Taxi's in Manila

The Philippines is truly a land of lots of quirky sights (which I absolutely love). One of my personal faves are the totally bizarre names that are given to taxi cabs, which are then proudly painted onto the side doors of the cab. An unfortunate amount of my day is spent sitting in horrific traffic (I live about 4 miles away from work and it usually takes about an hour to get home. If you’re wondering why I don’t walk or ride my bike, please read the entry below about running in Manila. Even hardcore Brian would not entertain such a foolish idea which goes to show I’m not just woosing out.). But on Friday when it was clear I would not be getting to the office any time soon, I started to chuckle about the cab directly in front of me, “Devoted to You”, which I got to stare at for an inordinate amount of time. I decided to whip out my camera and take some pics of the treasures surrounding me, which would also take my mind off of the fury building inside as I sat and sat and sat (as I’ve told many of you, I’ve never really been someone prone to anger, but since living here I have totally embraced anger. I get irrationally crazy and angry sitting in the traffic which honestly makes the entire day consist of just getting to and from work. Forget about doing any errands or going anywhere else cause you just don’t have the time to commit to these endeavors.)

Here’s a few shots of some taxi’s on my way to/from work on Friday and also a few from Saturday afternoon. It was perhaps not the best decision to try to take some of these pics, cause it wasn’t exactly a safe means of driving, especially when you’re just inches away from cars on all sides. Nevertheless, here’s what I got. The one I really loved that snuck past me too quick was the “Prayer Partner” taxi. I will have to do a separate post about the crazy expressions of spirituality on public transportation, which is also quite bizarre and humorous. You’ll see a little of it below, like the bible verses on the bumpers, but that’s nothing compared to some of the other sights in this staunch catholic country. Anyway, hope you get a good laugh out of these.

The joys and perils of new running shoes

So the other day I finally received the pair of new running shoes I had ordered online. I was overcome with enthusiasm about their arrival because I’d been unable to run for a few weeks because my previous pair of running shoes met an untimely demise. You first need to know that I rarely run in Manila anyway, because it’s fairly disgusting. There is really no good place to run—the heat and humidity is sweltering; the thick pollution hangs in the air, enshrouded by the heat; jeepneys trot along the roads belching clouds of black smoke; and most sidewalks are littered with human and animal waste, all of which makes it a bit difficult to mentally check-out since you really need to be on your toes about where you’re taking your next step—not exactly the mode of de-stressing that it is in the U.S. With this background in mind, I still try to run about once a week just cause it’s nice to get some “fresh” air.

So when I went out a few weeks ago and my shoes came to their early death, it’s not that I wasn’t aware of the potentially treacherous running conditions around me. But unfortunately, I let down my guard for just a second as I was distracted by thinking about how it was probably time to get a new pair of running shoes, when I was suddenly jolted out of my daydream because I realized I had just run through a huge puddle. I was thinking how unfortunate that was because my feet and legs just got soaked but continued along my way until I looked down and realized I had actually just run through a huge pile of diarrhea. Yes, I was covered in diarrhea from my legs to my shoes, especially my shoes. It was fairly disgusting but more hilarious than anything because it’s pretty funny to be non-chalantly running around, realize you’re legs and feet are wet but you think it’s just water and then become starkly aware that it’s not. I don’t know what was funnier, watching me suddenly realize my condition, or the sight of me dragging myself across the grass trying to wipe it off. Eventually I found a man with a hose who was kind enough to hose me down. But needless to say the shoes had to go.

By the time my new shoes arrived in the mail, I was rarin to hit the streets of Manila once again. Unfortunately, they were about one size too big but I didn’t really want to mess with sending them back and then waiting for weeks again to have the new size arrive, so I decided to just roll with it. About 45 seconds into my first run, I obviously was not used to the length of the shoes and caught my toe on a bump in the sidewalk and totally bit it. I came crashing down hard, so much so that all the traffic around me came to a standstill, likely with everyone inside their cars wondering if they needed to get out to go assist the clumsy American. However, to everyone’s relief I picked myself up and continued on my way though with a substantial gash on my hand that has somewhat inhibited my ability to type for the past few days (and also makes me slightly fearful of what parts from the streets of Manila are now circulating through my bloodstream). Anyway, all this to say that I just successfully completed a run without any significant foibles. It is surely going to be a great day.

Swimming with the whale sharks

So this weekend, Brian, our friend Matt and I embarked on one of the great adventures of the Philippines, swimming with the whale sharks. (Note: The picture of the whale shark above is from the internet just so you can get an idea of what I'm talking about, as we have not yet developed the pics from our cheapo disposable, underwater camera). These huge, gentle sharks come to the Philippines to feed each year from Dec-May and they are an increasingly growing tourist attraction. This is one of the only places in the world where you can swim with them in their natural environment. The whole experience was pretty nutso. We left our house at 5am on Saturday for a 6am flight to the city of Legaspi. We arrived by 7am and landed at an air strip right next to the Mayon Volcano, which is still quite active, almost erupted over Christmas, and allegedly boasts the world’s most perfect cone (thank you 7^th grade geography and tales of the “ring of fire”). One of my fave things about the Philippines is flying into these crazy little airports in the middle of the jungle. This is when you realize you are in the heart of the tropics, you’re not quite sure if the landing is gonna go down as planned, and you quickly ponder what role you’d play in your own version of Oceanic 815. But we landed with no major incidents and the arrival left me stunned once again as to why on earth people ever leave the province to move to Manila. The Philippines is absolutely gorgeous outside of Manila—so quiet and idyllic, really a tropical version of FF!! :) From the airport we hopped in a little van for a one hour ride to arrive at our destination, Donsol. At the information center we made arrangements for our boat, made a convincing argument for why we were Philippine residents and should therefore get the Pinoy price and not the tourist price (which we did and saved about $30-it certainly helped that our friend spoke Tagalog) changed into our swimming suits, and we were off.

A personal highlight of living in the Philippines is how Filipino’s love to make everything very official sounding. So our guide to the whale sharks (the local name is buntanding) was not just a guide, but rather, he was a “Buntanding Interaction Officer”. Our BIO took us, along with three others, out in the banca boat (the typical boat around these parts—essentially like a large motorized canoe with outriggers) to go find the whale sharks. There was one spotter who would stand on a perch above the boat looking for where the whale sharks were about to surface. Then we’d race against the other thirty banca boats to get there first (cause only one boat was allowed per shark), and if we claimed primacy over that particular shark, the BIO would start yelling “Ready, get ready! Faster please, it is better when you are already ready!” Although he was slightly annoyed with our lack of preparedness, we’d comply with his pleas and would quickly put on our fins and masks, line up on the sides of the boat, and then jump in the water when he said go. Brian was doing lots of personal commentary pretending we were all Navy SEALS, because it was a similar water entry and pretty hilarious. We were franticly following these commands and then after we were in the water, the BIO would yell “NOW!” and then we’d go under and this mammoth creature of 15-30 ft. would be swimming right at us. I would let out a huge, muted squeal under the water through my mask, which probably scared them away, but the whole thing was so crazy it felt like we were characters in a book. We saw five whale sharks total, but the last one swam with us for about ten minutes. In fact, I ended up literally stuck on top of it and could not get away from him. We were not supposed to touch them, so I was afraid I’d get in trouble, but I did not intend to be stuck on top of it. It started swimming towards me and then moved up, and I couldn’t get away. Although they are gentle creatures, it was slightly frightening, and the BIO eventually pulled me off of it. However, I ended up having a big rash on my leg from my brush against his scaly skin! This lead into fantastical thoughts that would be a fabulous children’s story about being morphed into a part human part whale shark creature/superhero and developing scaly skin where we made contact and having lots of crazy powers over the sea. We all had a pretty good laugh.

The trip ended on a bizarre note too as the province we were in was under the tsunami warning following the earthquake in Chile. We figured if the tsunami came we’d probably be rescued through our new kinship with the whale sharks, but it never turned that extreme. The tsunami didn’t end up touching the Philippines, but you better believe I took my exit row responsibilities much more serious than I usually do on the plane ride home as I was envisioning dramatic excursions down the big orange slide.