Hopefully, you can see the names of the communities on this island. (You might need to zoom in a bit.) Think of these names more as "counties," with a town by the same name inside each county. There are other villages, but just one town by that name, in each. At the far southwest is Tagbilaran, the only actual city in Bohol. Our zone in the mission includes missionaries living and working in, along the west coast, Loon (pronounced with two separate O's), Calape (where we live), Tubigon, Clarin, Sagbayan (inland from Clarin), Inabanga, Talibon (way at the north), and Ubay (around to the east side).
I've been intending to post a blog entry showing some of the beauties of our wonderful island of Bohol. This isn't the one, though, I'm afraid. This one is to tell about something kind of scary that's happened here recently.
On Tuesday morning, April 11, we went over to the church for our usual weekly District Training meeting, with missionaries from Loon and Calape. During this meeting, I got a phone call from the other senior missionary couple, the Bells, who live in Sagbayan. Reportedly, there was some terrorist activity - - what?! - - in Inabanga right then, and a firefight going on. Inabanga is about 20 miles from us. Fortunately, all our Inabanga and Clarin missionaries were at their own district meeting that day, in Tubigon (very providential), and there they would have to stay. Fortunately for the Clarin sisters, they had planned to stay, anyway, and had a couple days' clothing with them. Not the elders. But no one was to go to, or through, Inabanga or Clarin.
There's never been anything like this happen in Bohol before. As it turns out, there's a group in the southern islands of Mindinao, called Abu Sayyaf, of Muslim separatists who like causing havoc mostly through piracy and kidnapping of foreigners for ransom. From what I understand, they were wanting revenge against the Philippine government for some previous disciplinary actions. Why on Bohol? There was a convention of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) scheduled and a few days of it were to be held in Bohol. They could cause a lot of embarrassment to the government by attacking and/or kidnapping some foreign diplomats. Plus, it was Holy Week and an excellent time to find big groups of people together anywhere, if you wanted to do any bombing.
So, about a dozen of these guys came up in three "pump boats" (motorized outrigger canoes) and entered the river at Inabanga. I guess they were not totally unexpected, and the police and military were pretty quick to jump when some local kids reported seeing several men unloading arms and explosives. About half the Abu Sayyaf contingent were killed, plus a couple officers. The others, unfortunately, escaped.
All our missionaries were told to stay inside much of the remaining week, or to stay in the more populous areas, and to not venture into the bukid, the mountainous, forested areas at all. It was presumed that the bad guys were hiding in the hills. After a couple more days, the missionaries from Sagbayan were evacuated to Tagbilaran. On a couple of days after this, we had to make trips to allow missionaries to retrieve their belongings from their apartments.
Easter came and went without incident, thank Heaven, but a few days later there was more shooting, this time in Clarin. I think this followed a tip that there were footprints leading to a cave in that area. A couple more bad guys were killed. A car was discovered with food and scuba gear, apparently intended for assisting them in their escape from Bohol. President Duterte issued a bounty on the Abu Sayyaf. One million Philippine pesos (about $20,000 USD) were offered for each bandit, dead or alive. The ASEAN conference was held on Panglao Island (just south of Tagbilaran) without any problem.
On Saturday night, April 22nd, we were told that a suspected Abu Sayyaf member was spotted in Tubigon, so we were instructed to move everyone down to Tagbilaran. We had the missionaries in Tubigon and Calape gather here in our house on Sunday morning and we headed for Tagbilaran in our van and our zone leaders' pickup - - about an hour's drive. We also picked up an American elder in Loon.
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| At our place |
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| Something funny along the way - - a goat on a jeepney |
The Tagbilaran Zone Leaders had brunch for us when we got there.
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| (Not my best angle -- ugh!) |
After eating, we walked to the church for a 1pm Sacrament Meeting, then back to pick up the luggage of the non-Filipino missionaries, and took them to the ferry. They were evacuated to Cebu. Some of these missionaries had arrived in the mission only three weeks before. : (
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| A parting shot at the Tagbilaran apartment |
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| At the port |
We were also given the option to cross over to Cebu, ourselves, but it didn't seem necessary or practical at that point, so we stayed in Tagbilaran. Elder and Sister Bell joined us a couple days later. Of course, we didn't have reservations to stay anywhere, and we didn't know how long we'd be staying, so we just had to find places as we could. The first two nights were very nice, at Bohol Tropics resort in Tagbilaran. Our room overlooked the bay, with the port in the distance.
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| That's the Tagbilaran Port, off to the left, which has frequent arrivals and departures of passenger ferries and other boats. By the way, that's not actually a beach down below. It's hard-packed dirt. Anyway, it was way too hot to be very enticing. |
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| Incredible sunsets! |
The second morning we were there, we drove to the airport and picked up two men from the church's security department. They came over to assess the situation and meet with the military to determine what was best to be done with all the missionaries.
The Bohol Tropics didn't have room for us after the first two nights, so we drove out to Panglao Island and found this little place called Cabriza Suites, with rooms for us. Less expensive but comfortable and clean.
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| The pool was often in use by a scuba diving class. : ) |
One day that we were staying there, Tony and Elder Bell picked up some of the missionaries to go back to their areas and collect the rest of their belongings. Transfers were fast approaching and some of their areas were being closed for now, so they needed to be ready to go wherever they were sent. Sister Bell and I just hung out at our motel, but also did a little sightseeing. She took me to Bohol Bee Farm, which is now a large complex with organic restaurant, rooms, a large gift shop, and gardens. Their food is good and they grow their own produce and make their own ice cream. Wonderful stuff! I didn't see any bees. Hmm. It's a delightful place, though.
The next day, we did a little house-hunting on Panglao Island for another couple who will be coming in a few months. We did find a decent, secure little place that we'll probably rent for them. So our time in Panglao was not a total waste! We also went back to Bohol Bee Farm with our hubbies for a nice dinner.
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| Tony's seafood lasagna with a very colorful salad, with flowers! |
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| Just some random shots around Bohol Bee Farm's restaurant area. So very pleasant, overlooking the sea. |
Finally, we got word that we could return to our home in Calape on Friday (April 28), and to bring our sister missionaries, too. Well, one had gone to Cebu, but another (a Filipina) was assigned to Calape now. It was so great to head home!
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| These beautiful trees, all along the highway, are now in bloom. |
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| And banners are flying for the month of May - - fiesta month on the island of Bohol! |
The Bells were not yet allowed back to Sagbayan, but they came to Calape the next day and stayed in a little resort on Pangangan Island, near here. After a couple days, they were allowed to go home, and all the missionaries are now back in place, except for two sisters' areas that are closed for now, and the sisters reassigned. We're still being cautioned about our travel and all, as a couple of the Abu Sayyaf guys are yet unaccounted for, but life is pretty much back to normal.
Our 5-day stint as "refugees" sometimes felt like vacation, but . . . not really. It was relaxing in some ways, but things felt so unsettled. We never really felt that we were in any serious danger. Our Father in Heaven has always seen to our needs and protected us. It just felt strange to be lounging around all week, accomplishing so little and not knowing how long it would last or what would happen next. So, we're very grateful to be back!
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| Yay!!! (This archway was built while we were away, all of bamboo, and it was in place to welcome us home.) |
