i’m back from philippines!!!!

i guess i’m about 5.674 kg heavier than before, cos all i did there was to eat and rest, eat and rest, eat and rest. nothing else. and i spent 4 whole days in air conditioned comfort. gosh. thank god the trip was only 4 days, otherwise they’ll slaughter me for christmas. which means i’m all the more tempted to go swimming. but since today is my first day back, i shall rest a little. anyway it’s raining hippotamuses so i can’t swim today.

and since i’m so bored here, i shall blog about the philippino trip! everything below is true, nothing extra added, minimal exxagerations!

introduction:

1. the purpose of the trip was to attend a convention, where all the tans from all over the world came together annually. (note: real reason was to get a free trip since philippines is a pretty cool place too).
2. number of middle aged and elderly people grossly exceeded the number of 20+- year old group.
3. barely knew anyone there, and didn’t bond with anyone there cos of the demographics

the story begins……

let’s start from the airport in manila. gosh, i simply love changi airport. i always thought it was some cliche that changi airport is always termed as spacious and clean and orderly and what not. after a few trips abroad, i really believe this now. the manila airport was chaotic. small. no, i should say: the manila airport was CHAOTIC. SMALL. yeah, this is a better description. on the return trip, we left the hotel at 12 (the trip from the hotel to the airport was estimated to be about 20 mins, excluding traffic jams). the traffic was pretty smooth. yay. then we reached the airport pretty early. we were supposed to board the plane at 1330. and tadah! we only managed to board the plane about 1310. all thanks to the very inefficient airport staff.

let’s talk about the people. i used to think that it is a shallow and cliched thing to say that all philippino maids address females as “mum” (mispronounciation of ma’am) well, well. throughout my four days there, i was served 3 meals a day. and ALL the waiters (very few waitresses there, perhaps due to the culture) addressed me very politely and naturally as MUM. gosh. there was only once i heard someone addressing me as “ma’am”. and no, they don’t address anyone who doesn’t look like a madam as “miss”. there’s only “ma’am” and “sir”. so i guess it is not a cliche at all.

i noticed some interesting “road culture” in philippines too. they love horns. even when no one is blocking their road, or even if someone helplessly blocks their way, they horn. as if that helps a lot. yeah, and the road signs were pretty cool too. there were these signs, “absolutely no overtaking” and “strictly no parking”. which led me to think, so if the sign just said “no overtaking” and “no parking” the drivers could bend the rules once in a while? just before we got onto the highway, there was a dos and don’ts signboard. one of the don’ts: no slow driving. AH. they should have that in singapore.

and interestingly, they had male urinals (shaded from public view of course) along the roads. quite a lot of them, in fact. and they were in pink and black (the urinal stall i mean, not the urinal itself). so the male drviers will sometimes stop along the road, get off the car, and take a leak. and zip their flys on the way out in public view. and there wasn’t a tap anywhere near the urinal. so no hand washing. eeeeee.

and i passed by slums and the homeless. right in the middle of the capital. even the capital wasn’t very clean and orderly, i would say. it’s comparable to some parts of indonesia, although i haven’t been to jakarta yet. some of the homeless just lived along the road dividers which was a couple of metres wide and was covered with grass. some of the better-off homeless had plastic shelters and deck chairs. the worse-off homeless just lived there with plastic sheets to sleep on. it’s kind of sad watching them, when i knew that during our meals, there was mountains of wasted food.

the architecture of buildings in philippines were quite influenced by america too. from restaurants to government buildings, there were signs of american style in them. lots of interesting buildings around in the capital, and it’s a pity i didn’t take pictures of them, since i barely got off the coaches to step on the streets, and the pictures didn’t turn out well from inside the coach.

yeah, now about the hotel i stayed in. i guess more than 80% of the hotel was booked by the tans, since there were more than 1000 of us attending the convention. so everywhere you went in the hotel, you saw people with the orange straps with a identificantion card declaring our names and countries. the hotel was built in 1929, and it was a very charming place. they managed to keep the lobby cosy but quite “retro” and some of the things in the guestrooms were pretty retro too. like the fridge in my room. it was a beige-pink colour fridge, which screamed “RETRO!!!” at us. instead of having a brand on the door of the fridge, it declared “manila hotel”. cool. and the air con. coooold. there wasn’t a modern remote, but a knob to adjust the temperature, which once again screamed “retro!!!”. not that the knob was of any help. the room was freezing cold, whether you turned the knob to “warm” or “cold”. don’t look down on the super-old looking air con vents. it’s damn powerful.

now about the tans all over the world. gosh, i’ve never seen so many tans together. and no matter which country they were from, they could ALL speak chinese and hokkien, although some were barely understood when they spoke. the philippinos, the indonesians, the hawaiians (and yes, the hawaiians went “aloha!! aloha!!” when they were gathering). and i realised that the philippino chinese were fiercely proud of their heritage and language. now compare it with singapore. ok, i feel a little bad.

and *ahem*, i have to say i was very traumatised by the china-tans and some of the other random tans from god-knows-where. although they were wearing suits, they behaved in a very uncouth manner. the vulgarities they spewed made my father (who’s a regular vulgurity user) seemed like a cultured and elegant user of vulgar language. and they unashamedly sat down on the floor, in their suits to nap ANYWHERE after lunch. even when the venue was very posh and exclusive. gosh. not to mention their lack of courtesy when it comes to queues and buffet. they’ll just charge at the food and skip the queuing. but i supposed a large number of them are from the rural areas where they are not as sophisticated or cultured. but they seriously left a very bad impression on everyone.

and that’s all i got from the four day trip. and i thought it’s quite a lot of stuff, since i didn’t have the chance to step out onto the streets to explore the place. but if i did have the chance, perhaps i would have learnt more, took more pictures and i’d be able to provide a more accurate account. a pity, since the capital was really quite interesting and colourful.

pictures will be up when i get my hands on them.