Mahubay!

I spent the past week in the Philippines for spring break. I stayed with my friend Dana (who I taught with in Damascus) and her new husband, Mohammad. It was really fun catching up with her and getting to know him.

The trip got off to a bit of a rocky start. At the airport in Dhaka I was informed “Oh, madame…you never confirmed your reservation. You are on standby from Hong Kong to Manila.” He went on to tell me that I’d have to “take my chances at the gate in Hong Kong.” The fact that I had an e-ticket in my hand held no water. It was 2a.m. I was a little cranky, and still very stressed from a looooonnnngggg quarter at school.

So I called my travel agency’s “24 hour help line.” What that actually meant was 4 different people had cell phones. I woke them up. The first gentleman I woke up told me he couldn’t help me because he didn’t have a laptop or internet at home. So I called the 2nd number on the list. This gentleman was quite helpful and very patient with a very cranky Lee Ann. He checked the reservation and told me that everything was in order. He offered to talk to the ticketing agent.

The ticketing agent was awful. It soon became obvious that he was caught in a lie. His response to talking to my travel agent was “There are no rules about that. I don’t have to and will not talk to him.” THAT ticked me off. A ludicrous conversation ensued…lots of “no problem, no problem, madame.” At one point I said “Oh believe me, we’ve got a problem buddy boy.”

So then I talked to the senior ticketing agent. Nothing was resolved, but at least he was cordial and he did talk to my travel agent. Apparently the Hong Kong – Manila flight was overbooked. However I learned that there were 3 more flights that day. That’s really all the first ticketing guy had to tell me. By this point though I was really grumpy. The very nice travel agent let me vent for a while longer (grumpy Lee Ann on the phone while going through passport control did get me through much quicker though—I’ll have to remember to pretend to be having an angry phone moment the next time I’m in a long passport line). At the end of the call I did apologize to the nice travel agent. It wasn’t his fault that the plane was over-booked, or that I was sleepy.

Anyway, my flight to Hong Kong was delayed about 90 min. So I figured catching my connecting flight was a no-go. Then when I got off the plane, a Cathay Pacific person was holding a sign with my name on it. She was there to escort me to my connecting flight (good thing…HK airport is huge). She was a bit alarmed when she asked me for my boarding pass and I flatly told her “They wouldn’t give me one in Dhaka.” Not a big deal, we stopped and got a boarding pass. They were holding the plane for me. Actually, they were holding the plane for a lot of people. I think Dragon Air/ Cathay Pacific have more time issues than I do (hard to believe I know).

So I finally got to Manila with no further aggravations. In fact, the flight was half empty! It was not even overbooked! My bags didn’t make the plane of course. I was expecting that though. I was happily surprised to learn that the airline would deliver my suitcase to Dana’s apt. It was really nice to not have to come back to deal with customs. I did have to call them several times to remind them to deliver my bag, but that’s way better than going to the airport myself.

Ahhhh…finally relaxed in Manila. Dana and Mohammad took me to one of the mega-malls after dinner. We didn’t shop though, we went to the “bar court.” This was a big stretch of the mall with bars, cafes, and restaurants as far as the eye could see. I know I was staring with my mouth agape, possibly drooling. It was all so shiny and glam. There were bottles of beer, wine, and alcohol everywhere. I’ve been in Muslim countries for almost 6 years. You don’t see alcohol on display in the rare alcohol stores in Dhaka. You have to bring your own alcohol to most restaurants. It was mind-boggling to see so many people hanging out drinking, being served at outdoor tables.

The next day we headed to Mindoro Island, which is the closest island south of Manila. To get there we took a bus (for a VERY long time, traffic is generally bad, and made worse because of the San “Somebody” festival in one small town) and then a boat. In all it took about 8 hours to travel a very short distance.

But it was worth it once we got there. Dana’s friend Kenzo owns 2 houses there. We stayed in one. The house was right on the water, with a gorgeous view. It was easy enough to go to various beaches. One day we went snorkeling in a great place, “Coral Gardens.” I’ve only been snorkeling a couple of times, and never around coral. This was really cool. There were so many interesting things to look at that I forgot that I’m really bad at breathing through the snorkel thingy.

We also had 2 massage ladies come to the house. We debated about what the plural of masseuse is. Since I was with Dana, I insisted that it MUST be Masai! Does anyone know?

Alas, we had to leave the lovely beach and return to Manila. When we returned, Sheena (another person from my Damascus days) was waiting for us. During a girl’s night out I learned all the Damascus gossip, much of it about people I’ve never met. We toured the old Spanish city. Sadly, there was no sangria there. Happily, there were restaurants with yummy Spanish food and wine in other locales.

So what do I think about the Philippines? It was a perfect get-away from my somewhat conservative Muslim country. It reminded me a whole lot of NoVA, with some minor quirks. I guess the biggest quirk was seeing old white guys with young Filipina girls (as opposed to just the rich white guys out with young white girls in NoVA). It was a good vacation place (it would have been a great vacation place if I was into scuba). I don’t want to live there though.