Subic Bay

Hi All! 

     This weekend we decided to get out of Makati for a little while and have ourselves a little adventure.  There are a lot of places we want to go while we are here, but we wanted to start small to figure out how traveling like the locals works, and we must admit, it's pretty free and easy!  We decided to head up to Subic Bay (the old U.S. Navy base) for the night.  We booked a room online through agoda.com and then did some google searching about how to get there.  Subic Bay is about 200km north of where we live here, and everything we read pointed us toward the Victory Liner Bus Line for our journey.  We took a cab over to the bus station...which was quite eye opening to see how most people in Manila live.  Traffic is so congested here that two days/week only half the cars are allowed to travel, and the other half must stay home or carpool to get somewhere.  It depends on the type of license plate on your car.  Tuesdays are for one type of plate, and Wednesdays are for the other.  Cabs, jeepneys, buses, cars, and bicycles all vie for position on the busy city streets.  Lots of honking!  It took us about 45 minutes to get to the bus station which is about 30km from here.  It cost us 200Php or about $5.  Signs were good at the bus station, and people were helpful, and we bought our tickets right away!  Easy-peasy, right?  We thought so...until a security guard got on the bus to tell us we were on the wrong bus.  So we did the walk of shame down the aisle and out to the waiting area.  We had to wait for the next one.  It did almost seem too easy...  :)   About 20 minutes later, we got on the RIGHT bus.  Our tickets for the 3.5-4 hour ride?  245Php each  - or about $6.  Pretty cheap.

 

 

At each stop people would get on the bus and sell all kinds of food and drinks from peanuts and bottled water to speckled eggs and home made pork rinds......and meat on a stick.

Our bus from Pasay City to Olongapo City...it's good to know your bus number.  :)

 

 

     We got to our destination with no problem.  It was a nice air-conditioned bus, and it was pretty comfortable along the way.  However, there is no bathroom on the bus.  Something we found interesting was that anyone anywhere on the side of the street could flag down the bus, and the bus driver would pull over and let him/her on and then off again down the road a bit.  Everyone was friendly and helpful....I suppose we looked like we needed help a time or two.

 

     We grabbed our backpacks and grabbed a cab to our hotel which immediately set the tone for our experience in Subic.  The cab driver drove us less than a mile and charged us 200Php.  There are no meters in the cabs we encountered in Subic.  Interesting.  We checked in to our room at Seorabeol Grand Leisure Hotel, dropped our bags off, and headed out to explore and find a place for lunch. 

Our hotel pool.  We spent a little time here. 

 

 

     Everywhere we went people were trying to sell us things.  See this incredibly beautiful and realistic looking bracelet?? 

It is made of "...coral from the sea, ma'am...you know, shells..."   NOT.  It's made of hard plastic bits, and it's pretty obvious, but because he kept saying "I need to buy lunch, ma'am, sir....I need to buy lunch..." I thought we should buy one for 50Php or about $1.10.  My mistake.  With his eyes Eric said, "Don't do it" and he was right because as soon as the money came out, three more plastic-salesmen appeared out of nowhere hawking their wares, too!  I thought buying one would make him go away....nope...it made his friends materialize out of thin air.  We were really just trying to take a couple of pictures on the beach, but we didn't get to do too many because we were swarmed.  That was not a fun part of the trip.  We did manage a couple of pictures. However, don't be deceived...the beach is NOT as pretty as it looks in these pictures. 

Day two was sunny, so the pics came out really well.

Picturesque backdrop.

The beach could have been much prettier....we weren't sure if they were still cleaning up from the typhoon or if it was kind of dirty because it is the off season.  This is right outside the restaurant where we had lunch.

The mountains are a pretty backdrop to the water, but it was pretty hazy this day. 







 

     We found a couple of cute little coffee shops.  Always a priority in our travels!  And then we spotted this great church which was packed inside and out Sunday morning for Mass - with ice cream vendors, too!  This is what it looked like on Saturday night.  We loved it!

 

 

     We found a place called Seafood by the Bay for dinner.  It looked promising!  We opted for the seafood buffet, but when we started putting things on our plates, we noticed everything was cold.  I mentioned this to the waitress and she offered to "microwave" our plates for us!  Haha!  We decided to forego the buffet and order off the menu.  It didn't seem like a big deal to anyone else that all of the buffet items were cold, so maybe this is normal?  We will have to do a little research!

 

     After dinner  we went a couple of doors down to a place called Pier One which is a huge outdoor venue right on the beach with food and drinks and live bands!  We stayed for a couple of hours and listened to the bands -which were very good and thoroughly entertaining-.  There was a lot of American contemporary music as well as some Filipino music mixed in.  We enjoyed the evening immensely!!  It was very relaxing and just easy.

 

     The next morning we got packed up and went to breakfast.  We could choose the American or Filipino breakfast. The waiter told us that he felt obliged to let us know that for the American breakfast when it says 'sausage', it really means a 'hotdog'.  He seemed slightly embarrassed.  We thought it was funny.  We chose the Filipino breakfast.  Mine came with a native sausage - sweet and delicious - and Eric's was called beef tapa.  They both came with garlic rice and an egg.  The coffee was terrible, so we headed to yet another little coffee shop - the best one of the trip - and then back to the hotel to grab our backpacks to catch a cab back to the bus station. On the way back we even got to watch a movie on the bus! 

 

     We don't know that we will go back to Subic Bay - it does seem VERY touristy - even for us.  But it was a good experience for our first traveling adventure here! 

 

Until Next Time,

Eric and Kim  :)



Park Experience - Tag Line

     One of the first things we did together here was take a stroll through the park.  It really is a beautiful park.  It is busy in the morning with people hurrying through and using it as a shortcut, it is busy in the morning and evening with people exercising, it is busy throughout the day with people meeting and socializing at the restaurants, coffee shop, gelato shop, or frozen yogurt shop that line one side, and it is busy with people just hanging out playing Frisbee or badminton or just sitting on a blanket talking.  It is a great place to relax.

  

     So our first evening venturing into the park, we were stopped by a young Filipino girl who wanted to ask us questions for a survey she was doing for her university class.  She had to ask some demographic questions, one of which was "How old are you?"  Begrudgingly, I'm sure, I answered the question before Eric, and I'm sure I added an "ugh" or an extra-heavy sigh in there when I said "forty-five..."   Not really knowing how to respond to my obvious annoyance of my age and wanting this survey to be a positive experience, she responded with a perky, "That's okay, you're still pretty!"  We all laughed and then finished the survey...which I think was about the use of technology...and then we continued on our way through the park.  She was adorable, and all of about 19 years old.

 

     So, now, whenever we aren't sure what to say because of an awkward moment, or we want to make each other feel better about something...usually trivial...we say to each other, "That's okay.  You're still pretty!"  And we both feel better!

 

Until Next Time,

Eric and Kim

Makati Food....and Dessert.

     Hello All!  We hope you are enjoying reading about our adventure!  If you would like an email each time there is a new post, you can put your email in the little box on the left and click submit.  Several people have clicked the little google+ box, but we haven't figured out what that does for sure.  :)  Also, it looks like the easiest way to post a comment is to click on the post title on the left and scroll; a comment box appears at the end of each post.

     This weekend we hit the markets again!  Lunch on Saturday was tuna belly and teriyaki chicken skewers, 

and lunch on Sunday was some kind of squid balls (ahem...balls made out of squid...and some other things) with a sweet chili sauce and corn fritters with rice.  We forgot to take pictures of Sunday's lunch.  We are starting to get used to the way the weekend markets work.  It is important to ask how much things cost BEFORE you order what you want.  We learned this the hard way.  It's also good to taste things before you buy.  We did a lot of this...tasted more, bought less.  We drank dalandan juice and tea - green like a lime on the outside of the fruit and bright orange on the inside.  It is very mild and refreshing.  We also tried langka (jackfruit) - wish we had taken a picture of this one.  The fruit is ginormous!  And it looked like a little assembly line of people breaking it down.  It tastes a lot like banana, but the texture is very different.
 (Jackfruit)

We have found that the majority of our time is spent in some way related to food.  We are either looking for food, tasting food, shopping for food, smelling new dishes, chasing something we have smelled.....or just trying to figure ingredients out.  We tried one of the Philippines' most famous desserts this weekend:  Halo-Halo.  In the Filipino language of Tagalog, "halo" means "mix", so "halo-halo" is "mix-mix" - which is exactly what it is - a mix of all kinds of different things: shaved ice, condensed milk, sweet beans, jello, leche flan, candied fruits, and usually topped off with a scoop of purple ube ice cream (purple sweet potato).  The entire dessert is oddly delicious and thoroughly refreshing!  The ingredients are not familiar to us, so we didn't really know what to expect, but here you can see how hesitant we were to finish it:
Before:

After:

  YUM!

 

  Pay no attention to that dessert on the left.  We don't know how it got there. :)

 

 

     We are looking into doing something different next weekend, maybe a day trip out of Manila or to one of the other islands.  There are over 7,000 islands and 81 provinces that make up the archipelago of the Philippines, and every region has its own unique dishes.  We are looking forward to trying lots of them!  However, we are not the typical Makati ex-pats with the fat bank accounts here on the government's dime, so we have to be cognizant of a budget, and we are hoping to blog about traveling and exploring within our budget.  From what we have researched so far, it seems there are all kinds of places we can go and new experiences to share!  Things are expensive in the city - even at the markets - but that's because everyone caters to foreigners here.  Outside the city, it's a different world, and we are looking forward to exploring that part of the country, too!

 

     Makati is a hustling, bustling city Monday-Friday; it's the financial district with the stock exchange building, a countless number of banks, and all kinds of high-rise office buildings, hotels, and apartment buildings.  Traffic is crazy.  Cabs honking, buses honking, jeepneys everywhere.  There are streetlights, but we are not quite sure of their purpose.  People are everywhere.  When it's time to cross the street, it's like swimming upstream against the salmon headed downstream or you go underground to cross at busier intersections.  However, the weekends are quiet and peaceful here.  Seems that most people go home to neighboring areas for the weekends leaving the streets empty.  That also means a lot of places are closed - especially on Sundays - but the feeling here on the weekends is completely different than during the week.  We are getting used to things, and that feels good!

 

     On a side note, we did a little search of coffee shops in our immediate area.  In a 5km radius from our hotel, there are more than 30!  So, guess who's happy?



See you soon!
Eric and Kim

Our first TYPHOON!

     So, it is the rainy season here from June - November, and the Philippine Islands generally get 18 - 20 tropical storms each year during this time.  Typhoon Rammasun (aka Glenda) arrived today with lots of rain and some pretty big gusts of wind!  We did not receive the brunt of the storm, just some of the wind and rain in the outer bands.  Our power went out at about 6:30am but was back on by 10.  We went out for a bit to find some coffee while our power was out, but there were very few places open!  We stopped at the little mini-mart across the street from our hotel and picked up some Cheetos (Yep, they have cheesy goodness here, too.  Hey - who knows how long we might be cooped up in our apartment??), but they did not have any coffee.  We did notice a new restaurant that just opened a week or two ago that was open, so we ventured into the rain again and headed for The Flying Pan.
     We had to wait a few minutes while two employees on the outside and about five employees on the inside tried to open the doors for us to enter.  They had closed and locked the doors and stuffed something under them so the rain didn't flood into the restaurant, so it took a few minutes.  But, the sweet Filipino waitresses waved and smiled at us through the door windows the entire time, so we waited to go in!  We are both glad we did!  Breakfast was delicious!  Potatoes and scrambled eggs with peppers and pork Sisig, a delicious Filipino pork dish, with garlic rice....and of course coffee!  It was perfect for us to sit and eat and spend an hour while we watched the wind and rain (and took pictures).
     After breakfast we headed back to the apartment for most of the day and watched the rain (and a movie).  Most of Makati stayed home from work, so it was nice for us to be able to spend the day together.  After dinner we took a walk through town.  Many trees were stripped of bark and younger trees were pulled right out of the ground by their roots.  After the wind and rain subsided, we were left with a very enjoyable evening of low humidity, cool temperatures, and cool breezes.  It's the first time we didn't return to the apartment soaked through with sweat!  The park was closed for clean-up.  It will probably take a few days for all of the clean-up, but crews were out there working even while it was still raining.  Here are a few pictures:

The parking lot directly across from our apartment.

Every corner looked like this with broken pots.

The big glass building behind this mess of tree limbs is where Eric works.

We noticed the roots of these trees don't get very big.

Ayala Triangle Gardens (aka The Park)

 

Typhoon Breakfast.  :)

 

So all in all, it was a big storm, but it didn't affect us too much.  Manila and some of the islands to the north were hit quite hard and are experiencing flooding.  Many places north of us had been evacuated as well.

 

Until next time!

 

Eric and Kim

 

    

Week One in Makati!

     So far we have been together here in Makati, Philippines, for about six days!  We have walked a lot, checked out a few open-air markets, walked some more, checked out a couple of grocery stores, visited quite a few restaurants, walked even more, and we even tried a little cooking with some of the things we picked up at the markets like lychees, tamarind, Thai chilis, milkfish, tilapia, mango, and a few other things.   Not all in one dish, of course.  :)
     The open-air markets are wonderful!  There is so much food from all over – Middle Eastern, Greek, Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, Filipino – even grilled sweet corn like we get at the fairs in the states!  There is fresh seafood, exotic spices, sweet treats, fresh fruits and vegetables, handmade crafts, flowers, plants, and so much more.  The markets are only open on Saturdays from
7 – 2 and on Sundays from 7:30 – 2, so we can’t wait to go back next weekend!

Fresh fruit and veggies

All kinds of fresh seafood....some cooked and some not.

Selfie at Salcedo Market

Milkfish (left) and Tilapia (right).  Delicious right off the grill!

A few things we brought home - giant avocado, lychees, and tamarind.

Suman (wrapped in banana leaves).  This will be a staple dessert!  Yum!  Sweet, coconut sticky rice.

Another selfie.  :)

A few handcrafts we brought home.

One more selfie!

Food from everywhere!

 



A few things to note:  I have not used a hair-dryer or put on make-up, and neither of us has been in a car since I got here.  And it is AWESOME!

More soon!
Kim and Eric