BY JONATHAN BALOG
Jonathan Balog lives in Rome, where he works as a writer, teacher and tour guide. His fiction and poetry have appeared in Dark Moon Digest, Chiral Mad 3, Chilling Ghost, Dark Visions vol 1, Ominous Realities and Dread: A Head Full of Bad Dreams – The Best of Grey Matter Press. He’s also done lots of guest blogging and written the occasional freelance article on Italian history, art, wine and food. When he’s not working or in lockdown, he’s (preferably) traveling somewhere in Europe or Southeast Asia. Follow him on Instagram @jonbalrog.
We were surfing along without a care in the world, till suddenly we were thrown by a high and terrible wave.
The wave crashed into me at the tail end of my trip. For the past three and a half weeks I’d been wandering around the Philippines, eating lechón in Cebu, floating down the underground river in Puerto Princesa, ziplining in El Nido, jumping off waterfalls in Kawasan and putting away half a bottle of Tanduay each day. If my room had a TV I was glued to CNN by night as reports came flooding in of the growing outbreak in Lombardy. Meanwhile, my comrades in the Italian tourism industry were desperately sharing hashtags like #italyrightnow and #romerightnow, trying to stave off the awful truth that was becoming more painfully obvious by the day. By the time I made it to Siargao it was clear our goose was pretty well cooked.
Siargao is the surfing capital of the Philippines. The sport was introduced to the Filipinos by US servicemen in the 1960’s, then gained momentum in the 80’s courtesy of American and Australian backpackers. Eventually the Filipino government took notice, sponsored the Siargao Cloud 9 Cup and helped airlines open direct flights to the island. Today it’s considered one of the top surf locales in the world with waves appropriate for everyone from beginner to pro. I’d decided early on that this is where I was going to cap off my adventure.
After setting up camp at a bungalow, I booked a session with an instructor named Raffie. The first day on the water I was absolute shit. I hadn’t been on a surfboard since I took my first lessons with a group of Russians in Vietnam the previous year. I didn’t catch a single wave, even with Raffie launching me and calling out the precise moment to stand up. The whole thing was fucking demoralizing, and as the pambot carried us home I wondered if I was just kidding myself, that I was too old, too out-of-shape, too clumsy to try my feet at a sport I should have taken up in my teens.
The next day was a decided improvement. Having switched to a longboard I was able to catch at least half the waves I chased, thus salvaging a bit of dignity and self-confidence. That night Raffie and I went out to celebrate at a club on the main strip, then took the following day off. When we met in the morning for our third session, he informed me we were due for a change of scenery. Rock Island, I would later learn, is a spot for the upper-intermediate to advanced, with a long right-hander that sometimes breaks for one hundred meters. I still don’t know what Raffie was thinking taking me there. Maybe he was so impressed with my progress he thought I was ready to step my game up. More likely he had a better deal worked out with the pambot driver.
The day began as my moment of glory. Not only was I catching every single break, but riding each for what felt like a solid minute. I had all the momentum. All the energy I’d spent working myself to death throughout the year then embarking on my travels halfway around the world had been brought to a head as I rode that board like the last boat to the Promised Land. Everything had paid off in spades. I’d bought the ticket and was kicking the shit out of this ride.
Then came the wave.
I was paddling back to the group when I saw the foam cascading a few meters before me. It was soon obvious there was no way in hell I was going to scale it in time. Panic drove Raffie’s words of warning from my mind and I grabbed the nose of my longboard as the wave threw me back like a piece of debris, the leash on my ankle pulled tight as a gallows rope. When I stopped summersaulting and thrashed above water, I became acutely aware of two things: a throbbing pain in my right shoulder and a near inability to move my arm.
The ambulance was waiting for us when we reached shore. I rode in the back of what was essentially the covered bed of a pickup truck. One of the paramedics sat with me, holding me still and sharing words of consolation, while the driver careened down a country road, hitting every bump at top speed.
At the hospital, the middle-aged nurse asked, on a scale of one to ten, how much pain I was in.
“Right now somewhere between a kidney stone and childbirth.”
After giving me an x-ray, he sat me down in a wheelchair.
“All right,” he said. “The good news is there’s no fracture. The bad news is it’s badly dislocated. The other bad news is we’re not equipped to treat you here and we’re going to have to transfer you to another island.”
“Are you serious?”
“I’m afraid so. The next ferry leaves in two hours, so we need to get you to the dock as soon as possible.”
Traveling in this condition would be insufferable, not to mention the prospect of the bill. Ignoring all expert advice and common sense I hadn’t purchased travel insurance. Still, at that moment I’d have turned over my bank account to anyone who could make the hurting stop.
“All right,” I said. What a fucking way to end a holiday. “Is there a washroom I could use?”
The nurse gestured towards the back of the room. I stood, cupping my useless arm by the elbow, feeling like it would drop off without support. Halfway to the bathroom door, in a purely unconscious motion, I shrugged my shoulders.
I felt the joint pop back into place.
I stopped, bent and stretched the arm. I reached forward and moved it a quarter to the right like a referee. I pinwheeled it backwards and forwards.
“Hey,” I said.
The nurse looked up from his clipboard. He blinked, and looked again.
—-
The campground where I was staying was run by a collective of surfers, stoners and backpackers. After the first night they’d accepted me into the tribe, sharing their food, rum and weed, very generous considering the draconian drug laws of the Philippines. That night as we sat around the picnic table I regaled them with stories of my close encounter with the surf gods.
Yet while I had just survived one crisis, I was now facing another. COVID-19, previously brushed off as an overhyped sensation, was now a clear and present danger. President Rodrigo Duterte had announced an imminent ban on both international and domestic travel. In just a few days, everyone in the country would be confined to whatever island they happened to be on until further notice. It was urgent that I reach Luzon, the island of Ninoy Aquino International Airport, as soon as possible.
I caught the last flight off Siargao the following morning. We landed in Angeles, giving me enough time for one plate of sisig, and I took a bus north to Manila.
My original itinerary had been a flight to Rome with a connection in Saudi Arabia. However, Saudi Airlines had cancelled all flights to Italy, and the Dutch agency where I purchased my tickets was ignoring all incoming email and had turned off their phone. At the airport they told me they could reroute me to Serbia tomorrow, but I’d be on my own after that. Thinking that was my best bet I accepted the odds and checked into a hotel in Manila.
The following morning the city had completely shut down—shops, restaurants, buses and even taxis were forbidden—and the police were given the green light to shoot troublemakers. The girl at the front desk put me in touch with a friend who agreed to drive me and a few other refugees to the airport for a reasonable fee. However, when I attempted to check in to my flight, I was informed that Serbia had closed their borders. The closest available destination that was still accepting foreigners was Athens. Why not, I thought. I’d always wanted to see Greece.
There was more bad news waiting for me in Saudi Arabia. During the course of my flight, Greece had followed suit and closed their borders as well. The one remaining European country accepting incoming flights was Germany. I pulled out my phone and called Audra, an American teacher living in a small town near Stuttgart, whom I’d met on a tour of Pompeii two years back. I apologized for waking her up and asked if I could crash at her place. My angel of mercy was delightfully accommodating.
For the next seven hours I waited in the lobby, trying in vane to read a Margaret Atwood novel and wishing with all my soul for some Adderall and a pot of coffee to wash it down. When they opened the gate at 7am I waved my boarding pass like a golden ticket to the Wonka factory. As the plane took off I blacked out to the sound of televised prayers from the Quran.
Germany, along with the rest of the world, was in the process of shutting down. Audra and I grabbed some take-away kebabs from what seemed the last operating shop in the country and dipped into a case of microbrews at her house. The next morning I was on a flight to Italy. The last flight I’d be taking for a long time.
It had been twenty-eight days since I left, and the streets of Rome bore a striking resemblance to London at the beginning of 28 Days Later. Never before had I walked through a city that felt so completely and utterly desolate. It seemed that while I was gone, the wave had taken out our entire way of life, the world I’d known and made my own for over ten years. But I was home, and there was an apartment with all the amenities waiting for me where I’d be safe. There was nothing left for it but to wait for the wave to roll back.
