December 24, 2008: First Contact

As it happened, Alma woke me at 8:15.  This was less upsetting than it might have been.  It's the Philippines, after all - I had no intention of sleeping in and missing everything.  (It then took me an hour to navigate the shower, in which the temperature fluctuated constantly between "ice cold" and "scaldingly hot," leaving a small window of usable water as it transitioned between the two.  It took me several days to realize that the problem was the temperature was turned up too high; once this was solved I could take a shower in relative peace.  Except for the fact that the shower window didn't close all the way and was open to the outside, and the staff would sometimes pass by it, leading me to duck quickly.)

Breakfast was pretty good - I tried a number of new things including bibingka (a slightly sweet cake made with rice flour) and puto bumbong (sweetened, glutinous rice wrapped in a banana leaf).  Not long thereafter, a tropical downpour started that trapped us in the house for most of the day.  We hung out and I displayed my "knowledge" of Tagalog for Alma's cousin.  Around 2 pm I attempted a catnap, but either I wasn't tired enough (though I felt pretty tired) or it was just too weird to sleep right then.  Alma wandered down around 2:15 anyway, as the rain had pretty much stopped and departure was imminent.  Finally a daytime look at the outside!

At first glance the Philippines looked reasonably similar to the US, at least in the urban areas.  The plethora of American brands - McDonald's, Starbucks, Krispy Kreme, Dunkin Donuts, KFC, etc. - helps this illusion, but the similarities mostly end on the surface.  I found this out when we went to the Greenhills Mall.  It turned out that we were taken first to what was actually a giant flea market.  There were hundreds if not thousands of people packed into the space, which was already so full of stalls selling mostly (if not entirely) counterfeit goods that you could barely turn around.  It didn't help that I was the only white person in the area (eventually it became less odd to see another one, but for the first day or two I barely saw any and felt extremely conspicuous as a result).  Alma, who doesn't like to tawad (bargain or haggle), wasn't much happier.  Eventually we made our way to the "real" mall, but by then we were hungry and just wanted to go eat.  But first I dealt with my first flare-up of CAS (Clueless American Syndrome).  I wandered into a bathroom in the mall, and when I came out, Alma was glaring at me and demanding I thank the janitors gathered near the entrance.  Even for a culture whose language has a word (po) that exists solely to indicate politeness or respect, this struck me as overly formal, but I offered a clumsy thanks.  As we walked away, Alma curtly informed me that I had walked into a pay bathroom (or "comfort room" as the Filipinos call them); the uniformed staff I had taken for janitors were actually fee collectors.  (As it happened, someone was standing in front of the apparently otherwise quite conspicuous sign indicating payment when I walked in, so I never saw it.)  The fee was pretty nominal (10 pesos, about 21 cents), and I didn't end up having to pay it (the fact that I so clearly was the clueless American probably bought me some slack), but it was pretty embarrassing.

We ended up having a late lunch at a place called Casa Reyes, which had good pork barbecue.  3-for-3 start to meals on the trip, an encouraging sign.  The rest of Christmas Eve was spent back at the house, where some relatives had come to visit.

Since we didn't exactly go anywhere picturesque on Christmas Eve, here's an abbreviated look around Alma's uncle's house.  This used to be a pool, but when use of it dropped off it was converted into a fish pond.  We actually ate tilapia pulled out of the pond at a couple of different meals.  The bedroom I was in (see below) was level with the pond, while the living room, dining room and kitchen were at the level of the balcony I'm taking this shot from.

A near-constant source of background noise in the living room was the waterfall (along with the two water bubbles) draining back into the pond.

Another look at the waterfall gadget.  The pipes running down bring water up from the pond, which then goes right back out into it.  The pond didn't always smell that great - I mean, it smelled like fish, after all - and so I kept the doors to my room closed as much as possible to keep it out.

The two "outside dogs," Bruno and Kim.  I never saw them anywhere but out in the yard (there was also an indoor dog, a yappy Chihuahua named Kulit).  We found out near the end of the trip that Kim was actually going to have Bruno's puppies within a few weeks, so I guess they made good use of their yard time.

One more look at the yard.  I called this photo "backyardinmanila.jpg," but actually it was out front of the house.  I'm a genius.

I spent a lot of time during the day on Christmas Eve stepping out onto this balcony (which was covered) to see if the rain was easing up.

My sleeping arrangements, a fold-out couch.  There was a nice steel rod conveniently positioned in the middle of my back, but I was able to angle myself in such a way that it wasn't as bad (I had to do that to keep my feet from going off the end of the bed anyway).  That's an enormous TV to the left.

This was the other feature of the room... a bar!  Clearly in days gone by this room was used primarily for entertaining, but most of the bottles looked pretty dusty.

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