By Danilo P. Padua, PhD
I am taking this opportunity to recollect my nostalgic travel to Texas, USA on January 20-26, 2020 before the declaration of the COVID 19 pandemic sometime in March of the same year. This is because of the current resurgence of the same health curse in China which is widely recognized as the origin of the dreaded disease.
According to updates as of Jan 19, 2023, the disease had already infected about 667,430,325 worldwide and a death toll of 6,726,367 of which 65,673 are from the Philippines. China has only 2,023,904 with a death tally of 5,273. The whole of Dec., 2022 was not a good one though for China as global analysts estimated a huge total of more than 30million infections with a daily death of 6.000 compared to the Philippines’ 84.
If the analysts are correct, it means that China might be infecting more people in other countries since they are currently one of the great sources of tourists in the world.
I boarded an ANA plane in Manila on the 20th of Jan, arriving in Narita airport for a lay-over of about 3-4 hours. Narita airport is big and modern. Even soap are coming out of its “faucet” without touching the container.
I then took a 12, 828-mile travel from Narita to Dallas-Forth Worth in Texas on an American Airlines flight, arriving there 15min earlier than its expected time of arrival. There was no glitch in the aeronautics control system then, either in Manila or Texas.
The stewardesses of ANA very young while those of AA were already in their middle age indicating that the latter were given a better job tenure than the former which is great.
On arrival in Dallas, the air was filled with Spanish language, rather than English. I was reminded of my 12-unit of Spanish language courses which I took granted of. I should have attentive to my teacher then instead of joining my classmates in collectively challenging our maestro that the beautiful language was useless to learn. Most of the airport personnel there were of Mexican extraction which is not surprising since Texas is adjacent to the country of Nachos.
I can vividly recall that clearing with the immigration was primarily done thru a machine. I failed the first time I tried. Somebody who saw struggling with the machine suggested that I asked for the help of immigration officials who are available. Wanting not to be embarrassed, I tried again and voila, I did it in a breeze. Everything was big in the airport.
When I arrived in Texas, it was a freezing 1degee C. My Google search earlier showed that it will be 10degrees on my arrival. I was a jerk for not finding the right info on the weather. I brought only clothes and jackets that I normally use during the coldest months in Baguio. I was wrong. I almost shivered to a cough and cold condition. Luckily, I didn’t and I survived the unexpected coldness due to my American hosts. For one, we rode a car with a heater. Secondly, my host was so kind enough to lead me to a store and bought long johns and warm sweater for me. Many thanks to them.
The travel was a business trip for me. I had the opportunity to observe various businesses of my American hosts located in small towns about three hours by car from Dallas. Since it was cold and I didn’t have the required clothes, I wasn’t able to enjoy the sights. Add to that the fact that it was almost always raining during the almost one week that I was there. My hotel room was like a COVID 19 isolation facility.
My consolation was that, my hosts took me to different types of restos for lunch and dinner during my presence there. Nachos, pizzas, crabs and shrimps, freshly caught fishes, Mexican-inspired meat menus whose names escape my faltering memory, and ‘giant’ burgers were some of the fares in those restaurants.
Going back to Dallas, we passed thru wide freeways, and exited to other wide freeways. So unlike of course our own expressways where you have no choice but to get out into a small narrow road or into a traffic-filled avenue.
Getting back to Dallas the family of Alex Coloma and Brenda Domingo-Coloma who are already residents of San Antonio, Texas, graciously visited me in Dallas and took me around Forth Worth, as it was not raining when I got there. Brenda hails from Tublay and was a former faculty member of Saint Louis University while Alex, from Mindanao, was also a teacher and a preacher of the Church of Christ. They have two sons, one of which is conscripted into the US Army, and an adorable girl.
That’s when I really had the tourist-time. The Colomas took me to various tourist sites in Forth Worth which included a visit to a water Park with cascading and a bit dangerous swirling water that could drown someone if not stepping carefully. They also took me to the exact location where former US President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in the 1960’s. Many thanks also to them.
Alex took me to the airport for my flight home. The Dallas Forth Worth airport has four wings, A,B,C,D. I lingered on A wing when I should have been in the D wing. I was given a wrong info. It was almost too late when I was told about the mistake. Fortunately, there was what they call SkyLink train, linking the four wings. It is a fast and efficient train that is running on an elevated platform located at the outer part of the wings. I almost messed up my flight to Hongkong where I had the layover this tine.
Arriving in Hong Kong on the 26th, I was surprised to see why all people in the airport were wearing masks-from the passengers passing or lingering about, to the plane crews catching up their planes and attending shop keepers.
I was lucky this time as I brought with me ten pieces of face masks, bought for only 2 pesos each in Baguio, as protection for my allergic rhinitis. Naturally, I fished out and worn one when I was told of the COVID 19 disease. Nobody was wearing one when I left the U.S.
Just less than a month later, the first case of COVID 19 infection was detected in the Philippines brought by two Chinese tourists. In March, 2020 the pandemic was declared. I was safely home, not locked down. **
