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Published: February 28th 2011
Next stop - Manila of the Philippines! To get there we had to take a taxi, a ferry, another overnight bus, another taxi, another bus, a plane, yet another bus, and one more taxi until we finally reached our hostel in the capital city. A grand total of 27 hours which ended in us falling into a heap when we finally got to our room.
As soon as we were in the streets of Manila the city had a different feel to the rest of Southeast Asia – probably as it’s a cluster of islands isolated on its own in the Pacific Ocean. One of the first things you notice is that you are in a Christian country; there are churches everywhere and advertising billboards strewn across practically every building!
To add to this the traffic in Manila is crazy, constant tailbacks on every street usually filled with a range of colorful funky looking taxi’s, aswell as tiny tricycles to take you wherever you want to go (pedal power and motorized ones!). Whilst in the taxis you have the luxury of listening to the biggest love ballads being blasted out constantly (Celine Dion, Stevie Wonder, you name it!!) Or
if not love ballads the radio will always be on some kind of Christian station having a good preach about God! Take your pick?!
Sadly, one of the major things you can’t help but notice is that there is a lot of poverty on the streets (this actually reminded us a little bit of India). A lot of kids approach you asking for money, one boy in particular came up and quite boldly asked Paul for 1000 pesos! When you are out at night you see lots of families sleeping on the streets alongside their children, which was heartbreaking to see.
On our first day here we decided to spend a couple of hours checking out the ‘Mall of Asia’ – the third biggest shopping centre in the world (Tina was in her element!!). Our two hours turned into an entire day, as almost everything you could ever need was in the mall!! It’s filled with endless shops, restaurants, an ice skating rink and a cinema which we decided to take full advantage of!
The next day we thought we should return to reality and sample some of the actual culture and history of Manila. We visited
Intramuros and Fort Santiago which is the oldest section of the city and built by the Spanish in the 16th century. Unfortunately none of us were totally blown away by this – a lot of the district was destroyed in the Second World War so there was not a lot left to see!
Since Manila is known for a lively nightlife and renowned for its karaoke bars we thought we’d join them for a Friday night out! We headed out for some traditional Filipino dinner first, pork sizzler which was delicious. Half-way through our meal a huge middle-aged guy started belting out some karaoke – all love numbers of course! We had heard before we came here that you should never laugh when anyone is singing karaoke no matter how bad they are so we ate dinner as best we could without trying to giggle away!
After dinner we moved on to a bar which was pretty unique to say the least! The bar was called Hobbit House and was themed on the Lord of the Rings (it was Paul’s turn to be in his element!). But what was brilliant about was that all the members of staff
were actual hobbits – midgets and dwarves! Quite surreal, but all the little guys seemed to love their jobs and the bar had a great atmosphere (and also a live band who belted out yet more love songs!).
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Dave
non-member comment
Little big men!
Great updates guys. Wow, imagine being in the Phillipines that is really something but the poverty is the other side of the coin of course. Paul you look like "big Arnie" next to these wee fellas,,,ha ha. Be safe guys,,,can't wait to see yous in New Jersey or as they say here,,,,New Joisey!!! Dad.