The inside of "our house" just before we leave it

The time has come for us to move out of “our house” on Middleside on the historic island of Corregidor.  Change is tough.  It’s downright stressful at times.  Since returning from our yearly U.S. hiatus to Corregidor last September, we have lived with the knowledge that we would be leaving the house we’ve lived in for over six years, the second-longest residence we’ve had in our almost 42 years of marriage – we lived for nineteen years in one house in Lansing, Michigan, the majority of our child-raising era.

Our lease with the Corregidor Foundation, Inc. (CFI) has expired and we must move on.  We are grateful to CFI’s Col. Art Matibag for permission to live in the old “aviary house.”  Since we have long-term commitments for upcoming tours, we express heartfelt thanks to Ms. Doris Ho and Mr. Roland Portes of Sun Cruises, Inc. (SCI) for offering a long-term room rental at the newly renovated Corregidor Inn, covering us for the next four months.  Our last day on the island will be May 6, the 73^rd anniversary of the Fall of Corregidor and the 13^th anniversary of Steve’s first visit – Marcia’s first came one year later.

Moving from a small house to a single hotel room is somewhat of a challenge as you can well imagine.  Over the years, we have accumulated “stuff,” and most of it will not be taken back to the States with us.  When you look at the following house pictures, you may notice books piled up over our kitchen table, our office desk, and our bed and our wardrobes.  Marcia especially is a reader and we often brought 20 or more fiction books back with us from used bookstores in Manila; they now total about 800.  Those will not be going home with us, but since we moved to Corregidor the world of reading has evolved to eBooks, and Marcia’s new Kindle Fire and Steve’s PC Kindle application replaced the need for so many paperbacks.  We also brought many WWII and specifically Corregidor-related books from the States, and those we are doing our best to send back.  Some books are autographed by the authors, others came as gifts from tour guests, and those we want to keep.

It is impossible for us to do an auction here, and we are grateful we found someone who was willing to buy the major household things, like the refrigerator and washing machine/spinner. Marcia actually wishes she could take just the centrifuge half of our washing machine because of how quickly the laundry dries.  Other stuff that we cannot take back we will just give away.  Stuff is not so hard to part with, and we are so very grateful for the time that we have had here. That will help as we leave our friends and this peaceful location behind, come May.

We realize with some surprise that we never photographed the inside of the house before.  Almost all of our photos are outdoor shots and/or tour groups.  Following are a few pictures of a house that was built around 1992, we think, and we had renovated in 2008, a house that turned out to be a home for us on a very quiet part of the island, and one we will forever miss.  It will be strange to walk or drive by “our house” in the future.

Dining room table, rarely used for dining because we always eat outside

 

Our living room, which we rarely used since we always entertained outside

Front entrance, which we rarely used since we usually used the back door

Office left, storeroom right

Storeroom

Desk in office, which we rarely used because we always work outside

Kitchen, used all the time

Hallway from kitchen to bedroom, laundry, and bathroom

Bathroom (comfort room) used a whole lot

Laundry room next to comfort room

Our bamboo and rattan bed, very low to the floor because we had to amputate the legs to fit it down the hallway

Clothes rack, room divider screen in lieu of drapes to maintain privacy

Wardrobes in the largest bedroom we've ever had - the space will be missed

Our move back to the Iron Range in Minnesota is bittersweet, since we will certainly miss the Philippines and its people.  But it puts us back much closer to our families and that is a good thing.  Who knows what adventures will find us “on the Range.”

Steve and Marcia on the Rock