Arrival:
We arrived at Manila airport just after 11 am, and security was a breeze. Myla seems to be coming down with something though, she’s sneezing. We grabbed our luggage and headed for the Malayan Plaza hotel, at which we stayed previously, and won’t stay at again. The experience is hardly what we remember. We hit the closest SM (SuperMall) where I was hounded by various condo kiosks. But we managed to pick up some mangoes and bananas and headed back to the hotel where we crashed around 5pm – the jet lag begins.
April 17, 2009
Kuya Romy and Ate Vilma came to our hotel to collect and take us back to Valenzuela, and after a small reunion we grabbed a cab and headed to the Commission of Higher Education to begin Myla’s accreditation process. We were informed that the matter would take a week to make a decision, so we decided it was time to see some of the country. We spent the night at Valenzuela getting reaquanted with the bucket system and sleeping without air conditioning. It is of my highly informed opinion that air conditioning (or lack of it specifically) is a good part to blame for high populations.
April 18, 2009
We jumped on a bus to Baguio. The bus ride from Manila to Baguio is supposed to be a 4 hour bus ride which took 7 hours. We saw some nice scenery heading up into the mountain city,
though once we were in the city there was not much to see. We shopped around for a hotel and settled on the hotel Veniz (the most expensive, but the only one with Vacancy) and it turned out to be the nicest dive we have ever stayed at.
April 19, 2009
I got up early as I have been lately at 2:30am and read until I thought it ok to bother Myla into waking up as well at 5:30. She’d been asleep since 5 the night before. We got up and went to see the Baguio Bo-tan-E-Kal Gardens, which was really pretty. Set amongst huge mountain pine trees. We spent a few hours in their taking pictures.
We decided to keep moving , although Myla’s sickness had become worse by now - it reminded me of Bronchitis. We picked up some menthol gum for Myla and a small hand towel for myself which I now where down the back of my shirts and is one of the smarter things I’ve done since being here. So we jumped on a bus to San Fernando City, La Union, a coastal town. 3 hours later we departed the bus into the hottest sunshine I have had in the Philippines yet. We stepped off the bus, but having no where, or idea to go, we walked into a garage in front of the bus stop, where Myla began asking about destinations. Now also, in front of the bus stop is a line up of passenger tricycles ( a motor cycle with a side car) and when we came back outside of the garage we walked toward them to get a ride. Right where the bus dropped us off, and I mean where a person first puts their foot on the ground – was some money. I bent down to grab it, and as I did , the closest tric-cabby saw me bend down at which point he saw the money. He started forward, but quickly saw he had no chance to get there before I did. I picked up the money, knowing the cabby was upset, looked at Myla and cooley said; “Did you drop this?” Myla’s reply; “No.” So I pocketed the money anyways, 150 pesos ($3.75 CDN) , and Myla then hired the cabby to take us toward the resort hotels, and paid him 30 pesos for his time. So everybody won.
We stayed at the Ocean Paradise Hotel, which was nice, and swam in the ocean. We each had a San Miguel Light beer and dinner, which was tasty. We spoke to a couple of gentlemen at a dive shop next door. What they were saying about what there is to see was a little confusing at first, but when I realized what they were talking about I was kicking myself for not having my underwater video equipment with us. So we decided not to dive, but to return at a later date. Myla’s sickness- while it hadn’t progressed, hadn’t gotten better so we decided to head back to Manila the next day. (No I don't describe what there is to see, it's too good to say without a picture.)
We had breakfast and took a tric into the city where we jumped on a bus for Manila. It was a 6 hour bus ride that took 6 hours. We went to the SM for dinner, talked to some more condo people for a few minutes and then headed to where we are now – the Pearl Manila Hotel. We will spend 3 nights here recouping, waiting to hear news about Myla’s accreditation.
