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Old 28th August 2018, 22:48
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BobClay United Kingdom BobClay is offline
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Location: Cornwall UK
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I remember in the 70's visiting a place called Batangas Bay in the Philippines on a tanker. A few of us went ashore one night and were taken miles into the countryside to a bar which was like the front room of somebody's house. Nothing dubious, just a 'country pub' sort of.

It had an incredibly polished stone floor, and the lady who owned the house, who was also the barmaid, walked around with a large polishing rag rapped around one foot, which, she told us, she'd been doing for many years, hence the mirror like stone floor.

A most incredible place to get a glance of the Philippines (I've sailed with many Philippino crews and I can only say they are good people, but don't get on the wrong side of them.)

One of the features of this 'bar' was a series of pictures hanging on the wall, like the rest of the room, utterly spotless. As we sat drinking all these pictures started to vibrate, tapping against the wall rapidly, and the only sound I can remember was a sort of deep hum. It stopped and we all stared at each other wondering what that was, to which the lady of the house spoke in her language, (a curious mixture of European and Asian, a bit Spanish in sound) said something of which I picked out only one recognizable word. Volcano.

With a shrug she pointed into the distance and, interpreted by some locals for us, meant: 'It's just that volcano over there, always grumbling.'

Ok, not really an Earthquake, but I'm from the UK. We have volcanoes, but it's been tens or even hundreds of millions of years since they were worrying the locals (of which there certainly weren't any human types at the time.)

Living with a volcano, beneficial in terms of agriculture. Dangerous when it decides to throw a wobbler, as we've all seen on the news.
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