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Published: January 23rd 2008
Hi, my friends: This entry will have some passages in English, Spanish and French so that all of you can share some UNhappiness of my travel. Some of it will be direct translations and when I don't offer any, please cut me some slack: understand that I have been very busy lately, it took me long to get round to writing a new entry, moi le pauvre!!! Anyway, up to you, keep me posted.
Hola a todos! Esta entrada tendra pedazos en Ingles, Espanol y Frances para que todos puedan compartir algo de mi viaje, a veces habra traducciones y cuando no haya, espero que comprendan que he estado superocupado no mas miren cuanto tiempo me tomo para escribir esta. Disfrutenla y escribanme de vez en cuando.
Salut a tous; Cette nouvelle entree va avoir des morceaux en anglais, espagnol et francais a fin que vous tous peuvent lire un peu de mon voyage, des fois il y aurait des traductions; Je ferais de mon mieux pour traduire directement mais si je n'arrive pas a cause du manque de temps, vous devez me pardonner; j'ai ete pas mal occupe tout ce temps, regardez deja combien de temps
il m'a pris pour finir cette entree. voila, sinon, j'espere que vous allez profiter, ecrivez moi pour me dire.
Again more travel? well, given that I am still in this Asian paradise, I am still thoroughly inspired to pursue my travel quest; again, taking advantage of the teaching holidays to go and see more of our massive planet. My next destination on the list was Philipines, for one thing I wanted to learn more about the so-called Spanish 'colonisation' history our countries share and for another, this year I have been into sun and beaches, yeah, not that bad my friends, so far I have been swimming in four different beaches, so why not another one before 2007 finishes.
Otra vez viajando? Pues bien, no siempre se encuentra uno en un paraiso Asiatico, entonces tengo que disfrutar de mis vacaciones y recorrer mas en este mundo inmenso que se nos ha dado. Mi destinacion ahora es Filipinas, escoji este pais por dos razones, primero, queria aprender mas sobre este pais con el que compartimos una historia llena de 'colonizacion' espanola y segundo, como lo saben, este ano me he banado en 4 playas diferentes,
asi que decidi sumerjirme en otro antes que se acabe el 2007.
Encore en voyage? et bien, ce n'est pas tout le temps qu'on se trouve dans un paradis asiatique, donc il faut que j'en profite de mes vacances pour parcourir plus de cette inmense planete. Ma destination de maintenant a ete Les Philipines, d'abord, je voulais apprendre un peu sur cette pays dont on partage un peu d'histoire de la 'colonisation' espagnole et aussi, car comme vous le savez, cette annee je me suis deja baigne dans 4 differentes plages donc, pourquoi pas une autre avant la fin du 2007?
For the record, I've been writing this entry for some time now, so it might look like pieces of writing scattered around, thus, I will do my best to put the puzzle together and give you a single picture of my travel; what's more, I promised my sister that I'd write some in Spanish as a present to her, so here you'll have what looks like a bilingual or sometimes trilingual entry, which is not intended to be, really.
With hindsight, the trip to Manila was most unfortunate, in other words, what
I hadn't bargained for was that people were so eager to rip tourists off, it is really disgusting and... sorry if I sound too harsh, but hey, if you want your holidays to turn into an egregious experience, ugly as it can be, is full of foxes, sorry drivers who are not very frank, frankly!!! If you, on the other hand, want to enjoy a marvelous paradise, you will need to go to one of the Philipines' Islands, for example, Boracay, that's for sure.
Lo que si no esperaba es que la gente en Filipinas tuviera tantas ganas de robar a los turistas, No senor!!! en verdad que es horrible y lo siento si voy a ser un poco duro en este blog pero mira, si quieres que tus proximas vacaciones se conviertan en una pesadilla, ve a Manila, ellos te ayudaran de la mejor manera; tampoco tiene mucho que ofrecer. Si de lo contrario, quieres disfrutar de buenas vacaciones, ve directamente a una de sus islas, Boracay, por ejemplo, es un paraiso.
Something that might keep me going back to Philipines, though at the moment I wouldn't do it for all the tea
Que suerte que nos encontramos con otros Chinos
Este es el taxi que nos llevo desde los Angeles in China :-), would be the lovely people of Boracay, as well as the fine sand and water of the magnetic beaches.
Lo unico que me animaria a volver a Filipinas, aunque en el momento, no iria por nada del mundo, es la maravillosa gente de la isla de Boracay, la arena tan fina y el agua de las playas.
Empecemos pues...La semana de Oro llego nuevamente asi que me encontraba con 7 dias libres para ir a algun lado y ya les comente que durante esta semana que el gobierno organiza para tratar de promover el turismo en China, los precios de las aerolineas suben por las nubes, asi que no les doy gusto y aunque ir al extranjero es, como siempre, mas caro, me queda la satisfaccion que estoy pagando un precio justo y no de temporada. Pues bien, entonces decidi ir a Filipinas, otro pais que no conocia. Lo primero era encontrar la agencia, para ello, recurri a Tiger Airlines, la aerolinea que utilice para ir a Tailandia, asi que, en el internet encontre que para ir a Manila habria que tomar el vuelo en Macau que esta a 1 hora del campus donde trabajo,
la desventaja de viajar en periodos de lluvia
Yes, rainy season, that's our fault, but still... lo que no es dificil pues solo hay que coger dos buses. Luego de cancelar el pasaje, el viaje estuvo listo, leyendo cosas en el internet, supe rapidamente que no aconsejaban quedarse en Manila muchos dias, sino que al contrario, el interes de ir a este pais asiatico estaba en sus playas maravillosas. Lo comprobaria poco despues...
En Macao, cambiando pesos, pues es la moneda de alli, me he encontrado a un Canadiense, Claude, quien tambien habia ido a Manila; su primer comentario cuando le mencione para donde iba fue algo asi como 'pero como te vas a quedar tres dias en Manila es demasiado, ni siquiera entres alli, coge el avion a Boracay tan pronto como llegues al pais'. Crei que estaba exagerando, sin embargo siempre me quede con la intriga...
The change rate was 1 Yuan: 5.76 pesos. The normal rate should've been 6 pesos.
While waiting at the border to get into Macau, I met another foreigner, it's funny how we foreigners spot each other in China, it is not like looking for a needle in a haystack, you can ask, it is easier than you think :-). Some foreigners are polite
Llegue a Manila, mi primera impresion de alegria pronto desapareceria
Yeah, first impressions... you could see how happy I was there, but soon that smile will fade yeah, right there in what is supposed to be the Cosmopolitan capital of Asia enough to smile while others, I think, they're just so sad -or maybe too busy, let's give them the benefit of the doubt- that they do not even smile; I don't know you but I think that since we're so far away from home, at least it is a good thing to spot somebody who looks like us, if you know what I mean, and share that similarity with a quick smile, it doesn't hurt anybody, does it? Am I making sense? Anyway, it was not difficult to start a conversation with this Canadian guy as he was very friendly, he's a world traveller and have been in China for 5 years already, and yes, he speaks good Chinese, shame on me.
I must confess I did something which is a bit hypocritical: do you remember how angry I get when people do not respect the lines? well, while waiting in a long queue with Claude, we suddenly heard an announcement in Chinese and everybody started running, we did exactly the same; the thing is, they had just opened a new counter and instead of being like number 230 of the queue -as we were before-, we found ourselves
Un truc sympa pour manger
Normalement, tu ne demandes pas, tu vas, tu ouvre et si ca te plait, tu achetes, sympa being in the first 20 of the queue, sorry China, I know how horrible it might have been for the people who didn't react quickly but the payoff for us was quite worth it and... thanks China, you know how impatient I can get! (that was me being hypochritical, oops!).
He gave me some tips on Asian travel, Cambodia, Vietnam, etc; funnily enough, when he heard I was about to fly to Manila, he was very disappointed, I now know why. Yet, he asked me whether there was a way for me to change the destination and go directly to one of the islands instead. We had a coffee at MacDonalds as there is not much you can find once you cross the border in Macau; to get a real one, you need to go all the way to town, but you don't do that when you are about to take a flight. Anyway, it was nice to meet this Canadian guy and I thanked him for his words of advice.
After I changed the money into Philipines pesos, I took the bus to the centre of town (only 4 patacas); by the way, that's Macau's currency which
is roughly the same value as the Chinese RMB or HongKong Dollars. This will be followed by another bus to the airport costing only 3.5 patacas; here, thanks China, the shuttle to the airports are quite good and extremeloyy affordable.
We took off at 3:20 pm; there, I met a group of Chinese tourists coming mainly from Shenzhen, some of them work together and they decided to log on the net to find more people to travel together, which worked quite well for all. We arrived in Los Angeles at 5:05 pm and then took a shuttle to Manila, when we got there it was 8:45 pm. 9 is supposed to be a lucky number in China, and as we were the lucky 9, we were able to take one single cab to the town centre. One of the Chinese girls had the name of some hotels so the driver took us there. We got off the taxi and each of us paid 50 pesos.
Too scared to grasp the nettle
We then started walking to find a suitable hotel, after seeing a couple, we then saw the 'Lotus Garden Hotel' which was
quite nice; given that it was the rainy season, we were able to find reductions; while they were sorting out the prices and stuff, I said I would go to the seven-eleven shop as I was most thirsty. On the way there, I was approached by a Philipino man who very kindly told me, he had better hotel prices, I then took one of the Chinese with me and we went to see the hotel together; as we didn't like it, then the guy took us to another hotel; out of the blue, another guy from that hotel came with us, we saw the hotel but didn't like it, so we told them; the black guy flew into a temper and asked us to give him a tip; we obviously refused, the guy then threatened us saying that he had a knife and if we didn't give him anything, he would cut us out. The road was dark and there wasn't anybody around, so easy to see we were really in deep water.
We were talking and said we'd give him 10 pesos, he got angrier and told us to give him 100 pesos; not knowing what to do,
we felt lost, by what I had read on the internet and what the Canadian guy had told me, I was very scared, call me docile but I got my wallet out to avoid any trouble, so I gave him 100 pesos. He then gave it to the other guy and said now we'll have to give 100 pesos to him too, we were startled and didn't know what to do... we tried to talk him out of this but then he put his hands inside his pockets and said he'd get his knife, difficult it was to know if he was just bragging, but then, either am I too coward or wise to know we just had to do what he wanted. The Chinese gave him the 100 pesos and we rushed to the hotel as fast as we could; what an experience! acting like zombies, we checked in at the Lotus hotel, had dinner at the hotel as there was no way we would be going out.
I swear to God, The whole weird sensation lasted for almost three hours, it is as if somebody had done sth extremely bad to you, sth more than just being
The first thieve, le premier voleur, el primer ladron
Allez, qu'est-ce qu'il a l'air sympa!! y parece que no fuera, se ve tan buena persona, uyyyyyyyyyyychhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh swindled, this strange feeling I don't know how to put it in words; I hardly touched the food we ate at the hotel, all I wanted was to close my eyes and delete the bad memory from my inner thoughts, but there was no point in trying, the image was just right there, all potent and pervasive. Sad though, as I had taken to walking the streets at night, this time was the exception, I have to confess, I was so scared and didn't want to go anywhere but leave Manila on the spot!!!
Para resumirles la situacion, mientras negociabamos el precio del hotel, me fui a comprar una bebida en el 7-11. A mi regreso se me acerco un senor que me dijo que tenia unos precios mucho mas interesantes de los que yo habia visto en el Lotus Garden que era donde supuestamente nos ibamos a quedar. Ni corto ni perezoso lo segui, me mostro el hotel pero no me gusto, entonces me dijo que tenia otra opcion, nos fuimos con mis amigos a verlo; tampoco fue de nuestro gusto, asi que se lo dijimos, uno de ellos nos dice que teniamos que darle propina;
a mi me parecio pues, idea de loco y le dije que no; asi, nos amenazo y que nos cortaria con su cuchillo; la cosa se puso bastante peligrosa pues en esa calle no habia nadie, estaba oscuro y yo soy muy nervioso.
No sabiamos que hacer, saque un billete de 10 pesos, pero no le gusto y que teniamos que darle 100, le dijimos que no, pero se mando la mano al bolsillo, total que tuvimos que darle lo que queria; esos 100 se los dio a su amigo y nos dijo que teniamos que darle 100 pesos mas para El, asi que arrinconados como estabamos, el miedo era tal que nos toco darle otros 100. De ahi, salimos hasta el hotel con ese sentimiento horrible de miedo y de todo; llegamos, nos registramos, comimos sin cruzar palabra, y asi se nos arruino la noche pues ni ganas de salir a caminar tenia, lo que queria era dejar la ciudad tan pronto como fuera posible.
On a alors commence a chercher un hotel pour tous, on a vu quelques uns et apres etre fatigue de chercher on a vu: le 'Lotus Garden Hotel'
How to rip foreigners off
First, you smile, you tell them: 'Come, I'll show you Manila for 50 pesos. qui avait pas l'air mal; heureusement qu'on a eu des reductions du au fait qu'on etait dans la saison pluvieuse. Pendant qu'on decidait si l'on prenait ou pas, je suis alle au Seven-Eleven, j'avais ma gorge seche, en revenant, un gars Philipino est venu me parler pour m'offrir un hotel qui etait moins cher et bien, comme il a dit; apres qu'un des Chinois l'a vu, on a decide de ne pas le prendre, donc on lui a remercie, le gars tres insistant nous a dit 'bon, on a un autre a vous offrir' et un autre gars nous a rejoint; meme histoire, on a dit non; tout a coup, les gars ont commence a nous demander des pourboires, on a refuse et pour ne pas aller trop loin, un des gars nous menacait, il disait que si on ne lui donnait pas 100 pesos, il nous couperait avec un couteau qu'il avait dans sa poche. Apres avoir lu tellement des choses en ligne, j'avais trop peur; en plus, c'etait le soir et il y avait personne dans la rue, donc on lui a donne les 100 pesos qu'il voulait; et on pouvait pas le croire, il les a passe
Second, you pick up your boss on the road
so that you are two in case the foreigners don't want to pay 50 DOLLARS (because we need to rip them off!!!). Then, you give them a tour around the same spot and then you say it: GIVE ME 50 BUCKS!!! au deuxieme gars, et il nous demande de lui donner 100 pesos a lui aussi, on a crie et on a dit que c'etait degoutant; la, il s'est mis la main dans sa poche, on a eu trop peur et on lui a donne ce qu'il voulait.
Les gars sont partis et nous on a reste la, on pouvait pas le croire, vous pouvez penser que je suis trop bete mais la, j'ai eu trop peur et voyait que la fin, c'est vrai, je peux le dire; apres cela, on est revenu a l'hotel, on a pris la chambre tout de suite, on a mange a l'hotel et on s'est couche rapidement; moi qui commencait a m'habituer aux petites promenades, ce jour la, je vous jure, j'avais seulement envie de partir du pays tout de suite, c'est une sensation horrible et degoutante.
El hotel no estuvo mal, para que, se llama 'Lotus Garden Hotel', se encuentra en la calle del Padre Faura, que sabra Dios quien era. nos quedamos en habitaciones superior, que no estaban nada mal, todo limpio y la comida del hotel, que aunque no la toque debido a los acontecimientos pasados,
And then you tell them: 'Look, picture, nice'
do not worry, the foreigners are always stupid. estaba bastante variada y los meseros pues muy amables. Cualquier hotel para mi, ahora, estara muy bien... una de las cosas que no habia visto desde hacia ya mucho tiempo, es los cuestionarios que llenas al final de tu estancia, pero bueno con todo no tenia ganas de llenar nada, cuando me decian que Manila no era bonita, que perdia el tiempo visitandola, me decia 'ay, pero estos de que hablan, tendra su atractivo', pero bueno luego ya de ver un poco puedo decir que....tenian razon!!! Manila es una ciudad como todas, en verdad que no parece capital, los atractivos, pues si tiene historia pero todo se encuentra en uno de sus museos, el Museo Filipino, el resto vale la pena mejor que te lo cuenten.
Whereas it is true that this can happen anywhere, I have to admit that this only added to my disliking of the city; for one thing, it doesn't look like a capital, if you ask me, the attraction of the city is merely the Spanish area, The Intramuros, to be more precise, but apart from that... just google it, you'll save time.
We first visited The Intramuros, obviously and there
so, that was our first visit
Asi como ven esta foto, nos encontrabamos despues de que nos robaron por primera vez. On se sentait mal depuis le premier vol we spotted St. Agustin Church, the oldest stone church in Philipines. To my surprise, the visit was very worth it for the place contained some information about Manila interestingly transporting us to the past. Did you know that the first religious community to arrive in the island were the Agustines? well, now you do, and then, they were followed by Franciscans (1578), Jesuits (1581), Dominicans and then Recollects. The first American conqueror Lope de Pega landed in Cebu in 1563 and soon contributed to the edification of some churches.
Let's look now into the name of the church. Saint Agustin made his name, soon after he was converted, which actually reminded me of some of Jesus disciples who, after being atheists, devoted their life to Christianism; soon will they become martyrs as well. San Agustin is known to be the most important doctor in the church and what's more, he was the only founder of his own missionary community, the Agustinians. Thanks to the information of the church museum, I learned that this prolific writer is the creator of some very prominent books to date, for instance, The Confessions, The City of God and The Holy Trinity.
Next
to the church, you find the San Agustin Museum, which was built in the same place where the Agustinians had their living quarters. The place itself has its own history as it was destroyed three times, first by the British (1762), secondgly by Americans (1898) and finally bu the Japanese (1945). The museum was then inaugurated in 1991. It is a worthwhile visit as the building contains an eclectic collection of paintings by Filipino artists as well as some valuable art treasures. But what was most interesting for me was to learn about the reasons why, contrary to our continent, some dialects survived in Manila; apparently, as in South America, the royal order for the missionaries was to teach the gospel in Spanish, but history has it that in Philipines, some of the friars did disobey those orders and allowed people to pray in their own dialects, some of them even devoted their time to learn some of those dialects so as to make their instructions understood, notably when teaching about irrigation systems. It makes me wonder... what if our 42 Colombian dialects still existed, we would be multilingual as the Chinese, nice!
1 + 1 =
does it seem like a coincidence to ya?
Next day, early in the morning, we woke up and decided it was time to learn some more about the history of the city, so we did our planning; after talking to the hotel receptionist, we learned that a tour of the city would amount to 400 pesos, not a lot, but then you are forced to go to too many places including two museums, and I don't know how you can do that in four hours, it is just like going there taking a picture outside the museums and that's it? bloody hell! not very suitable for a slow-Frank-reader, I have to go inside, read, compare and reread, you see, some of us are not that gifted when studying history :-)
We then decided to go to the Philipines Museum by ourselves, they told us it was not that far so off we went on foot; on the way we strolled around the bahia which I must say, it was far too dirty, the sand was all littered with coke cans, sandals, etc. While admiring the uncleanliness of the place, I spotted a cart coming towards us.
Primera parada: Intramuros
Lloviendo ese dia, los ninos disfrutaron verdaderamente de la lluvia de la estacion lluviosa. I took a photo and the driver offered us a ride, we told him where we were going and he said it would be 50 pesos; considering the price being so cheap and the heck of the transport, we then decided to look more exotic on his cart.
Although we were told the museum was very close to the hotel, we just had to go straight from the place we were, this guy who was very kind indeed, took several turns and picked his boss on the way. They both seemed to be b... very friendly (it's not a typo, you'll soon learn why I was about to use b), we finally made it to the museum and then the guy asked us to pay him 50 bucks; we smiled, if they want to become trendy just like that, why not? so, we gave him 50 pesos and them to our shock he started screaming and saying he meant 50 American dollars, and he was following the American trend?!. Can you believe it? 50 American dollars, are they mad, are we like the jackpot for them? are they expecting to fleece us all the time? Wow, this was like
a nightmare again!!!
Both of them started arguing that a horse was very expensive and that he had told us before, we told him, 'you said 50 pesos, and now they were turned into dollars',was that inflation? my God, the horrible memories of the night before kept coming to me. I was looking at the possibility of jumping off the car but we barely had any space for ourselves, that's when I put two and two together and understood their cunningness: that's the reason why he picked up his boss so that we couldn't get away; the only thing I could hurriedly think of, was get my mobile phone and pretend I was phoning a Philipino friend, I made up a conversation and described the situation to my fake friend, the sentences I muttered, if I can recall were: 'Yes, I know they're ripping us off, please, come quickly; we'll be waiting for you, 5 minutes? ok. No, we won't pay that'. Courage just came up somehow and I then said to the driver, : 'We are not paying that much, you wait here for my Philipino friend is coming'; they got kind of scared and asked us to
Intramuros
The walled city built in 1571; en el pasado los Intramuros eran considerados como una de las mejores ciudades medievales pero ahora esta reducido a una que otra iglesia. give them 1,000 pesos and they will let us go, we said no, and at the end we gave him half of it (500 pesos) so that they let us go; they hurried off and then we were on the road again, I cannot explain the things I felt, but one thing is sure, I just wanted to go back to China straight away.
We then walked 20 metres to find out that the museum was closed, so I don't know how it works, apparently nobody knows that it is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, not even the agencies, I wonder how the hotel can propose tours of the museum when it is closed, which kind of confirmed my theory of the hotel tour, you go there outside the museum and bingo: bad news, 'apparently the museum is closed today', you did one more place; I was relieved that I didn't do the Lotus tour with them. We talked to the guard of the museum and told him the story of the driver, he said we should go to the police as the normal fare was something like 40 pesos, yeah right... Conclusion: again another day was spoilt and
Catedral de San Agustin
Si, esta es la famosa, antes que lo olvide, esta catedral que es la iglesia en piedra mas vieja de Filipinas es patrimonio de Unesco desde 1993. Por el museo de San Agustin pagas 80 pesos pero es bastante interesante. yet, I had promised myself not to go spare.
You can understand how much we were looking forward to get to Boracay, one of the Philipines's most beautiful islands; we would have to fly to Caticlan, which is known as the gateway of the island and then get on a small boat to Boracay. The flight would last for almost an hour and then the short trip to the island, it was all supposed to be fun. Fun in Philipines? well, my experience so far accurately give the lie to that claim, sorry!!!!
Next day, we compared prices in two agencies, the one at the hotel and a nearby one we found thanks to a passerby who was a guide herself. The prices of the agency were roughly:
Roundtrip Tour to Caticlan 7,900 pesos leaving the next day at 8:00 am and coming back four days later at 5:00 pm.
The price proposed by the hotel's agency was 5,900. Very appealing but then, there will always be a catch, we thought, however, we decided to give it a go, so off we went to the hotel again. The previous 5,900 pesos were increased to 6,242 pesos when
Pas tres different des eglises chez moi
La difference? ces toits que vous voyez ici, ont survecu pas mal d'invasions, en faite, plusieurs eglises a Manila ont ete utilises comme endroits de refuge pour des gens qui voulaient prendre la ville she phoned the agency again. Why was that? inflation again, I suppose, you see, within two minutes prices in Manila soar!! or maybe she hadn't added taxes? whatever! who cares at this stage, let's give her the benefit of the doubt as in retrospect, we got what we wanted; we paid to find out later that the amount written in the receipt read 5,942 pesos. Weird. I think they do not do very well at Maths in this country of them!!! Anyway, we were lucky for the receptionist told us that a normal tour price in the hot season comes to 8,500 pesos, which was reduced to 6,242 pesos in the rainy season. You see, no more questions, please...
As the flight to Caticlan was scheduled at 8:00 am, we knew there was no time for a strolling adventure, time was not the factor, you know it, don't ya? so we went to bed quite early as we didn't want to miss the plane. Happy I was that my bad Manila's experiences were about to end...
OOPS THEY DID IT AGAIN!!! But we were not that stupid this time
Next day, as I
stated above, willing to forget all the bad experiences in Manila, we were excited to leave the city and head to Boracay as we knew the waves will help us change our mood. Still worried, we asked the receptionist for the taxi fare, she said it'd be normally 200 pesos, so this time, I took the precaution of writing the numbers of the car, just in case... We hopped on his taxy and the guy said he would take us for 250, we asked him what it is supposed to be a goofy question: 'are you sure you are saying 250 pesos?' I wish I had had a bible at that moment as they are supposed to be extremely catholic; he said yes, so we told him the story and he said we have to be careful for there were too many philipinos who would live off tourism in the island (which is normal) and we will always have to take a normal cab (I suppose what he meant by normal was a car with a driver's licence and a special cerfificate on it, just like his), we thought, 'wow, why didn't we meet this guy before, a normal driver,
Bienvenu au salon de porcelaine
Here you find some of the porcelain traded and a collection of jars from South East Asia he was', but in Manila, I thought he was like a cup of Colombian coffee in the Sahara desert. You might say, I am very poetic :-)
As he was the one and only driver we wanted to have, we asked him if he could take us from the airport on our way back, he said he would be busy the next day, how unlucky we were! we had a decent conversation, we asked things about Boracay, but the honeymoon with him soon came to an end, the reason? the words: '250 PESOS EACH'; so, time to sing again: 'Oops, they did it again, they played with our money and we lost in the game, do you think we are dumb but we are not that innocent!!!' (I am a composer too), therefore, we protested and you could've seen our frustration, he claimed that the reason was that we had bags, yeah, right! this time as he didn't look that scary and we had both his plate and driving licence numbers, we went NO, NO, NO, NO, NO WAY, I did again my acting part, so I took my mobile phone to pretend I was phoning the hotel and
asked him the question, 'is this your driving licence?' you see, not so stupid for a humble guy :-). And it worked, suddenly, out of the blue, we discovered he suffered from a personality disorder, he put on a funny face expression, started laughing and said, 'oh, no, I was just joking' which we didn't buy...but at least we were relieved that for once, WE WERE NOT CONNED, One point for us.
Well, after that almost ripping experience, we got off the taxi and got to the airline check-in counter, to my surprise, they didn't even check my passport, the ground staff said they would do it in one of the gates before we get on the planes. Funny, the 'gates', that is four different doors next door to each other, and they all lead you to the same place. We were then asked to pay another fee to leave the airport (200 pesos), I hope they use that money to do something there for it should not just be another way to rip foreigners off, I am telling you I was so fed up with everything; last but not least, I talked to a foreigner I met on
the plane, he said at the hotel they might have also overcharged us as they always do that when you ask for a superior room and they give you a standard at a superior's price; I told him to stop or else I would start crying on the spot, we laughed a lot. Not that bad, the only good side of this though is that you don't run out of conversation when meeting new people as you become a moaner just as what I'm doing here right now. Am I boring you?! Just a thought.
Des que nous sommes arrives a l'aeroport, il y avait des gars partout qui nous demandaient nos billets, je me suis dit, c'est maintenant qu'ils vont nous demander nos passeports mais en faite, ils voulaient seulement les etiquettes du baggage pour voir les numeros; donc, j'ai tout compris rapidement, ils vont chercher vos baggages qui est juste a 10 metres de vous car l'aeroport est tellement petit, grand boulot!!! imaginez vous, j'avais tellement marre du systeme Philipino, des gens qui demandent de l'argent tout le temps, que nous avons refuse de leur donner nos etiquettes et apres deux minutes, nous
sortions avec nos valises a la main sans avoir paye le pourboire, SCORE! Pas besoin des guides ou comme ils les appelent des organisateurs du voyage, non, merci.
De la, on savait pas quoi faire, les gens continuaient a marcher et je n'ai pas vu d'etrangers pour leur poser des questions, donc, on a decide de demander un gars, et il nous a montre l'endroit pour trouver un bateau pour aller dans l'ile. On est alle au port, mais il n'y avait des petits bateaux disponibles, donc on a retourne pour trouver plus de gens et on est tombe sur le meme gars; il etait hyper sympa et nous a offert de nous amener avec lui et ses amis; en faite, c'etait un groupe de gens qui travaillait pour une compagnie Philipine, ce jour la, il y avait une convention a Boracay, pas mal! entre eux, il y avait un Chinois donc mes amis se sont sentis a l'aise et ils ont discute beaucoup avec eux; on a appris des choses sur l'ile, par exemple, elle est divise en quartiers qui vont du 1 a 3; le premier, etant le plus cher, car c'est pres de tout, le deuxieme,
J
Dommage que les conducteurs soient des voleurs, excusez moi, mais... pas mal, moins cher et encore bien, et le troisieme le moins cher du tout mais un peu eloigne, brouillant et pas tres safe.
Eux, ils nous sommes montre leur hotel, c'etait la classe, les gens hyper sympa, quelle difference avec Manila -comme la compagnie payait tout, ils ont ete heberges dans un hotel du premier quartier; nous, par contre, on n'a pas voulu rester la bas- mais heureusement, on a eu de la chance, on a pris un hotel qui etait au milieu du premier et deuxieme quartier, donc on a paye avec la tariffe 2. Et l'endroit c'etait une merveille, la facon dont l'a trouve etait fantastique.
L'entree a l'ile c'est magnifique, le paysage super, des jolis bateaux, je n'ai pas arrete de prendre des photos.
Les premiers hotels qu'on a vu etaient trop chers (8,000 pesos) donc on continue a chercher, en marchant on s'est appercu qu'on etait pres du quartier 3 donc on fait demi tour, en faite, on etait fatigues, donc, on s'est dit, on va retourner au premier hotel qu'on a vu dans le quartier 2, et tout a coup on a vu un passage, on se decide de le prendre,
et rien s'est passe; on continue a marcher et des petits appartements commencent a apparaitre, bcp d'arbres, de l'eau, pas mal comme decor; on s'es dit, wow, est-ce qu'on demande les prix? on ne voulait pas car on pensait que ca allait etre trop, dans la reception, qui ne s'appelait pas reception mais bureau d'Immigration! Je ne sais pas pourquoi, et non, ce n'etait pas un endroit pour les sans papiers, non, c'etait un bel hotel, dis donc, vous, ah?
On a ete accueilli par une femme tres gentille, qui nous a fait voir les appartements avec cuisine, frigo et tout, donc elle nous a propose un prix, pas cher, quand meme on a demande de le baisser et quelle surprise, la femme a accepte!! Les chanceux, mais ca n'arrive pas tout le temps, biensur, c'est une des avantages de visiter en saison pluvieuse. Vite fait, on a paye pour une nuit (2,500 pesos) et qu'est ce qu'on se sentait les rois de l'ile, a deux cents metres de la mer, pres du quartier un, et les appartements tres jolis avec des managers charmants! Non, mais...
On a dormi tout de suite car on etait trop fatigue, apres,
los techos como siempre magnificos
Bastante pulidos, muestra de Barroco producto de la colonizacion on est alle au marche pour acheter a manger, cette fois les fruits de mer ont ete le menu de la soiree, marrand, car ce n'est pas mon repas prefere mais les Chinois adorent et en plus on etait pres de la mer, pas mal un tres beau repas. Vous etes jaloux? On a passe l'apres midi dans la plage; meme s'il n'y avait pas bcp de gens, la mer bougeait trop avec des gens qui faisaient de sports: windsurfing, volleyball, etc. Moi, je n'avais pas trop envie de faire du sport, allez, on va dire que je ne pratique pas de sports comme ca, vous etes contents maintenant?, je me suis limite a profiter de l'eau et de la bonne lecture!!! Le soir, on a eu notre grand repas, on a vu la tele, oui, la serie Colombienne 'Betty la Fea ou Ugly Betty' adapte pour la tele Americaine, apres on a vu un film avec Hugh Grant base dans la telerealite, pour varier, c'est la mode partout, je crois que le titre etait: 'American Superstar', ensuite, grand dodo.
Next day, all that seafood did its nasty work in my stomach and at 4:00
am sharp, I woke up to go to the bathroom, yeah, I was running with runs :-) definitely the water, the seafood of Asia and me can't be friends! I went back to bed again and woke up quite late this time (11:30 am); to our happiness, the nice lady apologised for the noise we had the night before, to be honest, we were watching tv so we didn't hear anything, but we said, it was ok and she asked us to change rooms; to our atonishment, she gave us this wonderful family suite, with two different bedrooms, two large double beds plus two singles and guess what? all at the same price we paid the night before, what a bargain!!!, which also paid off to her as we quickly announced to her, we would be staying there the rest of the nights of our trip. I was wondering, was the Philipino government trying to win us back again? well, I hate Manila, that's for sure but I love Boracay, SCORE.
Luego, nos fuimos a pasear a la playa, cada vez me acuerda de Diveana y una de mis canciones favoritas: La Playa, y dice
asi: 'En la playa te encontre, caminando junto al mar...' , ay que dicha, estar alli, sin limitaciones de trabajo ni de horarios, solamente dejarme guiar por mi imaginacion y ser preso de sus rutas; pronto, ese camino me llevo logicamente a mi familia, luego -y sin quererlo- mi trabajo (workaholic!!!), y lo que es chistoso, es que me trajo memorias de algunos amigos que habia perdido. Este preciso dia llevaba yo puesta la camiseta que me dio mi tio preferido, el famoso y archireconocido Tio Pacho; era una camiseta amarilla con las figuras de la copa America que se jugo en Venezuela; entonces, segui caminando y de repente, una voz gritaba: 'Venezolano?', a lo que no preste atencion pero nuevamente la voz y cuando mire era un chico que venia trotando por la playa, Venezolano el tipo, dijo Sofiita, como El estaba corriendo, solo le pude gritar que no. Chistoso, que tal eso, un Venezolano en Filipinas, bueno, igual que yo, no? un Salazareno en Boracay, cuando se ha visto esto, Belen?
Then we went strolling on the beach, that was quite a nice walk, so peaceful it was, the right moment and place to give
my imagination free reign... I enjoyed arresting so many memories, the first ones that came to mind were obviously my family, then my work, obviously, and funnily enough, some extremely good friends I had lost. That day, I was wearing the shirt Uncle Pacho gave me in Venezuela, you know, the one with the 'Copa America' on it; as I was walking, I heard the words 'Venezuela' and turned around to see a guy who was jogging behind me. He was from Venezuela, what a coincidence so he asked me whether I was from there too. I just shouted for he was running, but this was funny, a Venezuelan guy in Philipines, I suppose you can say the same about me.
Anyway, on the horizon, you could spot some beautiful houses on the cliffs, we walked to find some lovely hotels, one of them the Monkey house; so great it was that it made me think of spots you only see in postcards, it looked kind of picturesque, cold, but the view through the bedroom window was magnificient, just the sea, coming to you through some hanging corals the lady had used to decorate it. I asked for the
price of the room which was almost the same as the one we were paying in the bungalow; that was extremely surprising, but here again, we were in the low season, that's why. The room, though free at that moment, had been booked by a couple for the next day, so no chance to get it. Somehow I was relieved for I still wanted to spend another two nights in my favourite bungalow having so much space to myself.
At noon, we went for a stroll, we headed to station 1, lovely views, people building sand castles, others drawing, some couples making out while others were astonished watching, that reminded me of Thailand. Everything was awesome, that's what I think of a paradise; suddenly, out of the blue, we saw lots of cats and dogs, but not in the customary way you see them, this time, they were raining (you see, Jacques, je le fais aussi en anglais :-); we run and sheltered on a concrete bench that managed to protect us a bit but soon that rain turned into a typhoon, so after running like crazy on the beach, we found a trendy snack bar where we stayed
for over one hour. We ordered a Philipino breakfast: beef, scrambled eggs, I suppose it is the Philipino version of the English breakfast, quite handy as I was hungry as a bear. I had asked for a coffee but like in China, they served it before the meal, that must be an Asian thing; Comme elle me manque la France!!! not only that, but it was a sachet of coffee they gave me, nescafe to be more precise, so I did it myself and very quickly as I didn't want the water to be cold. While I was waiting for my dinner, I did some Chinese, I know, I can be very diligent, sometimes :-)
Luego, seguimos caminando en la playa, fuimos hasta el final y alli pudimos ver desde lejos algunos hoteles construidos en los precipicios, se veian geniales desde la playa; asi que nos dispusimos a visitarlos pues imaginarse la vista del mar desde alli, era algo que valia la pena ir a ver con sus propios ojos. Los nombres de los hoteles eran tan increibles como las magnificas vistas: 'El Jardin del Mico', 'La Cueva de la Arana', etc. Nos enamoramos del
primer hotel, pues era algo que nunca habia visto, me recuerda la casa de Tarzan que yo veia en la serie Americana, muchas escaleras todo bien decorado, tan bien que habia un mico haciendo piruetas, genial!!! un par de papagayos tambien, la vegetacion parecia tomada de un bosque tropical pluvioso, no les estoy mintiendo.
Para completar la senora que nos atendio muy amable, con un nino en brazos, ella nos mostro la habitacion que parecia tomada de una postal, pequena, con un diminuto salon, subias unas gradas y te encontrabas en la habitacion que parecia que estuvieras en Korea, te acuestas en un pequeno colchon en el suelo, desde ahi miras hacia la ventana y ahi como en un cuadro fantastico Potteriano, ves el mar, pero con la diferencia que las olas se mueven y son reales, no, pero que!!! es uno de esos lugares que no ves muchas veces; queriamos quedarnos ahi, el precio era para sonar, demasiado barato, 1500 pesos la noche, pero por un lado, yo estaba contento donde estabamos y por otro lado, la habitacion ya habia sido reservada y la senora esperaba a los extranjeros en la tarde; la razon por la cual ella
Fort Santiago
After being destroyed several times, one of the oldest fortifications of Intramuros became a symbol of freedom for Filipines. Uno de los grandes simbolos de Filipinas esta ahora convertido en un gran parque lleno de flores por todos lados.
nos mostro la habitacion fue que como dijo, en caso de que no vengan se la rentare a ustedes; bueno, total que nos quedamos con la lastima, pero bueno. Nos dio tarjetas diciendonos que en dado caso, nos haria un descuento en el proximo viaje, pero que cuento de proximo viaje, en fin...
We then went to see the other hotel, the Spider, which was still under construction. The workers were very kind, they showed us around and let me tell you, if you happen to go to Boracay, this spider thing is a must, beautiful, the bar would be just incredible, even if it was still on the works, I felt like in a movie setting. We also saw a third hotel, which I don't remember the name, it didn't make the same impression on us, apart from being expensive, the rooms are just ordinary, the service, however, must be quite good.
As the hotels were just on the seafront, on our way back we decided to swim again and stayed on the beach for another two hours; soon it would rain again, suddenly I was in the mood to sing, so the
song that goes 'Raindrops falling on my head...' came to my mind and I sang it for some time while swimming under that beautiful rain, it was such an amazing feeling; (this is like one of the things I am now looking forward to doing, going back there and do the same); my friend was still in love with the Monkey House, thus we had to go back to ask the lady if the potential guests had checked in at 4:00, it was already 4:30; in fact, they hadn't so she told us to phone at 6:00 but we, I forgot about that as it was such a long way to go there. On the back of my mind, I was relieved, for one thing, I was quite happy at our hotel, for another, given that it was the rainy season, the Monkey House, although beautiful, would be too cold at this time of the year, there were not big walls to protect us from the cold nights, and I was very pleased we didn't rent it, we had a very cold rainy night, I was so happy to be sheltered in our family suite.
Asi que
Media Naranja
Ne me demandez pas pourquoi, ca s'appelle comme ca; o ese soy yo parece que me convirtieron en metal. No se, no se. Parece que les tomo 150 anos para construir todo este pasaje del Fort Santiago.
volvi al bungalow, lo primero que hice cuando empezo a llover hartisimo fue hacerme un cafe y tomarmelo supercaliente, que delicia, que paz, lo disfrute mirando la lluvia torrencial caer a traves de la ventana pensando en tantas cosas, en mi familia y en cuanto me hubiera gustado haberlos tenido a mi lado para disfrutar de las playas de Filipinas. Asi que mis memorias me trasladaron a la Costa Caribe Colombiana, a Santa Marta donde durante mis anos universitarios me vole de la universidad por 4 dias para pasar unas vacaciones maravillosas con mi familia. Recuerdo que el hotel quedaba justo enfrente de la bahia, que dicha!!! Bueno, ahora pues no los tenia conmigo aqui pero si podia llamarlos y contarles lo bien que me sentia alli...
Mi tarde la pase tambien leyendo, lleve uno de los libros controversiales sobre China y su guerra pasada contra los extranjeros. No lei nada sobre Filipinas pues aparte de algunas guias de Lonely Planet, no habia encontrado nada agradable para leer en una de las librerias cuando volvi a la ciudad. Tambien vi algo de television, pues afortunadamente tienen varios canales en Ingles, algunos en Frances y uno que otro en Espanol,
The Dungeons
where they kept the powder of the Baluarte de Santa Barbara debe ser algo relacionado con las tantas conquistas a las que la isla se ha visto sometida, eso si es un punto a favor del pais, pues en China me falta la diversidad de lenguas, solo tenemos dos canales en Ingles, y el resto, wo ting bu dong, que quiere decir que no comprendo.
En la noche decidimos cenar afuera, asi que rogando a que no lloviera nuevamente, salimos en nuestra caminata. Que coincidencia, cuando queria cambiar algunos pesos pues me estaba quedando sin plata, fui a preguntar si cambiaban la moneda de China: Yuan o RMB, desafortunadamente solo cambiaban dolares, asi que, ni modo. Por que coincidencia? pues me encontre nuevamente al Veneco, estaba en una heladeria con su novia, una chica Italiana, superagradable. Asi conversamos y me dijo que estaban en Pekin desde hacia ya 10 anos (que envidia, ellos si hablan Chino) y como yo, El tambien es profesor, pero no de lenguas sino de baile. Ensena Merengue, salsa, etc, lo que si me parecio particular fue que me dijo que el problema que tenia era competencia con sus alumnos, lo que no comprendi en ese instante; ya luego, me dijo que El ensena sus pasos
Il attends quoi lui? a mon avis...
Todos estos postigos fueron construidos para proteger la entrada al rio Passig. de base a Chinos que aprenden alli durante algunos meses, y cuando ya se sienten con confianza, ellos mismos se convierten en profesores tambien y abren sus propios clubes para aprender a bailar. Esto, me dijo El, es muy seguido.
Lo entiendo perfectamente pues con lo trabajadores que son los Chinos, no me extrana que luego de unos dos meses ya sean profesionales de la salsa. Su novia tiene una especie de galeria en Pekin; volviendo a mi culpabilidad catolica de por mi culpa, por mi culpa y por mi gran culpa, puedo decir que para mi defensa, el Veneco tomo cursos de Chino durante su primer ano, estudiando 4 horas por dia 5 dias a la semana, parece que en esa manera si funciona; desafortunadamente, yo no me puedo permitir ese lujo, y me toca, al contrario, poco a poco. Intercambiamos direcciones y no se sabe, quiza algun dia los pueda ver en Pekin o ellos puedan venir a Zhuhai, se ven muy buena gente los dos. Y esto, sin contar, lo interesante que parecen, han viajado a todos lados, parece que yo he sido el lento del paseo, pero ya, ellos llevan ya 10 anos aqui. Por
que tengo que justificarme cada dos minutos? se preguntaran ustedes...
Then we strolled through Boracay's particular streets at night, this time, there was no fear of being robbed or approached in aggressive ways; in contrast to Manila's locals, here the natives are adorable. We spotted some souvenir shops and it was right there when my money started burning in my pocket, no, that's a joke, believe me, I was as wise as an owl this time and only bought a couple of turquoise and coral collars for my women and bracelets for my men at home, don't get me wrong, I am talking about my mum, sisters, dad and brothers. I was very happy as the souvenirs will make perfect gifts. Next stop, a seafood restaurant where my friend made me eat some oysters (I swear, I didn't want it), we headed to the second floor of Paradiso, a beautifully decorated sit-down restaurant. I also had a very tasty cocktail, it was a mixture of different drinks, I absolutely dreaded being as sick as a dog but fortunately, my head was ok and I didn't have any problems that night...
I woke up at
5:00 am to find out that I still had the runs, needless to say I spent my penny, or my pounds I must say, and then went back to bed to get up at 10:00 am. Again, it was raining cats and dogs, so we decided to stay indoors, had lunch at 3:00 pm and went out to say bye to our lovely beach. The rain started again but I was enjoying the swim so much that I decided to stay put, what a great sensation, though the raindrops can be quite rough on your skin, sheltering from the rain in the water is something I had never experienced before (call me weirdo!); God, there are so many things we take for granted, this tiny one was worth millions. I noticed that in spite of the aggresivity of the waves, the water still manages to pull you back to the sea (you don't learn this on the BBC, is that correct?), which I thought it was quite dangerous, but here I was SuperFrank fighting again... As there were only two people left on the sea, yeah, I'm counting myself, I thought it would be wiser to get back to my
room, two hot cups of hot Nescafe were waiting for me; for the record, my blog goes advertising-free, it is just that I couldn't find any Colombian coffee there. And then I did some Chinese while watching James Bond on TV. I hate those, but here again, no more to watch.
De ahi, seguia la eleccion de un buen restaurante y eso fue dificil pues habia bastante variedad, restaurantes indios, mucha comida de mar, lo que queria evitar pues siempre que trato de ser fuerte con el pescado termino en el bano con una epidemia de diarrea que me deja con los ojos donde sabemos. Asi que nada de pescado esta vez, lo que si vimos fue un restaurante buffet 'The Summer Place' donde puedes comer todo lo que quieras por el mismo precio: 250 pesos filipinos; lo bonito del restaurante es su decoracion y la manera como tienen arreglados los platos, todo muy bien limpio, bastante natural y con bastantes hortalizas y salsas: agridulce, picante de tacos, sesame, etc. Asi que pagas, te dan unas fichas y tu mismo te sirves lo que quieras, las bebidas si las pagas aparte, pero no son caras,
esta bien para el lugar, muy bien, deberia decir; para darles un ejemplo, una cocacola que la encuentras afuera a 20 pesos, aqui te la venden a 40, pero bueno con todo lo que comes, no es caro, eh? con mi estomago de pajarito que tengo ahora, solo me pude servir dos veces; en cuanto a la musica, se diria mas bien que tienen un disc jockey de discoteca, agradable eso si, pero un poco fuerte. Uy, que me estoy volviendo, un Colombiano que dice que la musica es fuerte? Es que no se, esta bien la decoracion y todo a media luz pero con ese decor, esperaba mas bien algo asi como blues o Jazz pero nos pusieron fue musica de discoteca... o me he vuelto un quejon de primera clase o tengo razon, que creen ustedes?
Estabamos comiendo cuando un grupo de personas como 20 entraron en manadas en el restaurante, yo dije pero que popularidad la del restaurante y que alegria la de la gente, pues entraron corriendo y riendo, luego me di cuenta que estaba cayendo tremendo aguacero; eso es otra cosa, que forma de llover en Filipinas, las gotas de agua te azotan pero
fuertisimo, siempre nos tocaba buscar refugio, de lo contrario es como si San Pedro te estuviera castigando por algo que habias hecho, pero no a mi, yo soy muy inocente :-)
Next day, we woke up at 9:00 and off we went to enjoy our last hours at Boracay's beach; funnily enough, the waves were so strong that I seriously felt like a child and saw myself jumping and shouting in the beach, no, I was not the only one. The island was just too good that day, it offered us a lovely sun on our last day.
We thought our viacrucis wasn't finished again: they told us it was only 20 pesos per person to go to the port and the prices we heard when we asked, was, 80, 50 and even 100. At last, a guy said he would take us for 40 but he would get other people on his tricicle, we thought it would be fair. Once we got off at the port, we got on a boat to cross the island (20 pesos, again). The view of the port was mesmerising and the arrival of new tourists made me
feel a bit sad, but my fear of going back to Manila was bigger than any other feelings. We then got on a small bus to the airport, which was very handy as we didn't have to stop in Cathay.
At the airport, I spotted a foreign couple, and decided I should talk to them either to moan again or ask them to share a taxi with us once we were in Manila. Though the guy looked very mediterranean, I approached him in English, his accent was quite good, his girlfriend was very blonde. It turned out they were from Spain, so after we laughed as we had conversed in English for like 5 minutes, I learned they had been in Boracay for 5 days and were now heading to HK, lucky them. They were both working in Shanghai and to my consolation, they had been living there for 4 years but neither of them spoke any Chinese, SCORE! He told me about this Manila pension which we should check out, and funnily enough we found a leaflet of the pension just outside the airport.
The flight took one hour, funny, we were offered some drinks but as
and they were lining up there waiting for a tip
but come on folks, to move our luggage for about two metres? give me a break!!! you always have to pay for them, we refused, later we did find out they were free, so we called the flight attendant and she served us very nicely. Once we landed, we asked several taxi drivers for the price of the ride and one of them offered to take us for 250 pesos, yeah, we asked the question again and again, just to make sure he said PESOS!!!
De regreso a Manila, fuimos al parque donde encontramos una estatua conmemorativa del Doctor Jose RIZAL con el siguiente escrito: The Ethnography. Philipinas National hero; se trataba pues de un lugar donde pagas y entras en una especie de museo, creo que segun lo que escuchamos esta hecho mas que todo para Filipinos, pues las traducciones en Ingles son muy cortas comparadas con los largos discursos que escuchas en otra lengua nacional.
We wanted to go to Manila's pension which incidentally was just 200 metres away from our previous hotel, the 2,500 pesos a night-Lotus Garden Hotel; the pension was extremely cheap, only 750 pesos; though it was obviously very basic, we were using the room to sleep a few hours
before catching our flight, so no point in spending lots of money in a hotel, personally, I prefer to spend the difference in books or dvds, to be honest with you, I know many of you would agree to differ.
As I still wanted to buy some books, we had to ask different exchange rates, the prices would differ substantially depending on the people we were aking, wow, it is like being lucky or unlucky or should I say, being taken for a fool or not, I never know... so figures varied from 4.20 to 5.80, we accepted the last offer, obviously.
We then headed to the Rizal Park and the National Museum, which we did in a rush as we had only one hour left before it closed. My impressions of the museum? well, no thumbs up, the thing is it is very badly organised, on top of that, there are not enough English translations, and for those available, sometimes they can be extremely repetitive. There is work to be done in this museum, please whoever do something or call it otherwise.
As we had some time to kill, we went to the bay which was
most dirty, lots of sandals and old clothes didn't add to the 'beauty' of the place, to tell you the truth, it really looks like a dustbin. isn't it supposed to be spotless as it is located in the centre of town? it seems, there's no accounting for taste here, as a matter of fact, many people seemed to be enjoying these views, I spotted some people who were sitting near the bay admiring such dirtiness. You had everything there, namely, old people sitting on the bench, they looked like statues as there were no movements whatsoever, couples hugging each other while looking at the water, once in a while some water splashed them but I suppose it was kind of funny as they were all laughing, mind you, it might be their idea of a love paradise or some sort of masochism and sorry, but we don't have the same values, so we run away as far as we could.
For dinner, I had Japanese noodles with seafood, exquisite, I thought, diarrhea? what the hell, let's enjoy our last day here.
Back to Robinson's Shopping Centre, I got six new books, some for teaching writing, one for
learning techniques of personal improvement, by the way, I love those. I also got this strange book called: The History of Fear, it is supposed to take you through different ages showing you how fear changes, I thought it would be a nice and a different read, so I'll keep you posted. Finally, the most interesting one I got was called 'The most important books that changed the world', fascinating, I have only gone through 20 pages and I love it already.
Next day, we left the hotel at 8:00 the receptionist told us not to pay more than 80 pesos for the taxi ride; after asking different drivers, the best offer we had was 150 pesos; even though it was not what we were expecting, this was by far the only time that the taxi driver had kept his original fare and we actually paid what we agreed for. We were three and half hours ahead of the flight so we had time for some discussion... Later we met some of the people we had travelled with on our first day. The airport fee was 600 pesos this time. We boarded and after 10 minutes had passed, nobody
seemed to care that there was this delay. What the hell, I enjoyed the crowd and went back to my reading.
Volamos a Caticlan a mediodia, fue un poco triste dejar la isla y su gente adorable pero que mas, cuando llega, llega. Alli me encontre con algunos extranjeros, volvimos a comentar sobre las experiencias pasadas en Manila y el contraste de la isla, estuve feliz pues sus comentarios coincidian en gran parte con los mios. El vuelo estuvo sin contratiempos, todo bien, lei la mayor parte del viaje, el vuelo aunque un poco retardado parecia no afectar a nadie, asi que yo tampoco le cante sus 10 verdades, dijo Belen, a nadie, al contrario, me porte muy bien leyendo y mirando por la ventana.
3.5 patacas from the airport to the border.
When we arrived in Zhuhai, we went straight away to a Chinese restaurant called Mon Ting Xiang, which is just next to the Indian restaurant we had been before; the place was nicely decorated and I had Braised Chicken with Vegetable in Casserole (28 Yuan) + Steamed Corn (20 Yuan) both were exquisite.
Conclusion
Bon, qu'est-ce qu'on peut dire apres avoir dit tout ca; c'est vrai qu'apres quelque temps, tu n'est plus la, et tu regardes les choses d'autre facon, par contre une chose est certaine: Je ne retournerai pas a Manila, meme si vous m'offrez le billet d'avion et le sejour dans un hotel de 5 etoiles, bon, ca je reconsidere car je peux rester a l'hotel en regardant des videos de gens de Boracay, ca c'est sur :-). Non, mais serieusement, c'est une experience que je ne veux pas repeter, car quelque part, je regarde les voyages d'une autre facon maintenant, je n'ai pas beaucoup d'envie et je crois que je vais me calmer pour l'instant.
Pour vous, je vous donnerai le meme conseil de Claude, partez a a Boracay ou une autre ile de Philipines, mais svp ne considere pas Manila, laide, triste et vous pourriez tomber sur des gars comme nous; donc, a vous de voir, sinon, l'Asie est inmense et il y a pas mal de destinations ou les gens sont pres a vous recevoir gentillement. Pour finir, excusez moi celle ci mais je promets que les prochaines entrees vont etre plus optimistes!!!
Y ahora, que les puedo decir despues de todo esto? supongo que todo esta ya dicho. Se dice que siempre se debe aprender de todo lo que se hace y que se debe estar listo a tener malas experiencias para poder apreciar lo bueno; sin embargo, yo no quiero volver a repetir esta mala experiencia por varias razones, la principal es que este viaje me puso pero mal, cuando recuerdo esos choferes Filipinos, todo se me revuelve y no es que no haya encontrado gente asi antes, la hay en todos los paises, en el mio, en el suyo, etc pero nunca me habia visto tan directamente afectado, tenaz!
Asi que si me quieres ofrecer el viaje, el hotel de 5 estrellas y todo en Manila, lo siento pero mejores propuestas me han hecho :-) y dire mil veces no, ya que de verdad que hasta me han quitado las ganas de viajar; a ustedes, les puedo decir que si algun dia vienen por aca y estan interesados en Filipinas, como dijo el Canadiense, vayanse directamente a una isla del pais y no se queden en Manila que es fea, poco acojedora y lo peor,
tienen el riesgo de encontrar estafadores, lo siento si algun Filipino lee estas lineas pero la experiencia habla, como se dice. Por ultimo, disculpenme esta pero prometo que mis proximas entradas sean mas optimistas!!!
Even if in retrospect, some of the drawbacks of the trip was the lack of the intense sun you had during the peak season, but this was nothing compared to the feelings experienced dealing with most of the people from Manila; it would appear that what happened to me could've been just a coincidence, sort of being there at the wrong time, I still think that it would be too optimistic let alone naive to call it a coincidence: it happened four times -in the same place (Manila) as it never happened in the island (Boracay)- so, it is up to you to judge, but personally, I'd refuse to go to Manila even if you offer me the trip. To be honest, the mere memory of those guys gives me the gooseflesh, and not in a good way, let it be said, a place where you cannot even do what you like, for example, it was quite hard for me to refrain from
doing what I customarily do when I go to a new place, that is make for the streets in town to see the nightlife of the city. Looking back, those guys could've just been mouth and trousers but at that moment, we were far too scared to be sensible.
All things considered, I suppose I can say now, I accomplished it, I did it, and although I am not coming back, at least I can now talk my friends into not going to Manila ever, and be cautious of those people who have the genetic problem of not telling the true (sorry for the preconceived idea).
Well, I suppose I've moaned enough, so let's say that the ball is in your court now; It goes all down to the fact that you can prove me wrong, do it if you can but for the time being what I need is some days to get over it. Last but not least, excuse me if this entry was a bit too gloomy and negative, I promise the next ones will be much more optimist!!!
And if you decide to come to Manila, just some advice; be ready
to keep your hair on every time you get upset as you might need lots of stamina for that!
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alex
non-member comment
how sad
Hi! I just felt sad reading your blog about Manila, a place where i was born, grew up, studied, and travelled around for a good 26 years of my life. Yes, Manila is a mega-city with almost all of the mega-problems you could imagine. BUT, it is a city you could learn to love (and loving can mean still hating things about the object of your affection, right?). Too bad you've met the wrong people in your visit there. I would not blame it solely on the poverty being experienced by a lot of our people because you can be poor and still maintain a sense of dignity. I just hope you give Manila a "chance" - and I hope in the near future that you meet a Manileno who will gladly show you the city in its entirety.