33

I thank the Lord for this unique birthday experience

12-1am- I welcomed the Chinese new year and my 33rd birthday on top of the Bund overlooking Shanghai's signature skyline. Caught in the middle of a conversation ( I didn't understand unless translated) with a few couchsurfers, two Americans, a Brit, a German and a Chinese guy. where everyone was speaking Chinese except the Chinese guy

1am-130am-Walked the streets of Shanghai, hanging out in convenience stores

130-2am-Ended up sharing a cab with a German guy (working in the aerospace industry-sounds like a rocket scientist) who lived two stations away from our hostel

2am-My heart skipped a beat when the taxi dropped me off in a street corner that was totally unfamiliar (the German guy supposed to have told him where to go), several scary moments later, we managed to figure out where we I need to go with the help of a map on my pocket. The driver turned out to be a nice guy who said ba-bay when I got off in front of my hostel.

2:30am-4am REM

4am-woke up

10am-got up
1030am- Got locked inside a toilet with a broken knob. The door ended up being opened by a guy (after my noisy pounding on the door) with only a towel wrapped around him

11am-spent our coldest day in Shanghai walking around the french concession looking for a park and what-nots

4pm-tasted my best Xiao Long Bao I tasted so far; my travel buddies treat for me

6pm-Went back to the hostel and packed. Said bye to Rock and Wood and the Uighurs in a restaurant down the street

820pm-took the maglev train for 8mins which covered 19 miles (biting pieces of a hard uighur bread I have grown to like)

9pm-Got approached by a bunch of guys to carry a letter to the Philippines (a most bizarre experience which capped this extraordinary day)

11pm-waiting for my flight to Pinas with only three Pinoys and the rest are Chinese in an ongoing diaspora during the Spring festival

Phew!

2012 baby!

Let’s start the year on a very positive note.

1. Jan 1 - Given another opportunity to speak in church

2. Jan 2 – Arriving in the office 30 minutes earlier after coming from Iloilo

3. Jan 3 - Being able to get the last seat on a flight I wanted to be in at 2% of its actual cost

4. Jan 4 – Hitting the pavement

5. Jan 5- Deepest sleep in recent memory after a fun fun night (was not able to wake up on my ringing alarm)

Thank you Lord.

August 6, 1945

On my last trip, one emotional moment is seeing the A-bomb dome and going around the peace park in Hiroshima. While walking around, we met the son of a Hiroshima survivor. He shared his blog to me which features his mom's memoirs. As a reminder to us all, we should be thankful we live in generally peaceful times.

http://blogs.yahoo.co.jp/mitokosei/26522134.html

Back to the Future

First and foremost, I thank the Lord for this wonderful blessing of being able to travel again. I was able to go back to a place I have come to love, the land of the rising sun...a land of friendly trendy fashionable people, a land of uber- expensive train rides (220 yen for 15 min 6 station away ride and 2400 yen for a one hour bus ride), a land of a lot of elderly citizens, a land of the shinkansens, a land of the most vending machines, a land of sushi and ramen, Nippon.

man walking his dogs in Mino Park, Osaka

It is also a land recently struck by a horrifying catastrophe that only affirmed the tenacity and dignity of its people.

Landing in KIX again almost brought tears to my eyes. Maybe it is disbelief that I am able to step foot again on this place combined with a feeling of gratefulness for this blessing of being able to go back to Japan again.

Nippon for the second time around is sweeter like a wonderful melody to my heart, with koyo colors to highlight an already beautiful landscape.

This trip has so many highlights but I have to pick the top 10.

1. Staying in a minsyuku in Shirakawa-go, Gifu Prefecture

2. Onsen in Fuji-kawaguchiko and Shirakawa-go

3. Seeing the A-dome in Hiroshima almost made me cry

4. Seeing Fuji-san for the first time in Shizouka while riding the shinkansen

5. Hitch-hiking in Lake Kawaguchiko

6. Experiencing couchsurfing hospitality Nagoya and Kanazawa

7. Walking through the streets of traditional merchant houses in the old geisha district of Kanazawa (for me these streets are better than touristy ones in Kyoto and Takayama)

8. Most scenic train ride from Nagoya to Takayama (rivers amid wonderful koyo colors)

9. Walking on the sand dunes of Tottori

10. Enjoying the autumn colors from the top of the main tower of Osaka Castle

Oh, and one additional highlight is our attempt to capture Geishas and Maikos in action. However they walk so fast and try to avoid people as they transfer from one restaurant to another. So, all Anne and I, got were blurred pictures plus a pocket full of stories to tell of the experience.

Baler: Worth the Wait

My first trip to a local destination other than home, for this year reacquainted me with how crazy our bus terminals are. It made me realize how hopeless we are as a country in promoting tourism when we can't even follow a simple bus schedule and most of our bus terminals don't have decent queue systems.


Shing, Aileen and I got reserved tickets for 12mn bound for Aurora. We were at the bus terminal at 1045pm.

The queue system was chaotic to say the least. The passengers don't know where to wait since there is no designated waiting lounge. The system works like this, find a vacant space and wait there. The terminal was just one big parking space with buses coming from all directions. After numerous close brushes with huge buses and witnessing several outbursts from irate passengers, finally we got on the "Joy Bus" at 1am.

Well, as they say it is the journey not the destination. And this journey didn't start at a convenient note. So again, I invoked this adage, an adventure is an inconvenience rightly considered. And Baler, Aurora is worth all those little inconveniences.

Looking back, despite how we as a nation manage to mangle our sorry excuse for a system, we manage to fall through. For me, the beauty of our countryside is the saving grace each time. As if telling each visitor, hey it doesn't matter how inconvenienced you were going here but aint I worth the hassle?

Though our dear country may be a pain in the butt to navigate through, but it is worth all that once you get to know it better and see it beyond its inefficiencies. After all, who is going to promote it other than us and in order to promote it, we need to explore it first.

Circle of Life

We watched Lion King back in high school. My dormmates and I trooped to the Allegro Theater along J. M. Basa St. (those were the days when theaters were not in malls). I remember we all teared up when Mufasa died. We all sang with Simba, Timon and Pumbaa in Hakuna Matata. We fell in love with "Can You Feel The Love Tonight?" During our junior year, we (the Vanguards) sang Circle of Life in one contest. It was one of our more respectable finishes (3 of 4 I think).

So yes, Simba was a part of our high school. Lion King, along with Beauty and the Beast and Mulan are my top hand-drawn Disney movies. So when I learned that they were staging Lion King in Singapura. I've been wanting to go. But going there just to see it was impractical. So when an opportunity from my company, of a connecting flight presented itself via SG, I immediately took it.  I am so thankful for the opportunity to watch Lion King before its last roar on October 30. It is a wonderful blessing.  

The play's production design was astounding but the singing and dancing was not that impressive for me. Overall, it was a nice experience to relive a movie that reminds us of a problem-free philosophy. Hakuna Matata.

Bus Rides Gone Bad

Every time I go home I take a bus to my hometown of Ajuy, 87 kms from the city, a two-hour journey amidst verdant fields and stretches of hilly terrain overlooking the azure sea separating Panay from Negros island.


Steel and men.

I took my usual bus line home, Ceres. Yes, the goddess of agriculture. We were cruising along the national highway when the bus screeched. Our driver stepped on the brakes but not before the steel rods protruding from the truck in front us pierced our bus' windshield. Our bus windshield had cracks like the sun's rays. The conductor told the driver to chase after the truck driver. But I knew that our bus driver knew he was at fault. The truck with steel rods we was stationary when we hit it. The truck managed to get away.

But what ensued was three police stations visit in three different towns. What was usually a 1 hour and 45 min ride took 2 hours and 40 minutes.

Well, finally I made it home and once I am in the comforts of my home, I just managed a "nakabunggo ang ceres nga nasakyan ko, dugay dugay ang byahe"


Of drunk and unruly busmates

Going back to the city,fresh from my eventful ride two days before, I found myself on a packed bus with no conductor. The driver was also the conductor.

And for a seatmate, I got a drunk, rowdy guy who was talking #@a%$ the whole time saying if he was the conductor, things won't turn out this way. Add to that more passengers are getting on the already cramped bus. It was getting dark and the drunk guy's ramblings and endless taunts of the driver were getting on my nerves.

But a wake-upper in this story is when people started complaining about the bus' numerous stops to pick up passengers, the driver/conductor asked the complainants how would you feel if you were the one on the road trying to hail this "last trip" bus and it doesn't stop? At the point I had to agree with manong conductor, the best way to look at an incovenient situation is to see it from the perspective of the other party. So rather than bitch about it, I might as well just sit back and experience this misadventure.

As G. K. Chesterton said, an adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. And an inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered.