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Entry
60 - The Philippines: Manila, cocks, volcanos, stereotypes
Manila
thriller
Manila
is not much of a tourist destination. I knew this already, but hey,
you live in hope. I mean, Phnom Pen is associated mainly with brutal
genocide and mass graves, but nowadays it's a pretty pleasant place
to hang out with some cool bars. Anyhow, I got my first hint of quite
how far Manila is off the average tourist itinerary at Hong Kong Airport.
I'd
spent an uneventful flight from London enlivened only by the necking
of the couple next to me. This wasn't actually as bad as it sounds.
For starters, when they weren't playing tonsil hockey, they were actually
quite nice people. Plus, they were uncommonly good looking. He was tall
and rugged while she was like a rangier, more amazonian Winona Ryder
(this is good thing). When people are this pulchritudinous, you can
almost forgive their public canoodles.
Then
I changed flights. And, not only did I have the entire row to myself,
but I was one of three westerners on the plane. One was a youngish British
guy who was married to a Filippino. He was patronising his wife like
you couldn't believe, talking to her like an unpleasant father might
to a five year old. It looked like a mail order marriage that that desperately
needed to be returned to sender. The other was an American who got rather
upset about my putting my rucksack next to his laptop in the luggage
locker. So upset in fact that I felt obliged to tell him my bag was
full of porn and viruses.
Approaching
Manila and you start to see why people stay away. It even looks rich
in poverty and swampy even from the air. You come in over Laguna de
Bay, a lake on the south side, whose horrendous pollution (and fish
farms) are clearly visible from 6000 ft up. The whole place shrieks
'water and mosquito-borne diseases.' I'd also heard it was pretty dangerous,
with vicious knifings a local specialty.
Actually
it's not that awful: it's just a bit...well, there's no compelling reason
to be there. Like most Philippine cities, it looks like America would
if it was really poor. And not in a romantic sort of way either, just
rampant consumerism without much money. I was staying in an area which
was a bit Soho (London) might beif a a war had been fought there a decade
ago and no-one had really cleaned up.
My
hotel was OK. It had a Starbucks at the front of its garden for some
reason, but given the usual quality of coffee in these parts, this is
not the negative it might at first appear. Along with the decent-by-context
coffee it also boasted a gay local guy who fancied me. He told me I
was handsome. I thanked him and told him I was married. He grabbed my
arm and replied imploringly that 'this is the worst day of my life.'
It is an interesting - and, for me, entirely inexplicable - fact that
the two groups who find me most attractive are foreign swishes and women
over 45. This is my gift; I just wish I would re-wrap it and give it
to someone else. In the meantime, I might set up a coaching service
for bi-sexuals who fancy older women: 'No...say it like this...'
shock
of the cock
Having
slept off 60% of my jet lag, I woke for an early breakfast at a pleasant,
but surprisingly overpriced restaurant opposite the hotel. There I fell
into a lively conversation with the waiter about cockfighting, one of
the Filippino national sports. I think this may have been somewhat to
the the disgust of the British woman next to me, Valerie. This is, it's
OK to love someone's culture, just not the nasty bits they're really,
really into.
For
her sake, I passed this off as being interested "y'know, in the
cultural aspect of it, the fact that it's such an obsession here."
She seemed mollified by this excuse for my bloodthirstiness (and it's
only half a lie, I just happen to enjoy watching the sunday roast kick
its best mate to death, too) and we fell into conversation. She was
a granny who had sold her house and was spending her retirement travelling
- and quite impressively. She'd been all over the shop - depite a badly
athritic knee - and picked up a whole lab full of nasty tropical maladies.
Anyway,
having eloborately sketched directions to the local cock-pit, the waiter
told me that there were no cock-fights that day, so I went back to the
hotel and booked a car to the nearest volcano. On the way to my car,
I bumped into Valerie so I invited her along.
volcanic
Cotswolds
Although
the Taal volcano doesn't look like much on a map, situated as it is,
just beyond the southern fringes of Manila's endless sprawl, it's a
pretty casual geological formation in the flesh. The main crater - so
vast it doesn't look like a crater - has a huge lake it in it. In the
middle of the lake there is an island with the new volcano on it.
Scattered
all around this rather stunning, verdant vista are the blingin' weekend
retreats of Manila's wealthy elite. Money has certainly not bought them
taste, although it has bought them rather nice gardens. For all the
trashiness of their urban centres, Philippinos are great gardeners and
garden centres line the road, while tropical blooms scent the air. This,
combined with the gaudy architecture gives the whole a sort of Dallas
meets the Chelsea flower show feel. It's not disagreeable.
Having
lunched in Leslie's restuarnt on the rim (great view, great name), where
Valerie displayed an unexpected talent for puddings, we headed down
into the crater, where we hired a boat and struck out for the island.
Twenty drenched minutes later we were on its blackly volcanic beach.
It
is normal here to take horses up, but as a horse allergy sufferer, I
cannot. So I elected to walk, after having told my boatman for about
15 minutes that, no, I didn't want to give him more money to act as
a guide on a trail that was about as obvious as a motorway. I do believe
that, when in tourist spots, one should behave as a tourist. That is,
not find the pikiest possible way to do everything, a la Lonely Planet
- and put something back into the local economy. However, when someone
you've already paid (and fairly handsomely) starts whingeing at you
to accept a service you neither want nor need, you do feel the local
economy is taking the piss.
Perhaps
mindful of the gay chap from the night before, I decided to run up the
volcano in 34 degree heat to reinforce my manly credentials and self-perceptions.
It took half an hour and earned me a lot of odd looks, but no-one made
a pass at me -probably a little too sweaty and trashy. At the top, the
views across the lake are rather splendid (still no unwanted advances)
and you can also see another caldera and within it another lake, with
its own tiny island. This makes the small island..wait for it an island,
within a lake, within an island, within a lake, within an island (Luzon).
Somewhere in the US, they claim to have the highest order of this phenomenon,
but I think the Taal volcano may just have the edge in what is a rather
pointless set of geographic coincidences. I suppose to be really sure,
someone could dig a pond in the smallest island then chuck a rock in
the middle of it.
Somewhat
knackered and sporting a matching pair of blisters from my volcano running
I returned to Manila for my tenth sub-adequate meal, the Philippines
being the exception to SE Asia's normal great grub rule. Local stuff
is bad and so are the imports. This rough repast was a pizza of rather
egregious cheesiness at a place called Bar Havana. It was, I suppose
authentically Latin American inasmuch as their pizzas are awful, but
verisimilitude is not necessarily a good thing.
The waitress gave me a brief burst of excitement by greeting me with
'Hola Que tal?' Cool, I thought, someone who speaks Spanish, so I replied
"Muy bien chica, hablas espangnol, me tambien..." Before realising
that she habla'd only 'Hola, que tel;' because she worked at Bar Havana.
No hay mas parablas.
stereotype-u-like
No
matter - my meal was further enlivened by my table being being between
to other sets of foreigners, who, as it turned out were staying at my
hotel. I briefly thought there could be some conversation here, but
no. Proving that you should never underestimate how useful stereotyping
is, the two Germans behind me were reassuringly, inflexibly rude.
The
trio of Americans in front were rather more three dimensional than this,
being stupid, rude and loud. They also had a way of describing stuff
like they'd only just realised things could be like this, e.g. "Gee,
if people's parents aren't rich and they don't give them SUVs and Gold
Amexes they have to walk everywhere and clean the streets for a living.'
Well, I would love to think that the note of permanent surprise in these
borderline-retarded apercus was some sort of clever rhetorical device.
But, I fear these epiphanies were as genuine as they sounded. What it
is to be an moron - every day the shock of the not really new.
The
next day I cabbed out to Manila airport while my driver chatted about
the various nationalities. He told me that he too found that the abovementioned
stereotypes were a good guide. Rather charmingly the Philippines recieve
so few British tourists that he had yet to divine our national stereotype.
But he needn't worry...with San Miguel at 16p a bottle and cheap airlines
aplenty it's only a matter of time.
Then
we moved on to the Filippinos. I said that I found them very friendly;
this is true, they are probably the friendliest people on earth. He
agreed, adding that they were emotionally sensitive and romantic, to
a man. Was he romantic, I asked? Oh yes, he replied: he was 31 and had
eight kids.
departure
loungeing
Manila's
airport is no great cop (and the food is dreadful - a brie, ham and
jam (!) sandwich for breakfast) but it does have one notable innovation.
For a sliding scale starting at a fiver, they offer a pre-flight massage.
Well, I had twenty minutes to kill, so I scored a massage in the departure
lounge: it was friendly, emotional and senstive.
Then
it was time to leave. Fairwell Manila, it was, well, fair-to-poor. As
I left this most febrile of capitals behind, I was reminded of General
MacArthur's famous words, 'I shall return.' But only beacuse I really
have to.
June 4, 2004
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