22-26 Aug 2018

“What do we do on our Anniversary?” Suggestions came out and we finally decided, “Why not we visit your mum?” Yep. His mum. Remember the Perth incident when we wanted to surprise visit her? Well, we didn’t want to surprise her anymore because we might end up surprised instead of her.

I flew through Melbourne. T and I met at Tullamarine airport and flew together to Townsville. It was a 3hour flight. It’s almost the same duration as when I am flying back to the Philippines. The flight was luckily, uneventful.

His mum was waiting outside the airport. As soon as she saw us, she gave us her warmest hug. We dropped by T’s brother then we got to her home and spent the rest of the night and remaining few days with her. She’s indeed a tidy lady.

Next day, we woke up pretty late. The three of us decided to have lunch by the Strand. We then walked by the strip walkway along the beach. It was beautiful. The Strand had a variety of workout equipment and playgrounds along the way to which we enjoyed a lot.

We went back home to rest for a little while and wanted to do a small hike to the top of Castle Hill for the sunset but we procrastinated hence, unable to reach there on top while the sun was still visible. Sun wasn’t anymore there but the blend of fiery colors was still there. The view was, by itself, satisfying. We then bought fast food for dinner.

We planned to climb the hill again for sunrise but instead, we had a city center tour. We also planned to go to Magnetic Island, but no. It also didn’t materialize. Haha We procrastinated a lot. We just had a simple bonding day with T and his mum and a brief water play at home. It was great anyway. She gave me an early birthday present too. I was deeply touched. That night, we had dinner with T’s brother and friends and headed home.

Our last day was finally, an accomplished plan. We finally managed to cross the water and head to Magnetic Island. It’s a warm and beautiful island with 20+bays. Some bays were crowded some were quiet. We rented out a topless car to take us around the island. We had lunch there and just chilled. We didn’t expect that the water was warm because it would have been nice if we had our swimwears with us. We didn’t bring because we thought the water would be cold.

We went back home and we packed. We were flying back to Melbourne that night. T gave me a nice hotel accommodation because of our anniversary. I was set to fly back to Singapore the next day. Days were really fast. 4Days of exploration was over….365days of knowing such an angel had passed.

To end, I just would like to share how similar our Filipino family is to his family culture. I loved the way his family interacted as that’s the same way we interact with each other back home. I never expected that. We share the same orientation when it comes to family “family first”.