my own passport again, someone else always holds on to it for me, because let’s be real, I almost became an illegal resident of Macau over here, ahaha.

Then it was my sister’s turn. Me and my cousin were busy taking turns taking pictures of each other when my sister started getting antsy. Turns out she realized she didn’t have her phone anymore. We looked around nearby first, nothing, so we ended up browsing through the photos on my phone instead, and there it was, a shot of her phone still sitting inside the telephone booth at The Londoner, proof it existed, proof it was real, and still that wasn’t enough to bring it back. She rushed back to get it, but by the time she got there, it was gone. We even asked the police for help. No phone was ever found.

But looking back, that’s kind of just how trips go, no matter how much you plan, some things may go astray. We didn’t dwell on it though, just laughed about it eventually (not right away, hahaha 🙂‍↔️), held on to each other, kept going. Honestly, those are the parts I remember most now. Not the landmarks, the panic, the searching, the “hambal ko gid mung” the moment we found it. Maybe that’s just what a trip really is, not the places you managed to see, but the moments you almost lost each other and chose to hold on anyway.