Blogs from Philippines, Asia - page 324

Was in Cebu over the weekend for a business trip. I wasn't feeling well so was not able to go around much. The city is busy with preparations for the Sinulog next weekend. In fact, traffic is already getting congested from the number of tourists already in the city for next week's festival. Saturday's PAL flight was delayed as usual. We got there just in time for me to check-in at Marriott and have a quick look-see at the new Banilad Town Center. The building is nice, with a quiet atmosphere. Many Metro Manila brands still unavailable in Cebu are there (Yellow Cab, Holy Kettle Corn, Gonuts Donuts, etc.) so as expected, the AB crowd are flocking there like bees to honey. Lunch was at Ayala Center Cebu then official business for the rest of the ... read more

We spent out last morning in Boracay today. I was so sad to leave! Last night we had dinner in front of out hotel on the beach. Our cusine included fresh crab, oysters and shrimp. Fabulous! Afterward we shopped around a bit. As we were leaving the dinner table the power went out - on the whole island! It was a bit scary. Earlier I had bought a lighter and noticed that it had a light on it. I then figured out why. The power went out on two other occasions that night. Apparently the island has a problem with thier power. The mall is run on generators though (I guess so people won't steal when the power goes out). Anyway, after that I hung out with the nephews (Geno, Lee James & Lawrence) of Tita ... read more

So we made it to Boracay in one peice. The flight was only about 35 minutes from Manila to Caticlan. When we arrived it was pouring but luckly it was just a cloud burst. It was funny becuase when we were landing it was so close to all these huts and cows that I was sure we were going to hit them on our way in. From there we had to go to the Caticlan port to take a "ferry" to Boracay. We met up with Tita Cynthia (Tita Cyn) and Tito Periquit there. It's been so long since we have seen them. They send thier well wishes! I say "ferry" because it is a wasn't like the ferrys in the states but an "old school" ferry - It's hard to explain but I took pictures ... read more

There are so many places to go shopping here. It's crazy. Yesterday Mom, Tita MIla, Millai, Lola Mami and I got up early to go shopping in Divisoria. It's about 20-25 minutes away from Tita Milas. We went shpping at 2 different malls - One Luna mall and 168. Holy @%!*! I couldn't believe it. I had so much fun there! We stopped first at One Luna Mall. Some of the malls here like 168 and One Luna are comparable to flea markets, but they don't consider them flea markets. It's weird. The flea markets here they call "Changets" (pronounced cha aang gets, I may not be spelling it right) and you can find them all over...as we drove over to the mall I saw at least 6. Anyway the isles between the stalls are about ... read more

Happy New year everyone! New years for us has come and gone (about 8 hours ago). Yesterday was a pretty calm day. In the morning we just hung around the house for abit and relaxed. IN the afternoon Mom, Tita Mila, Uncle Mike and I went to see Millie and Adel's new condo. It's sooo nice. It's a private gated high rise cluster in a pretty nice, clean area (out side of most of the neighborhoods there are makeshift neighborhoods made by the poor, they call them squatters here). The just moved in and are still trying to unpack and organize. Both Rico and Isabella have thier own bedrooms (which are both bigger than my bedroom in my apartment) with thier own bathrooms! The master suite is huge (with a huge bath and walk-in closet) and ... read more