We’ve just finished an hour snorkeling at a beach somewhere in Sulu when the sky cracked red. Sitting on the beach, conversation with the Juan Portrait crew was starting to heat up around the reason why the band Sugarfree broke up. Bottles of Red Horse and shot glasses filled with Emperador were soon passed around.

As the sun started to set, everyone turned to look. I knew each one was debating whether to get their cameras and look for a proper vantage point, but the lure of alcohol and stories were just too much. After a moment, everyone settled back to their place, looking on as I raced for my camera and tripod.

From the open-aired windows of the military trucks provided by Marine Battalion Landing Team Six, I caught a fleeting glimpse of Sulu; from the chaotic streets of its capital, the bucolic sceneries of its outskirts, the stilt houses near its coastal area, and the graceful white mosques towering above the town’s painted tin roofs.

Our trip with the Juan Portrait team to and from the various rendezvous in Sulu wouldn’t have been possible without the help of the MBLT-6 team. Besides providing us with a place to stay in every night, they also lent their vehicles for us to use—complete with armed personnel and a platoon of convoys.

And that said convoy includes a tank. Yes, a full blown, massive, armored tank.

See, no matter what you read or heard about how it’s relatively safe to travel to Sulu, it simply isn’t true. Especially for people like us who are considered foreign to the place. We were told that the moment we stepped into Jolo’s port, everyone knew that we were already there.

And that is not a comforting feeling to have.

Through the five days that we were on the island, our movement was totally limited to the MBLT-6 camp in Patikul. To go out, we need to be on their trucks, rumbling at a fairly rapid pace. These trucks were not to be impeded by anything—local vehicles swerve out of the way when we pass, lest the chance of an Abu Sayyaf ambush begets us.

And through these trucks, I saw Sulu.

It looked as chaotic as any city I’ve been to. Pedicabs and tricycles rule the street of Jolo. It was surprising that their houses looked as ordinary as the ones as say, in Quiapo. It was jarring to see the graceful minarets of mosques towering over the chaos of the city.

I have no idea how many mosques there are in the whole island of Sulu, but I can tell from those we passed that there are a lot. Some of them, the major ones I suppose, are even quite impressive. It was with a disheartening feeling that we were left to admire them from afar. It would’ve been nice to see them up close, and if possible, even enter their premises.

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From our vantage at Camp Bud Datu, I saw a couple of mosques that really stood out. Again, I have no idea what the names of these worship houses are. My mind was too preoccupied with things that might happen as we hit the road again, leaving the comforts and security of the marine camps.

Which was quite unjust to the place.

From what I saw from the mountainous region of Sulu, I’m pretty sure that the island offers more than the little we saw. If the white sand beach of Quezon Beach Patikul is paradise, what more so those little islands I saw dotting the perimeter of Sulu.

This is a place different to most provinces in the Philippines.

In Sulu, there are no guided tours. Here, you take in as much as you can from a vantage of a speeding vehicle. You can swim on white sand beaches, but with escorts checking you out via binoculars from the shore. You wait for the sunset, not beside the sea, but on a speeding military truck trying to beat the retiring sun from setting before you reach the safety of the camp.

It is not a place to go to just for the heck of it.

It is saddening to admit, but Sulu is not a safe destination for tourists like us. I’m just hoping and praying that someday, I can take those words back and not only let everyone see how beautiful this province is, but also invite them to see it for themselves.

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There’s something about soft, plush toys that speaks to every child. They’re cuddly, they’re cute, and they make even the most hardened kid flash a smile. It gives them comfort, it gives them a sense of being of who they are—even after tragedies and life’s hardships altered them in ways that we adults can only begin to understand. A simple toy can bring them back to being ordinary children—without worries, without fear.

It was our last day in Sulu. We woke early in the morning, had our usual longsilog breakfast at the MBLT-6 camp. We packed our bags and together with a massive convoy of marines, drove to a graduation ceremony being held at the 26th Marine Corp camp in Barangay Danag in Patikul.

The weather was cool and the breeze felt nippy. The panorama from the balcony we were standing on was incredible. From our vantage, a sprawling land filled by trees. It felt like we were in Tagaytay City but for the crescent moons topping the graceful roofs of mosques and minarets. We were in a military camp in Sulu, Camp Bud Datu.

From the MBLT-6 Camp in Patikul, where we were based during our four-day stay in Sulu, our convoy of three trucks, a bulletproof SUV, and a tank clambered up the mountainous region of Sulu to visit the eco-tourism center at the town of Indanan at Bud Datu.

Three kids rowing and playing with a seemingly too narrow bamboo raft paused in front of me. Take our pictures please! They playfully hollered at me. Above their heads, a feather of a cloud was lighting up with fire. A few inches above their ankles, the warm sea was lazily pushing waves, lapping the white sandy shore of Quezon Beach in Patikul.

It was another fulfilling day of taking portraits in Patikul with the Juan Portrait team, a town in the island province of Sulu. With a few hours of daylight left, the group decided to chill a bit and visit one of the beaches on the island. Quezon Beach is located less than half a kilometer away from the MBLT-6 camp where we were bunking in, but still, we went there with full military escorts—safety being the primary concern of our hosts.

One of Sulu’s sultans lives right in front of the beach, Mohammad Muejuddin Jainal Abirin Bahjin. He gracefully chatted with us and even gave us some coconut drinks before we stripped off and ran to the waters.

Okay, you’re next, one of the teachers told a bashful girl wearing a traditional Muslim clothing. She led her to where I was standing and coaxed her in their local dialect, Bahasa Sūg, to smile a bit.

Taking portraits is really not my forte, finding rocks and waves much more interesting. But there I was, trying my very best to talk to these shy kids to pose in front of my camera. It was something alien to most of them, something they’re probably doing for the first time in their lives.

The distance between where we were staying, the Marine Battalion Landing Team-6 camp at Barangay Buhanginan and the Kaunayan Elementary School, where we were to photograph the kids, was only 600 meters. Close enough for a leisurely seven-minute walk.

But we weren’t allowed to do that.

It was still some hours before our flight to Zamboanga City—our jump-off point to the province of Sulu. We were headed to the town of Patikul in particular. And I was totally dreading it.

With time to kill, we got out of the airport and bought a few cans of Red Horse Beer. We brought it to a grassy patch near the terminal and guzzled a few down. I was hoping to unknot the terrible loops forming in my stomach.

And then we were flying. The metro was still dark as we took off. There’s definitely no going back now.

Some weeks back, I was invited by a photographer friend, Chris Linag, to join a shoot in Sulu. Having never been to that province, I immediately said yes—it was for a good cause anyways. We’d be going there to take portraits of school kids, print them and give them back the next day. Easy, right?

It was the second time they’re doing this so I assumed that Sulu is a safe place, so much so that I never even bothered to research about.

What an old man said to me while lazing around Linamon beach was still fresh on my mind as our vehicle wended its way through the tree-lined uphill road to Marawi City; he says that the people of Luzon are afraid to go to Mindanao, while the people of Mindanao are in turn afraid to go to Marawi City.

And yet, there we were, my companions from Iligan City’s Waterfalling Adventure Tour, finally exhausted of trekking across the city’s many waterfalls decided to pay a brief visit to one of the most feared places in Mindanao. Being a neophyte Mindanao traveler, I did have my misgivings about the trip, to say the least.