Philippines, May 98 (Travel report)
July 3 1998
General notes:
When going to the Philippines I like to travel around and have a little romance, rather than spending all my time in Angeles. So if I would find a nice girl I'd like to take her with me and stay with her all my holiday long. I found a beauty (and sweet) and here is the low down of our explorations!
The trip ...
1. Manila (day 8).
We took the aircon bus to Manila. Michelle had worked in Manila before and therefore was rather familiar with the city. We managed to get a flight from Manila to Cagayan de Oro only for the next morning at PAL ticket office in Ermita, so we had to spend the night in Manila. She knew a cheap but good hotel in Caloocan (600P, double room with a/c and TV) near the Philippine Rabbit Bus terminal. It was a rainy evening, so we skipped any night activities and went to bed early.
2. Cagayan de Oro (day 9).
This city has the nearest airport for a trip to Camiguin Island. It's a nice and friendly city, it also has a reputation to be rather save compared to other places. We found a nice piano bar with candle light and live music. A romantic place. I paid the piano player a drink and we made a friend. She showed us another piano bar with live Karaoke. Michelle was not shy to sing, she has a nice voice (and of course she knew all the songs from the bar in AC!). Michelle was acting like my wife. She took care of me and when we talked to people they often assumed that we were married. With her natural and friendly attitude nobody would ever believe that she works in a bar.
3. Camiguin (day 10-16).
The next morning we took the ferry boat to Camiguin. It's a nice trip of 1:30 hours with a fast boat, incl. a/c and TV (for 4,50$!). Most tourists go straight to the north where the beaches are. We decided first to stay one or two days in Benoni and later move to another place. We found a nice place ("J&A Fish Pen") with a/c accommodation (but without TV - great!) and restaurant for only 500 P. A real romantic place, directly at a lagoon, with candle light dinners in the evening. The owner and his stuff are very friendly, the food is excellent and cheap and the place is not crowded. Only few foreigners come here, it's also a tourist spots for Filipinos from other islands. We only missed swimming here. The lagoon is for fishing only, although we saw some kids also doing a swim there. For swimming there are better places like the cold spring in the north of the island, also there is a hot spring where you feel like in a bath tub, and 2 waterfalls.
Or you go to the (expensive) beach resorts in the North which do have a swimming pool. The beaches in the north have no white (only dark) sand, other beaches have no sand, but rocks only. The only white beach we found is in the south of the island: ÑKabila beach", a small section of less than a quarter mile. So we stayed all the time in our Fish Pen and did not move to a beach resort or bungalow village in the north. We skipped swimming but were exploring the island and visiting all places of interest.
If you rent a motorbike you can get everywhere on the island. Otherwise you have to take the jeepney or trike. But don't expect a highway there. Even they call their road which goes round the island "highway", it has sections which are still under construction, it's not more than a dusty trail. May be in one year or two the road will be fixed. But who cares? People in Camiguin always have time. They don't say "Hello", their greeting is "Hi friend!" Camiguin is a real pristine and romantic place, it's still the real Philippines. But, of course, you have to accept that the level of comfort is lower than on pure tourist spots.
(Part II)
July 4 1998
4. Cagayan de Oro again (day 17-18).
When we returned to CDO again we wanted to spend 2 days there before we took the bus to Davao. PAL have skipped their flights to Davao, and I did not trust the small local Airline "Pacific Air" (their nickname is Pacific Scare...!). Michelle was happy to find a TV in the room again, obviously she had missed this nice machine in Camiguin. I was not happy about that, but we compromised only to watch English channels (NBC Manila, CNN, Discovery, MTV, etc.) and no Tagalog soap bullshit.
CDO has a big shopping Mall and Michelle wanted me to go there for shopping. I was unable to say no. But when we saw the price level compared to Manila or Angeles, she also realized that it's a waste of money to buy things here which can be bought for less money in Manila. Good girl!!
I wished to find out more about TSM activities in Cagayan. We found a "Love Disco Club" with go-go dancers. A rather dark place with a dance floor, we saw about 20-25 girls, ranging from 5 - 9. Sometimes they were dancing all together (in street clothes, some in sexy outfit), later each girl had her own "show", i.e. she danced to the music (or better should say NOISE, because the sound quality was worse than from an old AM radio, totally distorted, but with full volume!) and undressed her top. Some had really nice boops, others had better skipped undressing.
Round the tables were "VIP rooms" with a glass window and curtains. We saw girls going in there and also the waiter bringing drinks inside these rooms. But I don't believe that they did short-time in there, it seemed to me that the guys were sitting with a girl only, may be she did a private performance (topless / nude dance) for him. If you order a girl to your table you have to pay her a Lady's drink for 250P. But this is good for 30 minutes only. Then they charge you 130P per half an hour. You also can barfine the girl for 2,500P (everything included). Oh my God, is this a Japanese place?? ;-(( I did not check if the price is negotiable, because I had my "wife" with me. This time I was really happy to have Michelle. Otherwise I think I would have returned to the hotel alone.
The next day we took the aircon bus to Davao. They have only old buses and the road is not in the best shape. 10 hours in this fucking bus. For Michelle it was an easy ride: she put her head on my lap and was sleeping most of the time. There is not much to see anyhow. In P.I. cities in the province do all look near the same.
In terms of area, Davao is one of the biggest cities in the world. But people don't live "highly packed" like in other metropolitan areas. We find a nice hotel room with a/c and TV in the center of the city. They even give "centennial discount" so that we pay only 385 P. We are rather tired from the bus trip, so we just have a short dinner and then go to bed early. The next day Michelle wants to visit her family alone, so I have some hours off. Time for TSM activities? Well, Michelle did very good to me every day, so I am mot unhappy to get a little rest. I have no VIAGRA yet!! ;-)).
I do a walk in the city, find an Internet cafe and everywhere friendly people. Most of the time I am the only foreigner. I notice that people look at me, they say "Hi Joe" (for them every white guy must be American!) and some girls give me a smile. If you like dark women, Mindanao is a good place. In a nice park I see chess players, it's the playground of the chess club of Davao. I do some games with the guys, but they are so experienced (they play about 50 games per day!), so that I have no chance to win against them. One of the chess players asks me if I am interested in a girl (I tell him that I am married already). May be other TSM members will check these opportunities to find a non-pro companion in Davao. During my stay I did not check go-go bars in Davao (there seem to be some activities in the Square Circle which is in the north east, outside the center), but I saw some street hookers hanging around the Apo View Hotel.
In the evening Michelle came back from her family. She was not alone, but brought her 14 year old cousin. A nice girl, a bit shy, but very beautiful (I'll keep her in mind and come back in 4 years!). We had dinner together and went back to the hotel. I asked Michelle, when she would bring her cousin back to the family. "Why? Is there a problem, if she stays in our room?" I was a bit shocked. Michelle expected her cousin to sleep in the second bed while we would sleep together in the first bed and possibly make love. May be some guys will dream of a situation like this, but I felt extremely uncomfortable. I remember stories from Manila where foreigners got into deep trouble with the police when they were found with an underage girl in a hotel room, regardless if there was a second adult girl or not. Therefore I paid a second room for the young girl. (Comments welcome!)
She did not understand the situation, but was not unhappy to be able to watch TV until early morning...
The next morning Michelle wanted me to visit her family. I had warned her up front that my appearance there might lead to some misunderstandings, because I am not thinking about marrying her. She said "no problem", "officially" I am a friend of her boss, and she is my tour guide only. That's what she has told her parents. So I agreed to have a look at her home. Of course, I was keen to see the place where she grew up and under what conditions a typical Filipino family in the province lives.
From Davao bus terminal we had to drive about 1h by bus and another 15 minutes by jeepney. We came to a small village in the countryside with bamboo huts and a small Sari-Sari store. The road stopped here, but Michelle said, this is not the place, we have to go further into the forest. She asked a motorbike to bring us about 3 miles up a small hill to her house. In the past I always laughed when I saw 4 or 5 Filipinos on a motorbike and now it was me together with Michelle and her cousin (plus driver) on a motorbike. Without helmets, of course. The last quarter mile the trail was very slippery so that the motorbike stopped and we had to walk the last part. And here I saw her home: a simple bamboo hut deep in the forest, in the middle of nowhere. No electricity, no water supply, chicken and pigs running around, a horse nearby. She introduced me to her parents and relatives. They were all very friendly, however, they did not speak English, so that one of her nephews had to act as a translator. I had to shake a lot of hands, there lived about 25 people in two small huts. It was a warm atmosphere and even we could not communicate directly, I felt comfortable and well accepted by her relatives.
Then we had lunch "together", should better say in sections, they did not have enough tables, seats and plates to eat all together at the same time. They offered me pancit bihon (=noodles and vegetable), rice, pork, fruits (Michelle had bought some stuff the day before). Michelle likes to eat fruit and she ask me to try local fruits like Rambotan (I tried it first time, it tastes great, it's very sweet! It has become a must now!), Jackfruit and others (I forgot the name). Unfortunately I just missed the Durian season, which ends in April. Also my favorite fruit which is Lanzones could not be found. After lunch I did some pictures and we went back to the village I mentioned before. Unfortunately it started to rain so that we could not take a motorbike but had to walk the whole way. The were not happy about this and rather astonished I did not complain. I even enjoyed the walk in the rain! When we arrived at the highway we managed to stop an Aircon bus to Davao (there was no official bus stop there, but the driver obviously had a golden heart when he saw us standing in the heavy rain!).
The next days we were rather lazy, in the evening we found some nice music bars where we enjoyed live music. It always amazes me that there are so many good music performers in P.I. It's a pity that they are not internationally known. In a Pizza restaurant two young were singing old Simon&Garfunkel songs. When I closed my eyes I imagined to hear the original stars live. Their imitation was perfect!!
My 4 week holiday was nearly over now and I wanted to spend the last days in AC. So we took the plane back to Manila (fortunately the PAL strike had only minor effects on domestic flights!) and from there the Victory Liner to Dau/Angeles.