MAY GOD BLESS and PROTECT YOU!
Wish and prayer of the parents, of their family, was the only thing that the girls brought with them in venturing to a far place, to another country with another kind of culture and people. Prayers and in themselves their high dreams and expectations.
The six, noticeably young girls were overly excited. Being from a poor family and now flying with an airplane, the excitement was remarkably high.
"If you are not inside, it just looked small!" Luisa said and the other girls looked at her.
"What are you talking about?" Thelma asked Luisa.
"This plane! Imagine it can fly! It is big and heavy! I remember the song; I'm leaving on a jet plane!" Luisa said and sang the last part of her sentence.
"Huh, you are singing but I think you are afraid!" Grace teased Luisa.
"I am not afraid; I am only a little nervous. Imagine, this plane flying so high, if it falls no one will survive!" Luisa said.
"Hey, don't talk like that. Nothing will happen with this plane. We will reach our destination.!" Luz subdued Luisa.
"Yes, Cyprus we're coming!" said Carla.
"Is Cyprus in Europe?" Lorna asked.
"We were told that our destination is Europe, thus Cyprus is in Europe!" Luz answered.
"I am not sure!" Lorna said, and the girls looked at her. "Cyprus is an island. It is near Turkey, Syria, Israel, Lebanon and some more Middle East countries. I doubt if Cyprus is Europe!"
"If Cyprus is not Europe why in our contract, our destination is Europe?" asked Grace.
"Let us not make it a problem! Maybe, we only stopover in Cyprus!"
CHAPTER 3 – THE CYPRUS JUNCTION
CYPRUS
In Lanarca International Airport, it was a big fat man that picked the six girls. They arrived in the middle of the night. There were two other groups from the Philippines they learned were cultural dancers too, that travel together with them on the same plane, but another person picked these two groups, and they did not know where these groups were going to. Them, they knew where they will go, to Nicosia City.
NICOSIA, CYPRUS - SEPTEMBER 1985
The big fat man that picked them from the airport introduced himself as Dimitri. Dimitri brought them to Nicosia. In there as they learned from Dimitri, they will stay for half year or maybe a year in Nicosia and worked there. After that, they must go to another country and if they were lucky, maybe the next country will be Switzerland.
Dimitri brought the group to their apartment on the third floor of a big building. When Dimitri leave, the girls occupied to each a bed for themselves. In the room, three double deck beds and one big locker with also six doors.
Dimitri told them, that there were six Filipinas in another room just across their room. The other group were on working so maybe they will have met them later. The apartment had two rooms, each room a group of six people, so they learned they were twelve people living in that apartment.
"The two groups that were with us in the plane where did they went?" Carla asked the other girls while she arranged her clothes and personal things in the locker, she claimed for herself.
"That's not what I am thinking but what Dimitri said to us. He said we could not go out from our apartment until he told us to do so. You all heard it?" Lorna said.
"I think what he said was only normal. We are new here and he only wanted to protect us! We are their responsibilities, right?" Luisa said.
"I don't know but to me, it means that we are prisoners!" Lorna was doubting.
"God, we just arrived, and you are already thinking about that? Are you not tired? I want to rest, may I?" Thelma stopped the for her unpleasant conversation.
"If you want to sleep, sleep! You had your own bed!" Lorna answered Thelma.
"How can I sleep if you are very noisy?" Thelma replied.
"I cannot sleep. I am very tired, but I cannot sleep. Does anyone of you felt nothing about this room?" Luz said and the girls looked at her. "The room is cold!"
"Maybe it's really cold here, because look, the blankets are very thick!" Thelma answered Luz.
"How come? Cyprus is East. The temperature here is different from countries with winter? And besides that, is not what I mean. It is a different kind of cold. A kind of cold you felt when there's a ghost!" Luz answered Thelma.
"You felt only uneasy, your first time in a different country!" Carla said. "There's no ghost here."
"Let us not talk about ghost! We just arrived. If really there is a ghost in here, it cannot do nothing, we are six persons, the ghost must be the one who will become afraid to us. I will try to sleep. I had not slept in the plane!" jokingly Luisa said to the other girls and she climb to the upper bed she assigned to herself.
"Okay, I will also try to sleep. I had not slept in the plane!" and Luz climb to the upper bed and Grace who's already lying under protested.
"You cannot sleep there!"
"Why not?"
"You are big. Maybe the bed cannot carry you and it will fall on me, I will be crashed flat!"
"And where will I sleep? All beds were occupied. If you like we can change bed. I sleep down and you are up here!" Luz was a little irritated of Grace.
"Okay, you take this bed. If I am you, it is better you diet. I wandered why you was hired as a dancer when actually your body was big!" said Grace who became upset.
"Maybe, I am a little chubby but even though I am a good and graceful dancer! This Visaya girl is a bully." Luz answered Grace at the same time winked at the other girls.
"I am not a Visaya. I came from Mindanao. Visaya if you came from the Visayan region!" Grace answered Luz.
"It's the same!" Luz answered Grace.
"It's not the same. I was born in Mindanao and grew there!" Grace said looking fiercely at Luz.
"What are you then? You are not a Muslim?"
"Think by yourself what will you call the people from Mindanao. You are the one who like to give names search it by yourself!"
"What's wrong if I said you are a Visaya? Actually, you are the one who started calling me fat!"
"Hey, we just arrived here, and you are like cat and dog already! Please!" Carla subdued the two squabbling girls. Luz and Grace listened, they both kept quiet. Although Grace still pouting to herself. She is really upset of Luz, because she knew that people from the Tagalog Region or from Luzon have a discriminating look at the Visayan people and the way Luz said she is a Visaya sounded so.
After a while, the girls fall asleep, and it is almost morning. Luisa, who was not a deep sleeper, wake up from the noise she heard. The opening and closing of door and of voices talking the Filipino Language Tagalog. Luisa came to where Carla slept and wake her up.
"Why?" Carla asked Luisa while still half awake.
"Listened, the Filipinas on the other room arrived already!" Luisa said.
Carla listened for a while then said. "Yes, they were home."
"We go out and greet them!" Luisa wanted already to be acquainted with the other group.
"I am still sleepy; I want first to sleep. Tomorrow we do it." and Carla closed her eyes to return back to sleep.
"Then I go alone by myself." Luisa said and opened their door to meet the other Filipinas. In the living room, two girls were sitting indecent and seemed drunk. The girls looked at Luisa.
"Hi!" Luisa greeted the two girls that suddenly sat straight. One girl came out from the kitchen and when she saw Luisa, she dropped the glass in her hand and before Luisa could say a word again, the three girls were screaming and amazingly fast entered their room. Luisa was surprised why the girls acted the way they did. Luisa closed the door of their room and she saw her group were all awaken.
"What happened? We heard screaming!" Carla asked Luisa.
"I heard also the screaming!" Grace said.
Luz turned suddenly when she heard the screams and she fall down her bed. When her chubby body fall on the floor, she felt pain but still quickly stand up and asked. "What is it?"
"I don't know. I just greeted them 'Hi' then suddenly they all screamed and ran fast to their room!" Luisa answered them.
"Why?" at the same time, Lorna and Thelma asked.
"You asked me!" Luisa said shrugging her shoulder.
"Come, we go and ask them." Carla went to the door and opened it. The five girls followed her, and Carla went to the door of the other room across. They stopped for a while and listened. They heard no noise from inside.
"Maybe they were already sleeping!" Grace said.
"Impossible! How come? We just heard their screams, knock on their door Carla!" Luisa told Carla to knock the door of the other Filipinas. Carla did knock on the door but there is no reply.
"Knock again!" Lorna said, Carla knocked again.****to be continued****Remedios Dorio