"Enjoying the Philippines"

The common sense about what people think about the city Manila, that it is unsafe, people are unfriendly and the city is dirty everywhere; I definitely don't agree with that. Karaoke, clubbing, caving, hiking and volunteering, Philippines has it.The Philippines and especially Manila is very enjoyable!

One of the enjoyable things in Manila and the Philippines is the passion of the Filipino's for music. The second national sport (after cockfighting) is karaoke, and the Filipino's are very good in it as well. My friend Sheng invited me to join her high school friends for a karaoke night. They had hired a private room with off course a big TV screen, karaoke equipment and a song book as big as a "Gouden Gids" (Dutch phone number book) with local and international songs. A guarantee for a great evening, with a lot of music, humor, drinks, food and a lot of enjoy. Everyone (at a certain point there were more than fifteen friends) participated in the karaoke, even I song some classics such as "Roxane, put on the red light" and "In the navy". What I more like is the fact that there is always food on the table. Every five minutes someone is ordering a plate of delicious food; a plate of sizzling sisig, nacho's or other Filipino snacks. Many red horses (local beer brand) later the party ended. This karaoke night triggered me to sing more. Together with Noor (another volunteer at World Activity Philippines) we song "Het is een nacht - Guus Meeuwis" in a crowded bar full of people where a band was playing. The audience (even they couldn't understand) was very enthusiastic about our performance.

Friday and Saturday night are good for clubbing. Last Saturday we went to club "Prive" in the district of Fort Bonifaclo, which is - as the name suggests - quite exclusive. My feelings about this club were a bit conflicting, because there is so much difference between rich and poor here. Comparable with the day life of the inhabitants in Manila, this club was way to expensive. To illustrate, the price for a cocktail is equal to the daily wage of the people in the slums (of it is not more), the differences are too large. A feeling of guiltiness came up. Another shocking thing were the (totally drunk) Filipino young girls, which were tempted by the rich (on average ) old western men with too much money. It is pathetic to see that old western men emigrate to the Philippines to "fell in love" and marry a way too young Filipino girl. In my view, it is more a kind of "fancy prostitution". Shame on these people. I feel sorry for the Filipino girls, who in many cases don't have another choice. Nevertheless, we enjoyed the music, cocktails and party until late in the morning. But even there we got aware of the problems Philippines faces with; child abuse and prostitution are still a big problem.

To help the people in the slums I joined Smokey Tours for volunteering. The founder of Smokey Tours Juliette Kwee organized a training for the tour leaders. She talked about the purpose of Smokey Tours; "Provide people in the slums with work and an income and donate money to another NGO working in the slums (profit is going there)". The organization is founded to help the tour leaders, that's the most important ideal. In her speech she more talked about the essential things in life, which people in the Netherlands don't see/face anymore (because all the technology, smartphones, etc). Her speech was impressive and really inspired me. After the talk of Juliette I spoke about the new bookkeeping system and the new procedure. Because of an increase in number of tours and the regulations of the Philippines government it's necessary to make the booking system and bookkeeping more professional, so I created a system which generates unique tour numbers (in Excel) to keep a better track on the income and expenses for each tour. The tour leaders understand the improvements and even asked me to give another training at the end of January about personal finance and savings.

Enjoyable in the Philippines as well is the north of Luzon. In the backpackers city Sagada, Suzan (another volunteer at WAP) and me visited the huge Samaging cave. A tour uide took us for three hours deep into the cave to see the underground environment. The track was sometimes very dangerous, because the rocks where slippery and even sometimes we had to climb up rocks and hang above steep cliffs. Nevertheless, the tour was excited and the rock formations where beautiful. The north is famous for her rice terraces, and what is a better manner to see this than on the rooftop of a jeepney. For three hours we were witting on the rooftop of the jeepney from Sagada to Banaue. The view up there over the mountains and rice terraces was magnificent. Note that the rooftop of a jeepney is not the most safe place to be. Especially in the curves of the road we had to held ourselves to don't fell off. Finally we arrived at the destination of our journey; Banaue. This city is famous for their rice terraces. In the afternoon I did a three hours day track on the top of the rice terraces. Why do you need a tour guide? A tour guide is not adventurous anymore and too easy, so I decided to go by myself. Adventure you can get than! Balancing at the edge of the plateaus with on the right hand side a steep cliff and left a muddy pool where the rice plants are growing. Just keep going, even when you are lost and "off the beaten track". Finally I made it to the city hall, including muddy shoes (even inside) and dirty pants.

Adventure and fun enough in the Philippines, in the next week I will visit Ati Atihan festival with a lot of domestic dances and music (in Kalibo) and enjoy the beaches of Boracay (party island).