Vignettes of the World
There are two kinds of heritage dining. Proper heritage dining is to eat at a restaurant that comes with a long history. Its food, its story and its business are all part of the heritage, its value lies in the intangible qualities of the dining …
One thing that I have learned about the Philippines is that the information online is not always so reliable. I arrived at Mariveles finally and settled down in my hotel. I had lunch at Mang Inasal, which is a fast food chain. I had my …
In my first evening in the Peninsula, I learned that my phone was not equipped to install an eSIM, so I ran to the mall nearby to get a physical SIM set up. I had to catch an early bus to Bataan Province next morning and the phone had to be ready.
The Glorietta Mall was bling all around. Its vibes certainly rival any major American mall. In the early evening on a Sunday, crowds of people gathered at the mall, wiggling their way between the competitive aromas of food and the half-filled walkways amongst the well-lit storefronts.
When I was done getting my phone set up, I walked into what would be the most severe thunderstorm I experienced in this trip. I was amazed. Within less than half hour, the rain flooded the streets. Despite having an umbrella, I was soaked to the skin by simply walking on the well-paved streets of Makati District. This was the Philippines’ weather in its true colors.
I headed to the Pasay district for the bus terminus in the next morning, my first full day in the Philippines. The bus terminus in Pasay is the transportation hub where locals take intra-provincial buses. The City of Pasay lies south of Manila, and it is now mostly known for the Ninoy International Airport of Manila.
Perhaps it is no surprise that Pasay, which is nearby Makati, would be worlds apart from Makati in every perceivable way. A casual passerby would notice the working-class character of the city. In Pasay I saw the first jeepney in my life.
There is something strangely heartwarming and comical about the jeepney. It is no exaggeration to call it a “community rider” in the streets of Manila, where traffic jams are the fact of daily life. The jeepneys are built to just about the height of an adult sitting down. People are packed like sardines into the car to take up two full rows of cheap plastic-covered cushioned seats. When the passengers are all squished, one jeepney can easily take up 20-25 commuters at full capacity.
There is typically no closing door at the back, people hop on and hop off as the jeepneys make their rounds amidst the chaos of Manila life. The common jeepney now is two unlikely features in one. Its structure is like a long and hard steel box. It roars on the streets of Manila in a masculine fashion. But most jeepneys also come with bright colors — some have graffiti-like decorations. When you see them on the streets, they do not necessarily strike you as a “cheap” mode of transportation, but rather a hip mode of transportation, bold in character.
The jeepney is the national cultural and urban icon of the Philippines for a good reason. They used to be American-made military vehicles called the “Willy Jeep.” In the Philippines, nothing goes to waste. After the Second World War, the Filipino company Sarao Motors took over the maintenance and repair of the jeeps. They fulfilled the urgent needs of public transportation in the Philippines in the post war years.
As the jeepney became a popular mode of transportation, the same company lengthened the original Willy Jeep to become the jeepney that we see now. This modification sealed the jeepney’s place as a more agile mode of transport than the regular bus. Sarao Motors remains the key company that produces the jeepneys today.
As it turned out, I never had a chance to get on the jeepney in this trip, due to safety concern as one reason, but more so because it would have taken too much time and effort to learn how to do it (the fares, the schedules, the uncertainty of my routes, everything).
At the bus terminus I learned that the next bus to Mariveles would depart in an hour. I took a look around. A few humble establishments offered snacks and bottled drinks. Then there are some vendors selling some commoners’ food that I couldn’t name. Some looked like burgers with patties of unknown meat. Others were so novel to me that I could not tell if it was sweet or savory. Funny enough, it was the food hawkers there that told me the time of departure of the next bus. I was told that I would pay on the bus.
When I got on the bus, I was pleasantly surprised. It was a spacious coach that meets any proper tourist coach standard. It was clean, air conditioned, and the windows were lined with curtains.
The bus ride from Pasay to Mariveles turned out to take more than four hours because there were many stops on the way. On the bus I came across a phenomenon so long-lost in the memory lane that it was a familiar novelty — a bus conductor. He did his work the 20th century way as well, by punching holes and giving away paper bus ticket stubs.
In so many stops along the way, food vendors made their rounds on the coach to sell their food. They hopped on and off every so often. I was curious about these Filipino delicacies, but I dared not try.
Within half an hour I started seeing countryside scenery. I had left the urban reality of Manila. The countryside views were pleasant, and no different from the countryside views that I have seen in other Southeast Asian countries. I did not know what Mariveles would be like. I had some loose plans, but a lot had to be played by the ear because provincial Philippines was completely new to me, and information was not so readily available. “What an adventure,” I thought, and it turned out to be so as well.
Known endearingly as the Pen, the Peninsula Manila stands for much more than just a luxury hotel. Its history was inexplicably interwoven with that of Manila and the Philippines. My Rendezvous with the Peninsula Manila Here’s my confession: I was a squatter at the Pen …
I had a fabulous first trip to the Philippines. In fact, the experience was in the ranks of being miraculous, even as measured against my years of experience as a travel writer. “Hey, do you want to join me in Manila?” My friend was attending …
At the Skyline Hotel, there are a few staff that take turns doing different shifts in the day. The ladies bring their child with them to work sometimes. And I try to talk to the children, in whatever simple Vietnamese that I am able to speak.
Me: Toi la Helen (pointing at myself, then pointing at the child)
Mother: Gong Chai!
So this lovely child’s name is Gong Chai. He was doing his homework. A leftie, I see, and I was a leftie at his age too.
I went in and out of the hotel often, and the second time I saw him, his mother brought him lunch. It was rice in a tin box, with small pieces of meat. Judging from the color, the meat was cooked in soy. It was certainly not the heavenly morsels that I get at the Vietnamese restaurants, but it was good, simple, humble and motherly.
At that moment, I thought of my grandma and her food. Perhaps in an effort to tame the emotions that were welling within me, I pulled out another Vietnamese word that I gathered over the years. In the most dramatic, theatrical manner, I delivered the one word that suited the occasion, “ngon!!” (Delicious!)
The child looked at me like “huh” but her mother laughed. She was probably thinking, “why is she trying so hard?”
In the evening, around 8 or 9, I took my New Yorker and sat at the table outside to read a bit before bed. The lady was off duty then, about to get home. She was on the motorbike, and the child was seated at the back. I saw her carrying two big bags of soda cans with her.
Her shift was probably as long as half a day. At this hotel, the child encounters all sorts of foreigners, and this can be a part of his early education. He’d be quite accustomed to the idea that people look different, speak different languages, dress quite nicely, and some would be kind to him.
They didn’t see me, so I didn’t get to say goodbye. I watched them leave quietly, a mother with her precious child at the back on the motorbike, with two bags of soda cans hanging on the side, almost as tall as the child. They slowly disappeared into the lull of the night.
Seeing this, I said to myself, “that’s telling.”
I wondered about hope. What this last sight of the lady and her son suggests to me is that she would do what she could to earn just a few more bucks, for the sake of her child’s future. She has a proper job at the hotel already, but in her capacity as a hotel staff she comes across the opportunity for a minuscule more. And why not? The dignity that she has exhibited is in the fact that she allows her child to grow up having realistic views of the world, being exposed to the enormous gap between those who have plenty and those who don’t. Maybe he will be inspired to be more than his humble mother. Whether he becomes successful or not, he will appreciate the young days when he saw his mother hard at work, and taking the extra opportunity to provide for him. For he is her hope.
Surely, in the times that I have visited Vietnam, I always could see that the country has hope. At least in the urban areas, what I could observe is that the Vietnamese people are way beyond mere survival in their standard of living. Phu Quoc, being primarily a tourist location, bustles with the dynamics that sets the tone between those foreigners who spend money for fun and those locals that earn the same money for a chance to do more with life.
In this dynamics, the foreigners’ expectation of “what I am supposed to get with this much money” are the terms that govern the relationship. Having joined a couple of island tours in Phu Quoc, I must say that the Vietnamese people are very adept at handling challenging situations. I would not say that they are professional, for there are many scenes of chaos, and in so many ways things aren’t communicated adequately because of the language issue. But my experience has been that “no one is left behind,” even for me, this one lone fish in an ocean’s worth of tourists in the tours. When they see that someone awaits to be taken care of, they simply find the solution. They do not do so out of a sense of professionalism. They do so out of a sense of responsibility that likely comes from old-fashioned family values and socialist school education.
Hope is expressed in the way that people handle life and business, how they hustle for more and always strive to meet expectations. I seem to be able to see a common spirit behind the way that they manage their operations. They work in the belief that “with hard work I will get better in life.” They solicit opportunities with the mindset that “I am willing to do more for you tomorrow.” And that is how their hope is shown, in embracing the value of hard work. They do not question the expectation that has been shown to them. When the tourist demands something, they take it as a given that it is the standard to meet. Then they do what they have to do to satisfy the same. No attitude, no complaints, no arguments.
As you can see, I am roundly impressed by what I saw in Phu Quoc, beyond the beauty of its natural endowments. The airport certainly lived up to its notoriety for being wildly inefficient, but if you would tolerate just this one bit of extreme inconvenience, Phu Quoc is a wonderful alternative to other beach towns in Southeast Asia.
Phu Quoc is a beautiful island with countless beaches. Its tourism revolves around the beach towns that it builds to attract foreign tourists. Of course, for the sake of a holiday I could just stay in the “nice” parts of Phu Quoc and be wilfully …
One reason why I love traveling to Vietnam is that I love Vietnamese food. Every region of Vietnam has its own uniqueness being part of the full repertoire of Vietnamese delicacy. In Phu Quoc, seafood is the star of the show and I had one …
I was waiting for the driver to pick me up at the Dinh Cau Temple. In the open area outside the Dinh Cau Temple, I saw some snack vendors and I was curious. Besides that they were apparently sweet snacks, I had no idea what they were. I decided to get one.
This is the fifth time that I visit Vietnam and by now I have learned the names of my favorite foods, so I can order with ease. Other than that, I do not have much Vietnamese besides “hi” and “thank you.” But whenever I learn some new words I am quite eager to put it to use. So at that little street vendor, I asked, “how much?” in Vietnamese:
Me (pointing at snack): bao nhieu? (how much)
The vendor looked at me and I noticed he paused for a distinct moment, seemingly thinking.
Vendor: muoi lam nghin (15,000).
Only at that moment did I realize what silliness this is. I could ask “how much” but whatever the answer, I wasn’t going to understand. I have no Vietnamese numbers in my system.
So I proceeded to show him my phone on the calculator mode, and he ignored my gesture. He simply took out 15K and showed me how much it was (wasn’t this how it was always done before the phone age?)
I then figured, when I said “how much” in Vietnamese, his pause was likley that he was thinking, “OK, this lady clearly doesn’t speak Vietnamese, so do I reply in Vietnamese or just show her the money.” He took a leap of faith with me and said the price in Vietnamese.
And I failed to impress, obviously.
After this sweet treat, I went to another vendor, who was selling ice cream. Her ice cream comes with one cone and two scoops. I was intrigued by the tropical flavors. So I pointed at durian and mango.
My intention must have been lost in the shuffles of eager business objective and inadequate customer service. She handed me a cone with two scoops and before I could stop her, she gave me another cone with two more scoops. She had to have understood that I meant one scoop of mango and one scoop of durian in one cone, but she gave me two cones of one flavor each.
She saw the surprise on my face, but I gladly took over two cones and joked with the American man, who was approaching with curiosity, that the ice cream is so good that having two cones is a good idea. The lady gave me an extra cone (without ice cream) as a way to show that she was “sorry” about the “misunderstanding.” I gladly took over that cone as well.
That evening, I took out my Duolingo and started learning Vietnamese. I must know enough in the language to order my ice cream right.
It is no surprise that the Goddess of the Sea is the long-revered deity for the people of Phu Quoc. That is certainly the commonest worship in the coastal regions of southern China as well. I wanted to visit heritage and religious sites in the …