Olango Again

Olango island, second part.

"What a beauty truly it is 

and what a privilege to still be able 

to see it in its natural form."

Suns out, suits out. 

Summer has definitely arrived, and what better way to commence the season than a short visit to an island nearby. Olango island: home to a beautiful and vast marine and bird sanctuary. 

Olango has grown to have made a name for itself despite an obvious lack in progress with its commodification (which is obviously a very good thing given the struggles of popular islands now— Boracay and Siargao); its provincial setting compensates with beautiful (too scenic to handle) landscapes and seascapes. I've already expressed my fondness over this island in a previous post on this blog (Olango), with which similarly evokes how I still feel with this second visit.

However this time, it's a little diffrent, my friends and I preferred a more nostalgic mode of transportation to roam around the island— by biking — that evoked an uncontainable bliss and a nostalgia of great intensity. Considering that I haven't biked in so long, it felt like tapping into my younger years, where biking around was the equal to texting at this age. It was just so fun, to simply and blatantly put it. 

But more than my fondness over the island, I also really wanted to talk more about the new-found tiny confidence I gained to prance along the seashores of a beautiful white sand beach, in nothing but a one-piece bikini bathing suit— overlaid in black sheer shirt to still consider the conservative in me. I was conscious to say the least, I've always been adamant with my rash guards and board shorts, even to a point of thinking that mere entertaining the idea is far stretched.

  "Truthfully, it is hard to be confident 

when your consciously bothered by other people's views."

But, here I am after constant self-persuasions and a tiny bit of confidence, clad in a one-piece bikini bathing suit in Olango island. To be honest, it was both equally liberating and intimidating to be in one. I have never realized the gravity of being in such skimpy garb, especially when you're thought of as not the standard size or just downright unconventional. All my adulation goes to those women who are empowered and body-positive, who celebrate themselves even when they're ridiculed for how their bodies look like. It truly takes courage, which I for one took time to gain (even after wearing such, I was still in a place of pretense; acting like I was confident and all when deep down my soul I was uncontrollably drowning with thoughts of other people's ideals). Truthfully, it is hard to be confident when your consciously bothered by other people's views. Sometimes, putting up a facade can help filter out what they have to say, but it will just never erase the fact that they have something to say.

It dawned on me, that being in a bikini is showing all your vulnerabilities. All of the things your most insecure about, bared for everyone to see. That is why, not until I got to wear a bikini, I have understood why it takes courage and why people who have the courage to bare themselves ought to be admired. Bikini is a little-to-none clothing and as much as it is covering the most privates of a woman (even a man's) body, it does feel like baring one's soul. With that, it felt like I bared myself to Olango and it was as if Olango embraced all that I have and all that I am with no filter— literally and in a millennial-jargonistic way. 

For now, I see Olango as my home away from home. What a beauty truly it is and what a privilege to still be able to see it in its natural form— raw and innocent. 

ONE PIECE 

Coco Cabaña

PHOTOGRAPHER

Kristine Buquiran