We got inspired by the passion people doing the things they love, heard amazing life stories and decided to listen a little longer.

We’ve lived in the Philippines now for about six months, and I think it’s time to look back and see what has changed in our lives.

About a year ago Al and I decided to make changes in our lives. That time we’ve been living, diving and working in Bunaken National park for years (6 1/2 years for my hubby, little less for me) and even though we loved it… we also started to get irritated by the “small things” and the remoteness – and we knew it was time to do something little different for a change.

We were very sad to leave Bunaken, probably more sad than anywhere else even in my life before. We had borrowed a lovely house and a dog plus many jungle cats. We loved the dives and most of the time our guests, our bosses were kind and fair people. I’m not gonna go deeper into why we decided to leave in the end: lets say that there was not just one reason but a sum of many small things that made us finally decide to try our lives somewhere else.

About a year ago when we left our home, first we did some travelling, saw family members and finally got a job in the Caribbean. We took the job spontaneously and even though we did a lot of research of the destination, it wasn’t enough after being used to living and diving in the “coral triangle”. The place wasn’t all bad, there was some great adventures on that journey too, but for settling down and actually living there permanently – no thanks. I’ll write a whole blog post about it later at some point.

So we decided to leave again and did some bucket list sort of things, and finally, last March we landed in the Philippines.

First we decided to come here just for the yoga and cheap living – and to figure out what next. But more we stayed the more we liked, settling down on Panglao started to feel like a good choice. We found some work despite of low season and started to get new friends. We got deeply touched by some really good hearted people and it was so freaking good to realise that there are still so many honest kind people around. We got inspired by the passion people doing the things they love, heard amazing life stories and decided to listen a little longer.

Summer we took care of our good friends’ house, dog and cat, done some diving with the whalesharks, learned how to propagate corals and how to participate on conservation projects, enjoyed quiet beach time when masses are away, had dinner parties with too much red wine, got to know little Maya and her awesome parents. Laughed a lot! Drank too many cold beers because why not. Cooked better food than probably ever before.

Quiet summer went and high season is now about to start. We moved to a new home near the beach and Al had his birthday party with more than 30 new friends! And we finally won yesterday Wok Bar’s legendary quiz night! My good friend Maria came to do the PADI Divemaster course with me and many friends are coming this autumn and winter for a visit. We found a little abandoned kitten and became his new mommy and daddy.

All I can say at the moment: Life is good.

❤ Heini