Hi, I'm in Cebu.

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Here's my first entry...

I'm in Cebu city, on the island of Cebu. It's a lot smaller than Manila, and supposedly much nicer, but I'm finding it nearly as squalid and impoverished. I took a boat here from the island of Masbate (it's north of here) with my travelling companion, Redj. It was an overnight sailing. When we arrived at 6 am, there were poor families in outrigger canoes paddling right beside the ferry, holding out blankets to catch coins that they were asking people to throw down. The ferru had to go very slowly into port to avoid running these beggars over...

We got into port and there was a dead cat on the sidewalk rotting away. It must have been there for weeks already. No one had bothered to clean it up. There was trash just everywhere. It seems like no one wants to clean it up, so they just let it sit.

Once we got into the city, it wasn't so bad. We arrived the day after Sinulog, the annual festival for the people of Cebu City. In all fairness, this might be why there's so much trash abounding....

Tonight we're heading to Tops, a lookout over the city,on Mt.Busay (to the west). It should be a spectacular place to catch a sunset.

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