lance’s blog

i was in senior high when this happened. a schoolmate requested me to accompany him to the office of his friends at PAG-ASA. since it was not very far from our school we just walked. the trip on the way to the office was fine. but the way back home was far more memorable because i almost died that day.

it was already dark when we went home and that area of tomas morato before circle theater was not fully lighted. since using the pedestrain lane would make out trip longer we decided to cross the street on that part of tomas morato though it was a bit darker. my schoolmate was able to cross first because i hesitated. then without looking if there were vehicles coming i run across the street. luckily i did not stop nor look anywhere else. as i was about to reach the other side of the street i felt a strong wind rushed behind.

upon reaching the area where my schoolmate was standing seemingly dumbstruck he told me he thought he would see me rolling. as i was crossing the street a car came speeding toward my direction. perhaps it was best that i didn’t notice it because it might have caused me to stop or panic and cause my early death.

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about six years and a half after my first near encounter with death i was requested by a choir member of ours to accompany her to the regional capital in order to inquire regarding her enrolment for first year in the former Divine Word University. during that time buses still take the old route which is via Buray and the national highway was not yet as good as today. it was muddy and dangerous.

so there were also limited number of buses plying the route and it was common to ride on top of buses just to be able to get to Tacloban City. that day we waited for a bus from 1:00 am so that we would be able to arrive at Tacloban before the school opens and so be able to go home earlier. but the earliest bus passed at about 5:00 am already. it was almost full so i have to ride on top of it while my companion was able to find an empty seat inside.

during the trip i dozed off. i can’t recall how long i was asleep. what i could clearly recall is that when i woke up we were already about halfway to Buray passing along dangerous curves with very steep and deep gorges on the left side of the road. many times the bus had to pass too close to the dangerous side and as many times i have almost fallen down. i realized that i could have fallen and died that day even for a little wrong movement.

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there are other occasions in my life when i had close encounters with death. there was also the time when i think i could have fallen from a ship we were riding, or that occasion when we almost got ambushed while i was still a cadet, or when i luckily escaped a bombing incident of a movie house that got bombed a few minutes after i went out of it. but i guess it was not yet my time to die during those times. God must have a reason and a plan for me.

and having been given so many chances in life to live, i guess i have to accomplish the task He wants me to fulfill.

This entry was posted on Friday, July 27th, 2007 at 12:33 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.