The Land of a Thousand Straws

"Imagine crisp, oven-baked creamy crackers overflowing with the mouth-watering savory taste of corned beef!" The words call emphatically from the back of just one of the many treats in my Philippine Airlines in-flight snackbag (which I will not be eating) effectively giving me one more thing in my life I have been asked to imagine, that I will now have to go out of my way not to imagine. Nestling the "Blue Skies Corned Beef Flavored Crackers)" next to the Chicken-Flavor peanuts, I note that this flight is a somewhat somber occasion - it is the last flight I will be taking within the Philippines. Travelling is usually a curious thing - it's kind of like any of the forbidden things from a fantasy novel - once you've had a taste, you want more. This trip to The Philippines has been no exception.

I recall being slightly wary about this 7 week excursion, from the beginning, way back when it was in the hypothetical stage. The longest trip for me, ever, away from the States. Did I really want to spend nearly half of it in a place where, according to my parents and their friends, cab drivers team up with robbers, and drive you to a place out of the way, where their friends jump in the back of the cab and steal your watch at gunpoint? (Unless you're smart like me. I don't wear watches!) Where backpackers are kidnapped on a regular basis, in the remote north? Where pirates roam the waterways in salty phalanxes, free to satisfy their aquatic wanton desires, wherever one of the Philippines' ample tributaries flow??? Maybe a little exaggeration, but it seems to be that one can never exaggerate enough, when it comes to the Philippines.

Over the course of the past three weeks, I've scrawled a number of little notes to remember in my portable pocket moleskine, but have felt somewhat ashamed that I haven't really been able to take the time to sit down and inform my readers of the trip's progress. At this point, though, I'm actually happy typing, looking back on my experience as a whole, and reporting to you the impressions with which I am left. The biggest of which is simply that I am very excited for the next trip I get to take back to the Philippines, and that it happens (relatively) soon.

We've seen a lot - but regardless of how much I ignored everyone who, upon arriving, said, "You're here three months? No? Three weeks? That's not enough!" the fact is, and always has been, that three weeks in The Philippines is nothing. It's like when Charlie Bucket says he's eaten two Wonka bars, and his math/science teacher just assumes he's had two hundred, because it makes more sense (Where did that movie take place, anyways? It was like England or Europe, but all the protagonists were American? Whatever). There's just too many Wonka bars (things to experience in The Philippines) to have just two Wonka bars (three weeks). Stick with me here. It's late.

We've seen as much from north to south, as we have from top to bottom, hiking along the mountaintop rice terraces of Batad, to peering at ribbon eels 20 meters under the surface of the ocean. And it's been a wonderful, if somewhat superficial, look at the beautiful and complicated country that is the Philippines.

We started, like most trips here, by landing in Manila. Manila is dirty - cough-inducing exhaust permeates the atmosphere. Manila is hot. Manila is humid. The whole thing has a soporific effect which, coupled with the fact that the pollution pushes you indoors, warrants frequent napping - in and of itself not a bad thing, but I mean, we're in another country, here! These first three days really gave me a different perspective on the fact that Lucy lived here. Literally, in this very place we were staying. She spent 30 times as long as I would spend here in Malate, the red-light district, and I find it all the more amazing/impressive, after having spent some time here.

Some might say Manila is just another big city, but it really isn't. Having just come from Tokyo and Bangkok, I'd say Manila is like any other big city (somewhere in between Tokyo and Bangkok), with the exception of destinations. What was the first thing we did upon arriving, after checking in? We went where everyone goes to escape the heat: The Mall. Ah, the mall, that towering air-conditioned bastian of capitalist commerce. We watched Iron Man, which if you haven't seen it (and even if you have) blows Indiana Jones out of the water. Who'da thunk that the whiny romantic wus guy from Swingers would direct a better action hero movie that Steven flippin Spielberg?

Time Out: It's bedtime. We're headed to Hong Kong tomorrow, but more on the Phil's to come!