I was back home in Manila just over a year ago around Christmas time. Now, I’m back here for more punishment. My memory of my previous stay was not the most pleasant. I was actually surprised at how much better it is to visit Manila outside of the Christmas season. Reasons? Less traffic, less crowding and less heat.

I couldn’t believe that it is less hotter here in September than it was the last time I was here in December two years past. I suppose it’s due to the rainy weather. It’s still rainy season, after all. Thankfully, it hasn’t actually rained much since we’ve arrived. I never had the need to bring out my umbrella from my bag.

Although it may be heaps cooler right now than previously, I still found myself sweating. A lot. Heaps! I couldn’t stop sweating the moment I step out into the open, beyond the range of cool air-conditioned air. Trying to keep myself dry with a help of a hand towel was like trying to bail out water from a sinking boat. I’m not sure where all that water is coming from, actually. It’s really a bit much.

When I’m finally back in the comfort of an air-conditioned area, it takes a while for me to stop perspiring. In the end, I still end up with a wet shirt, wet hair and sticky skin. Disgusting, I know. But that’s how it is since my arrival in Manila a few days ago.

Whenever I’m in shops, the security guards (for you non-Filipinos reading this, there are security personnel for mostly every shop) would look at me suspiciously. I don’t blame them. I look like I was guilty of something the way I was perspiring profusely.

Raquel found it funny that we came across some people who were wearing jumpers and jackets in this warm weather. It wasn’t even remotely cold outside! Even at night. I must have been away from Manila for far too long. I remember my previous American employers complaining about the same thing. And now we’re the ones doing the complaining.

I was hoping that these sweating episodes would last a maximum of four days. But it’s day six now and I’ve only started to adjust to the humidity and heat. That’s a bit of good news, I guess. I don’t feel the need to change my shirt yet.

In the meantime, I’ll probably continue to take refuge at air-conditioned malls and hotel lobbies until I finally stop melting in this humid place I call home. The only things that make this trip worthwhile was that I get to be with family, relatives and long-time friends again. And probably the chance to do some inexpensive book shopping. If not for these, I’d rather be back in good old Melbourne.

I was originally planning on writing a complete travelogue of our trip to the Philippines last Christmas season. After giving it more thought, I decided to just retell the more interesting events and curious aspects of our vacation instead. This way, I wouldn’t be too overwhelmed by the task of writing about our trip. So, here, I’ll talk about our three-day vacation in Bohol.

When we were still living in Manila, we’ve never really ventured too far from Manila. The farthest I’ve been to was Cebu and I did that only once because my Dad used to work in Cebu. In Luzon, the farthest I’ve been was Lucena, Quezon to visit my Tito Pogi’s (aka Teddy) family there. Anyway, Raquel and I wanted to a beautiful and interesting tourist spot in the Philippines that is far from Manila and isn’t Baguio.

The choice came down to the Sagada hanging cemetery or Bohol with its Tarsier and Chocolate Hills. We opted for the latter. I thought I’d rather see the beach, wonderful unique-looking hills and the smallest primate in the world than see a bunch of vandalised coffins hanging from a cliff wall. Although, I was told that despite the vandalism, the hanging cemetery still looks cool. Still, I wanted the less depressing option.

We booked our flight from Manila to Tagbilaran City (Bohol’s capital) two days after our arrival in Manila from Melbourne. We wanted a couple of days in Manila to do some additional shopping for things we might need for our stay in Bohol. We also had our Australian Dollars exchanged for Philippine Peso so that we’d have some local currency to use when we get to Bohol.

Wanting to see the inside of the newer NAIA2 (the international and domestic airport apparently reserved only for Philippine Airline flights and its affiliates), we picked Philippine Airlines return flights. It was only at the airport after my parents dropped us off that I realised that we have forgotten to bring a few things with us. We didn’t have our usual identification cards, for example. Fortunately, I still had my Victorian drivers licence with me while Raquel only had a very old ID from when she was still working in Makati (and still single) and a credit card that showed her new surname. Still, the guard at the airport entrance and the check-in personnel both let us through to the terminal. Soon, we’re up in the air.

When the airplane captain announced that we were about to land, Raquel and I both looked out the tiny window of the airplane to see what Bohol was like from the outside. Right then I told Raquel that I wished we had booked for a longer stay than three days. It was beautiful. All the coconut and banana trees and few nipa huts. I love seeing scenery like that. Anything that takes me back to when I was younger while visiting the provinces.

Then the plane landed. We stepped out on to the tarmac. We were at the Tagbilaran airport. However, to my surprise, it was just a relatively small building. It reminded me of a busy bus terminal near Pasay City except smaller. I guess I shouldn’t have been at all surprised. It was a small town after all.

When we walked out of the airport building, we were suddenly approached by this mob of shouting people carrying signs with names of hotels, resorts and people. They were all drivers looking to get passangers. Coming from Manila, I wasn’t at all sure if we could trust these supposed drivers at all. I was fully expecting these people to rip us off. I wanted to take a taxi with a proper meter on it but unfortunately, according to the airport guard, those come in rarely to the airport.

Since we probably wouldn’t be able to get a legit taxi, we sought out a driver that could take us to our hotel, the Alona Palm Beach Resort. The other drivers were at least kind enough to point out the guy who supposedly services our hotel.

The driver, Bong, greeted us and directed us to his car. It was a white sedan that had no special markings to distinguish it from any other private vehicle. When I got in, there wasn’t an identification card hanging from the rear view mirror neither. That got me a little anxious, to be honest. We only have Bong’s word that he works for Alona Palm Beach Resort at that point. While on the road, he called up his office to confirm that we are heading for the hotel. That certainly help lessen my anxiety about our situation. He also loved telling jokes and that helped, too.

During the trip to the hotel, I noticed how the roadside slowly became less and less uninhabited. First there were buildings then next there were just nipa huts and old houses made of wood in view. For a moment, I feared that we were going to be abducted and held for ransom or something. Well, thank God it was just me being a worrywart because soon, we were pulling into the resort driveway.

Apparently, we were too early having gotten there at about 10 AM. The room we had booked won’t be ready until 2 PM. In the meantime, we were supposed to just hang around the lobby while we wait for our room to be vacated and cleaned. That’s a four hour wait that we would rather not waste sitting around. We left our bags with reception and then we headed straight for the beach with the intent to explore the surroundings.

Near the beach, we noticed a groundskeeper eyeing us from afar while he was sweeping the ground. Actually, he pretended not to be looking but I caught him several times eyeing us. He was slowly sweeping towards our direction until he was only a few feet away from us. He stopped, looked around suspiciously, then looked at us.

“Uh-oh,” I thought. This could be trouble.

He continued with his sweeping then said, “Psst! Sir. Do you want a boat ride to Balicasag (island)? Only P1,200, sir.” For a moment there, I thought he was going to offer us something illegal. But then, maybe offering hotel customers boat rides on the side was something that wasn’t allowed for him to do which would explain his suspicious behaviour.

“Sorry, but we don’t have a lot of money with us,” I said. And that was the truth, too. We stupidly left behind the our local cash in Manila.

“Ah, ok. How about P1,000, sir?” he asked. Although we weren’t haggling with him, it was an interesting offer nonetheless. Either way, we were telling him the truth. We didn’t have a lot of money and we would rather spend that on the tour the next day. We had contracted Bong the driver to show us the sights the next day for only P2,000. That’s actually cheap since there were only the two of us and we have him booked for the whole day.

We said no again to the groundskeeper and continued to follow the path along the beach. From where we were, the path seemed to go through a bunch of nipa huts. We followed the path wanting to explore what was beyond the huts when a couple of ladies dressed in a white coat and white pants intercepted us. What was it now, I wondered.

“Sir, do you like a shiatsu massage?” one of the lady asked. If we were just going to be fending off people left and right as we walk the path, we might as well just head back to the hotel. And that’s what we did.

We ate lunch at the hotel restaurant (which was a bit expensive but, hey, it’s a hotel) then just sat at the reception area to wait for our room. It was warm and we were tired. I couldn’t help but fall asleep right there. I must’ve been snoring loudly or otherwise embarassing the hotel personnel there because we were informed at about 12 noon that our room was finally ready. Yes!

The room was spacious and gorgeous. And, most imporantly, it had airconditioning. We just spent the rest of the afternoon holed up in that room. We only came out again after dark for dinner. Again, we had our dinner at the hotel restaurant but this time, it was by the swimming pool. It was a romantic ambiance with the pool glowing blue while Christmas lights where hung from the coconut trees. The food we ordered was actually delicious but still quite expensive.

When we finished our meal, we decided to try walking around the beach again. I was hoping that since it was already dark, there wouldn’t be a lot of people who would be hassling us. I was right. We were able to go past the nipa huts without anybody trying to sell us something. And what lay beyond the nipa huts were more resorts!

As it turned out, there were a lot of resorts along Alona beach and Alona Palm was just the farthest one. So, when we walked along the beach, we were able to see what the other resorts were like. All of them had this barrio fiesta feel to them. There were bands playing, people grilling seafood and having drinks or simply enjoying the atmosphere. We then realised that we could’ve saved some money if we had eaten our lunch and dinner in one of the restaurants along the beach. Darn.

At least, we also found out that there was an information centre along the beach where we could access the Internet and have our Australian dollars exchanged for Pesos. And we also learned that there was a cheaper place where we could have dinner next time.

After spending a couple of hours by the beach, we returned to the hotel. We don’t want to tire ourselves too much because we’re supposed to get up early the next day for the whole day tour with Bong. I’ll just continue the story in another post.

We’ve been busy these past weeks with work, chores and general everyday living that we’ve been neglecting some of our more leisurely pursuits, this blog included. Hubby has been planning a detailed post about our Bohol trip but he’s just too occupied with other things at the moment that he hasn’t gotten around to it yet. Man, you should really hear him talk about our adventures, or maybe misadventures; it’ll give new meaning to the words impassioned story telling!

Anyway, next best still is to see the photos we’ve taken during said trip. Note that you’d have to have a SnapFish account to view the entire album.

Yes, we’re back in good old Melbourne and loving it. We’ve actually been back since Monday but four days onward I’m still feeling a bit sluggish. Our three-week vacation over the holidays in the Philippines was okay even though it didn’t exactly meet my extremely high expectations.

Let me explain. I left for Australia in November of 2000 and I haven’t spent Christmas in the Philippines since the last one. That’s six Christmases spent abroad. I have very fond memories of Christmas and New Year’s Eve growing up. Whenever the Christmas season rolled in, I would look back on those fond memories and think of how I’m missing out on all the fun.

And so, I was very excited to spend Christmas at home again after all this time. My expectations were unrealistically high, in fact. I guess, in retrospect, I was just setting myself up for some bit of disappointment. It’s like I’m expecting that this recent Christmas should match or trump the best ever memories I have of past Christmases. Not to say that the recent holiday season was bad, though. It just didn’t feel more fun than past ones.

Maybe it was because there weren’t as many street light decorations as before. Maybe because not all of my closest relatives were in the Philippines to celebrate the holidays with us. Maybe I’ve just grown too old for it all. Or maybe, I unrealistically wanted a recreation of a cherished memory of Christmas and didn’t get it.

However, I still loved that fact that I was able to spend the holidays with my Dad, Mom and little brother (who isn’t all that little anymore). I missed them being away from home for so long and I was glad to have been able to spend those few precious days under the same roof with them again.

Although my overall trip home had been somewhat stressful and had not meet my great expectations, I was still glad to have spent some time with my family again.

I’ll write up the more interesting experiences we had during our vacation in later posts. And thanks to everybody who had wished us well on our trip.

We’re going back to the Philippines for a much anticipated vacation in December and thinking that it may be a good time to visit some of the country’s tourist attractions as well, I originally set my sights on a 2 day/3 night stay somewhere in Palawan. However, the idea didn’t sit well with hubby, who wanted to go somewhere where there are more things to do and see than swimming and sun baking on the beach.

He wanted to see the tarsiers and the chocolate hills in Tagbilaran, Bohol and since its nearby island of Panglao is dotted with beach resorts as well, we thought it the best compromise for a travel destination. Knowing nothing about where to stay in Bohol, I lurked at Filipino forums PinoyExchange and Female Network for some ideas. Both have good threads on Bohol accomodations, tours and travel agencies.

Thinking that getting room, tour and airline ticket rates in this day and age of the internet would make everything a cinch, I emailed some travel agencies in the Philippines and even filled out online forms to ask for information. Things I’ve learned from this experience are:

1. Most of the travel agencies and resorts never reply to emails.
2. People who answer the email don’t read it properly or try to understand it. When I say I’d be needing a room for a couple, I didn’t expect the person to come right back and ask, how many people?
3. Information is given piecemeal. If you ask for prices, that’s all you get. People who answer the emails won’t even qualify what the prices quoted is for (Is it per night per person? For the whole stay for all people? What are the inclusions?) Several exchanges of email would be required just to clarify these things.
4. Some travel agencies push customers into choosing a particular resort. For example, I asked for room rates to two resorts and the agent said that the first one is good, then proceeded to give quotes. No mention of the second resort at all. Maybe because the first one is a bit more expensive, I don’t know.
5. Some resorts quote their prices in US Dollars and nothing else. This one really irked me, why the hell would the prices be in US dollars when you’re in the Philippines operating a local business?!? This practice reeks of elitism and exclusivism. Owners are sending the message that your Philippine peso (or any other currency for that matter) is not as good as the US dollar. I glanced at their price list once and looked elsewhere.
6. Other resorts have a different price list for Filipinos and another for foreigners (yes, in US dollars!). In most cases, the prices for Filipinos are a bit cheaper than the ones quoted for non-locals. Although I understand that this is to encourage Pinoys to visit local attractions than go abroad, it also made me uncomfortable. Why the discrimination? Filipinos are proud of being a hospitable people but asking a foreign guest to pay premium price suggests otherwise.
7. I considered cutting costs by booking flights with smaller airline, Cebu Pacific, but changed my mind after reading MarketMan’s travel woes with them. With limited time to spend on holidays, I don’t think the cheaper price justifies shody service and lost time.

In the end, I booked our flight online with Philippine Airlines and if their online booking is to be believed, the booking is confirmed. As for accomodations, we went with Alona Palm through Accomline. It came out cheaper and hassle-free than if we went with any of the travel agencies who replied to my emails. Now the only thing to think about is organising the tour and finally getting there. Can’t wait!