Letting it all go

Bulabog Beach located on the east side of the island is best for kite boarding and windsurfing.[Photo provided to China Daily]

Later in our training, Brian gave us a recreational bonus before we finished the morning exercise: he offered us a chance to "experience the water".

My teammate and I swam behind him as if he were the surfing board, each of us holding a bar that he wore. He navigated the kite and directed us to float on the water. The three of us moved swiftly in the water.

My teammate had to leave early to catch her flight, so we had taken only two entry-level classes. At the end of the lesson, Brian gave each of us an IKO membership card, and my teammate said she would return in November, the beginning of the next windy season.

I did not make it last November. When I went back again this April, I did not see Brian. I heard he had left for Cebu, a kite resort hub nearby.

I may go back again to Boracay to take up more classes. If nothing else, the white beach makes me relax and helps me to let it go.

About Boracay

The word "boracay" means "white cotton" in the local language, and it is said that the island was given the name because the white powdery sands on its beaches were like cotton.

The white beach takes up four km of the island's seven km length. It is less than one km wide at the narrowest point, and has a total land area of about 10 sq km.

Although it is small, it has been inhabited for a long time. There were about 100 people living on the island when the Spanish arrived in the 16th century. They were planting rice and raising goats. The Spanish had coconuts and fruit trees planted on the island.

It is said that German backpackers were the first tourists who arrived on the island in the 1970s. Boracay became a paradise for backpackers in the 1980s and 90s. It was only in the new century that well-to-do tourists arrived in large numbers.