Holy Moly Week We’ve spent most of the week maxin’ and relaxin’ at Xandra’s house, enjoying soccer, trying to eat a little healthier, and getting some work done. Holy Week is upon us, and Manila is emptying out. Most people have Thursday through Monday off, and it seems like everyone in the city is leaving for their hometown in the provinces. Traffic has been insane, with buses jampacked up to late hours of the night. TV news has been interviewing people at bus stations who complain of long waits, crowded buses, and the fear that they won’t make it hom [View Full Entry]

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The start to the day has almost become ritual: Delicious breakfast followed by…WAIT! I have to be in front of the TV for the game. Not NCAA basketball this time, but UEFA. Our countdown to Athens—we will be there for the UEFA Finals—is going on, so I am doing my “scouting,” if you will. Let’s recap: my team (Arsenal) and Meli’s team (Barcelona) are out. During the World Cup last summer, I became a super fan of Didier Drogba, from Côte d'Ivoire, who plays for Chelsea; I’m rooting for them. AC Milan has Kaká from Brasil, who also impressed me duri [View Full Entry]

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Breakfast with Ghosts Tita Reena and Xandra are off to work before we get up, so at the breakfast table, it is just me, Leroy, and mom. After hearing her friends talk yesterday, I press her for more ghost stories, but this time for the ones that they used to tell us as children. There are many people in the Philippines who believe in ghosts, dwarves, and other beings. I’m not sure if the belief is quite as simplistic as that of children, where they believe that ghosts walk among us and we can see them now and then. Sometimes, it [View Full Entry]

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Another morning, another great breakfast. WAIT! The NCAA Championship game is one: Gators vs. Buckeyes. I root for the Gators, partially because I was so impressed by their win against UCLA, somewhat because my folks live in Florida, a smidgen due to my desire to see them make history by repeating as NCAA Champions and winning in the same year that the football team won the championship (over the Buckeyes in the Fiesta Bowl) and mainly because I don’t think Ohio State can beat them. If they contain Oden, the guards will take care of Coneley Jr. and the game is [View Full Entry]

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Healthy Eating and Work on a Slow Monday With all the feasting we’ve been doing, it’s no surprise that our bodies beg us for vegetables and healthier options. Lucky for us, we’re staying at the right place. My mother, Tita Reena, and Xandra are all pranic healers and the last two are certified trainers in this form of CAM (complementary and alternative medicine). In keeping with their beliefs, they eat mostly vegetarian foods, with the occasional sprinking of certain kinds of fish and seafood (but certainly not eel, which is a bottom-dweller and has no scales and t [View Full Entry]

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Table time, until the game comes on Having made the transition from Parañaque, where Jamie lives, to Marilena Gardens, where Xandra lives, we quickly settled into our new home for the next 8 days. I must say, a true highlight of being in the Philippines for me is the fact that we have meals together at the table at least twice a day with everyone, and sometimes for all three meals, that is when we are not out. It is only when we sleep-in that Meli and I end up eating breakfast alone. By the way, having an in-house maid who [View Full Entry]

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Business Morning It is Saturday morning and I descend the stairs and find Jamie, Vit, and my mom almost finished with breakfast. I sit down and enjoy another Filipino breakfast, the new addition being chicken vienna sausages. Leroy joins us within a few minutes, and we spend some time telling stories of Boracay and asking Vit how the last few days have been. Her mother is improving, and that is good news. Then, Jamie, Leroy and I go to Jamie’s office, where he heads the video department. The office is half-staffed, so I reprimand Jamie for making his employees work on [View Full Entry]

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Early Brekkie and the Trek Back to Manila Breakfast was too early for the stomach, but with longganisa on the menu, I was happy. Xandra, Sam, Baba, and my mom came to meet us, but they could not eat because their breakfast was not ready at their resort. Xandra was just coming over to see us off. We left at about 8am, taking a jeep, boat, and van back to Kalibo airport. Linus and I sang songs throughout the 1.5-hour van ride, subjecting our co-riders to TV theme songs, musicals, and hard rock ballads. It certainly made the time pass for [View Full Entry]

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Up with the Sun At 5:15am, Leroy gently wakes me up and asks if I still want to join Jamie and Linus to watch and photograph the sunrise. I get up and look outdoors to make sure the sky is still dark. By the time I pull on my clothes, brush my hair and teeth, and wash my face, the sky is light outside. No worries, the sun rises behind some hills so I haven’t really missed too much. I walk outside and immediately spot them on the beach, cameras and tripod in action. My Olympus Stylus 300 is just a [View Full Entry]

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Total indulgence: Meat and rice breakfasts before beach massages This morning, we wake up and head down to the breakfast buffet that is included in our hotel rate. It is everything you want a Filipino breakfast to be - a man makes eggs to order and the rest is self-serve. Three kinds of rice - white, red (like brown rice), and fiesta rice (fried rice with other stuff in it, like eggs and onions), beef tapa, corned beef, vienna sausages, daing nab angus, other fish, other meats, pancakes, fruit, toast, cereals, juices, etc. One could really go crazy in this kind [View Full Entry]

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