Moth Balls and Dancing Kiddies

(Note: Alright, so I have been quite negligent in my posting writing. In my defense, it just so happens the places I've been staying at post-Manila have limited (if not, no) access to the Internet and I have only been able to write quick messages to my parents that I am indeed "behaving myself" and not pissing off the motherland.)

Compare and contrast
After my brief scare in customs, I spent the next few days in the province of Cavite, about 45mins away from Metro Manila (think Ajax distance for the Toronto-folk). I did as I had set out to do - a whole lot of nothing. I drove around with my tita (and subsquently got told she'd like me to meet someone she knows...uh...*blink, blink*), had a facial and swam. I even went to my first gigantic Starbucks ever in the Philippines, next to a call centre and randomly walked into a group of Korean teenager going into a spa (Key giveaway: they weren't speaking Tagalog and had the ubiquitous Zac Efron hair I thought I left in Seoul).

On the third day, my tita and I went into Metro Manila with my tito on the way to work. The goal of the day - see the sights of Metro Manila that I didn't get to see the last time I was there, avoid shopping and see my grand-aunt.

We started off in Makati, which I would liken it to the downtown core of Toronto, particularly the financial district. If you avoided the slummy areas of Manila and/or were blindfolded and then dropped off inside the core of Makati, you would definitely think you were in a developed country...but you wouldn't be.

In 10 seconds, you can travel one of Metro Manila's streets see the most spectacular things (e.g. modern architecture) and then see a seven-year old boy walking in between the jeepneys barefoot, singing for some pesos. You can immerse yourself in gigantic, super-awesome shopping malls that could swallow three Eaton Centres whole (and still have room for ice cream) and then see a small family scrapping pesos for basic groceries. It is the most unfortunate yet interesting situation I've ever really encountered. There seems to be a struggle between how Manila wants to be viewed and how Manila intends to actually get there.

For instance, I went to a fabulous exhibit at the privately-run Ayala Museum in Makati. In addition to showcasing the usual historical lore that most people know of the Philippines (e.g. Spanish Colonization), it now has an exhibit dedicated to the Philippines pre-Spain and the significance of gold and other religious/cultural influences. The exhibit demonstrated how a pre-Spaniard class system existed using gold has a means of distinguishing your class level. Through the golds' intricacy, it was even discovered that the Philippines' evolution had a stronger link to Buddhism and Indonesian than previously known...something that not a lot of Filipinos know.

After going through that exhibit I was pretty jazzed to go see the National Museum of the Philippines in Lunetta Park. I assumed that if a private museum was that well done, surely the publicly run, national museum would be even better. Yeah, you know what they say about assuming stuff...

I got the sinking feeling going through Lunetta Park to get to the National Museum that my assumption was SO off the mark. The Park is near Manila Bay and you could tell immediately that at some point, it was beautiful. On the one side, it had a fountain dedicated to showcasing all 7,000+ islands. At first glance, if I didn't know to look at the fountain as a gigantic map, I would have thought someone forgot to clean out the pool because it was full of garbage bags of various crap piles. The park also had a few mini-parks/gardens that lined the main thorough way, including one donated by the Japanese Embassy back in the 80's (??). In my naivete, I thought it still could look pretty and be interesting. Except for the black stray cat that refused to move for me to even get to the Garden, it wasn't that interested. It looked like it hadn't been tended to in years, had even more jerky cats (you can tell I have a hate-on for stray Asian cats) and the only people in the Garden were locals using it as a hideout from class.

When I finally arrived at the National Museum, it was a ghost town. My tita had gone to the musuem eons ago and had no interest in going inside so I went in solo. The place seriously creeped me out.

The building's exterior is quite beautiful but inside, it was dark and not welcoming. It also had the distinct smell of moth balls or something else equally gross. Also, whereas the Ayala Museum had customer service that would rival museums in North America, the lady that took the money for my ticket looked kind of bitter. The museum comprises of four floors but I only got up to the third because the hallways were dimly lit and it looked like I was the only one up there. A perfect area to attack someone and take her money I would say. So I bolted down the stairs so I could have dinner with my tita and tito.

For all the potential the public tourist attractions have in Manila, it doesn't seem like anyone cares at the government that they are doing the city a great injustice by making key landmarks look craptacular. It's sad that the private sector in Manila had to pick up the slack.


Dancing for money and Getting Wet
After hanging out in Manila for a few days, I flew out to Mindanao to my mom's hometown of Cagayan de Oro to visit family and go white water rafting.

White water rafting in the Philippines is ridiculously cheap, in total, I think I spent about $30 and this included the rafting, food, transport and a CD of photos that were taken while on the water. My cousin and I bought our spots the day before and then took our younger cousins out to McDonalds. Usually my rule for traveling is (with the exception of coffee) is to avoid going to commonly found places in North America unless absolutely necessary. Since my younger cousins don't have a McDonald's in their hometown and it's considered a treat, we went.

Our excursion to McDonald's started off normally - we walked in and placed our orders. However, as we were waiting, something totally unexpected happened. A group of kids with guitars got up from their tables, stood in front of the Christmas tree and started singing...and dancing.

It went on for five minutes and I couldn't stop looking. It was so cute and incredibly hilarious at the same time. I got flashbacks of childhood Christmas parties with my family where my older cousins and I would be herded together like cows and be made to sing and dance just like these kids, only we weren't as good (one of the 5 year olds dancing even busted out some Beyonce-like chest pumps) and instead of throwing money at them, risking eye injuries, strangers actually gently gave money to them at the end (and so ends the origins on why I sometimes I have no shame).

You might be wondering at this point whether or not I wound up taking video footage of this for prosperity's sake... I so did...although how I got it was quite embarrassing.

After lunch, one of my cousins knew that I wanted to take a video of the kids singing and dancing so I could show the world that it is truly ingrained in Filipino culture to make kids perform at will so she actually went up to the manager to ask if they could perform again. She obliged and they even got me a chair to sit on while they performed. I kindly declined the offer and positioned myself so I didn't look like a complete creeper (I think they were amused at the fact a tourist wanted to take footage of it). As with tradition, I did give them pesos at the end but felt weird doing it...in any other situation or circumstance, getting kids to sing/dance and give them money just sounds wrong...

Ok, in the next installment, beach bumming it in Bohol...for now, I'm heading to some stores to do some dammage...happy now, Lori?

xoxo

C