India - Jim Nov 30th

We arrived in India on Friday afternoon, still on antibiotics for the Typhoid but feeling well, and ready to explore a new country. After navigating the chaos at the airport we found ourselves in an ancient taxi winding our way from the SW corner of Delhi to the NW corner where we had a hotel reservation in a Tibetan refugee part of the city. Both we and the cab made it and within a few minutes we were in our pretty plush room, plush by my travel standards, it has an in room bathroom. We parked our stuff and went out for a walk to check out the immediate neighborhood, tiny lanes with stalls on one side and shops on the other full of people, shopping, strolling or just hanging out along the way enjoying a cup of tea with friends. When we got back to the hotel we decided to take a bit of a nap before dinner, the first thing either of us knew it was 10PM and we just wanted to sleep a bit more. The next morning we were up pretty early, had a great breakfast at the hotel, banana pancakes for Adam, toast and eggs for me, and headed off to spend the day, Saturday, in Delhi seeing the sights and museums, turns out it was local election day in Delhi and almost everything was closed for the day esp anything to do with the government so we walked a lot and saw the Indian version of the national mall, the Arch of India, kind of an Indian Arch de Triumph, at one end and the enormous Presidential Palace at the other end. Later we found a beautiful park that housed the tombs of some of the Mogul Emperors, think Taj Mahal on a slightly smaller scale. It was a great way to spend the afternoon especially the grounds which were beautifully landscaped and just a great place to hang out. Later, we walked across a few streets and into a local bazaar where we found a Kashmiri restaurant, the food was great but we really dont have much of an idea of what we ordered. From there it was back across Delhi by auto rickshaw, metro and petal rickshaw to our hotel and a fairly early night. Today, being Sunday and not election day the National Museum was opened and we spent over three hours going through its many rooms, after which we visited the largest mosque in India, the courtyard has enough room for 25,000 worshipers. While in the district surrounded by the mosque we had a lunch of street food which set us back a grand total of 66cents. We just arrived back in the area of our hotel and spotted a cypercafe and thought we would take a little time to update you on our happenings. Most of the day tomorrow we will spend in Delhi, in the evening, around 8PM we will board the 2nd class sleeper car of a train to begin the first leg of our trip to Nepal. More on that when we get there.

Reflections on the Philippines

Adam-November 27, 2008

So three weeks in the Philippines and I’ve formed some impressions and opinions, now they are quite strictly my impressions and I’ve seen a relatively small cross section of the Philippines (the Northern Luzon region), so they probably aren’t too valid but they are what they are. First, a few things that have jumped out at me during my stay here, starting with differences in the bathroom…or as it’s called here the comfort room (CR). Several of the houses we’ve visited had showers but they are never used. Instead every CR is equipped with a large plastic bucket (probably 10 gallons or so) and a scooper pail. The scooper pail is used to pour water over yourself and this is called taking a bath. I’m honestly not a huge fan I guess I’ll always be partial to showers but there are worse ways to bathe. Still on theme CR there have been certain areas we’ve visited that don’t like toilet seats. Its not that they break or the toilets don’t come with them because the seat is often sitting on the ground removed from the toilet. Alright done with the CR so let’s work backwards…food.

Food in the Philippines revolves around one thing and one thing only…rice. Every meal involves rice; in fact it seems that every Filipino home has an endless supply of cooked rice waiting to be eaten. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are pretty indistinguishable in the Philippines. Breakfast could be sautéed vegetables with some sort of meat while lunch might be fried eggs; the only think that can be depended on is rice will be present. Seafood is also very common and usually pretty salty. Most meals contain some sort of vegetable in a mystery sauce. I’ve yet to determine what exactly most of the mystery sauces are…but most of them pretty much taste the same. Bread in the Philippines exist as either a sweetened from of wonder bread, or some breakfast rolls sprinkled with sugar. Needless to say we steer clear of the bread. A few oddities and Filipino specialties worth mention, the first foremost being Balut Bolute is fertilized duck egg allowed to develop for a few weeks boiled and served. When you crack the egg open you suck out the soupy goodness at the top and then proceed to eat the rest. The chick is just developed enough that you can start making out what you’re eating, it’s actually quite tasty. Other Filipino specialties include a wide range of fruits you could only find in a tropical country (one of my favorites being Jack Fruit). Buko (coconut) pie is a classic desert, garlic peanuts, fried pork fat, and sticky rice wrapped in banana leaves are perennial bus favorites. Filipinos are also epic eaters, they are always eating and they eat a lot…but most of them are still skinny (this will probably change obesity rates are climbing and diabetes is a big problem here). Their fast food institution of choice is Jollibee, one of the most disgusting food experiences of my life. Any food that isn’t traditionally Filipino has a cup of sugar added to it…imagine sweet Mexican food???

Wandering though the Philippines is a little like wandering though cities that have been abandoned…if it weren’t for the millions of people. It seems like people have grand visions of things here and then forget after you build something you have to maintain it. This is true of just about everything (except maybe the shopping malls more on that later) from personal homes to government and corporate buildings. The skyscrapers which were pearly white when built have been turned a permanent shade of gray from massive amounts of particulate pollution and no regular cleanings. The walls of houses are chipped and badly in need of a little TLC. This condition seems to know no economic bounds. The insides of all the homes we’ve visited are very well kept and clean, but the outsides which were clearly nice when built have since fallen into disrepair. The one exception to this is the malls. The metro Manila area is full of malls sometimes with two right across the street from each other. The malls are always well kept, air conditioned (a big deal around here) and extremely popular. This seems to reflect the broad effort of the Filipino people to become more modern.

This trend towards modern can be seen everywhere, but at the same time it is resisted on the most basic levels. Kitchens are a prime example of this. Most families have a kitchen for looking at inside their homes, but all of the cooking gets done on burners outside the back of the house. The malls are springing up everywhere but people still do most of their actual shopping at local markets. Similar contradictions can be seen else where the fast food restaurants have guards with automatic rifles while the national museum has no guards. The female guards in the malls are seen wearing skirts and two-inch high heels while carrying pistols. On the subject of gender relations the president of the Philippines is a woman and the Philippines is well known as a place where woman can achieve on the same level which men can, but they still play a subordinate role on the home front. Corruption in politics is the standard, not the exception, senators and governors are renowned for having many wives (the male ones) and retiring to sprawling estates. The largest export of the Philippines is overseas workers. Over 10% of their GDP is brought in from Filipinos working over seas, many of these working in domestic service jobs. As with some other former Spanish colonies the catholic religion is an ever present force, statues of the Virgin Mary are common place and it seems religion worms its way into the strangest places (i.e. the picture of UN Day banner with 10 commandments right below). Over all, my time in the Philippines has been a wonderful experience, the people are great (except when they are trying to sell you something, every time you walk into a store prepare to be bombarded by at least three different people), and the culture and land is something very different from anywhere else I’ve visited. I’m excited to go explore India (and escape from the heat).

Pictures

Follow the yellow brick road

I'm Back: Jim, Monday, 11/24/08

Before I back up and tell some stories of our trip up north I should fill in a little more info re. Adam's last post, "We've got Typhoid". It seems that what I came down with on the bus ride from Banaue to Baguio was indeed Typhoid fever, confirmed by a blood test I took on Saturday and received the results of Sunday evening. I have an appointment to go back to the doctor today but in anticipation of the results of the test he told me which antibiotic to take if it was positive and since Adam had brought that very antibiotic with him we were able to start last night when we got the results without having to run to the drug store. We will pick up additional pills today when we go to the hospital for the doctor apt.
I got pretty feverish and weak on the bus ride from Banaue to Baguio and knew I had something, most probably some form of viral flu. As Adam has related I wasn't very social that first night in Bagio, I took some Tylenol and Ibuprofen to knock down the fever and body ache and went right to bed with water close at hand, because despite this being the cool mountains of the Philippines I was sweating profusely. The next few days I got through with the help of the above drugs, feeling a little better and then a little worse but never great. After a day and a half back at Bhabie's house, where we are staying in the Manila area, and still not feeling better I gave in to the pressure to go to the doctor. We checked around and found a good MD at a nearby hospital, went there, waited three hours for our turn, saw him, went downstairs for the lab work and returned home to wait for the results. The next morning Adam was feeling pretty good and decided to go into Manila to see more of the city and I remained at the house to try to get some work done around naps. Adam returned much earlier than I had expected and when I asked him why he said that he had started feeling worse and came home to rest. That was when I began to think that we might have something a little more serious than just a flu. When later Sunday afternoon we got the results of the blood test and started to laugh about having Typhoid we confirmed to Bhabie and family that we not only had Typhoid but were totally nuts. We'll let you know if there are any changes to the diagnosis later after having seen the doctor again today.

Now, I'll try to fill in a little bits of the story of our trip up north that Adam left out. First, the story of what Adam called "a little hike to Batad", maybe for him!!! Batad is a village in the Philippine province of Ifugao, the province that is home to most of the wood carvers that Weir Handmade works with, it is not on any road but it does have some of the most spectacular views of rice terraces in a province known for its spectacular views. To reach Batad we, Johnny, Reggie, Adam and I, first rode with Johnny (see Adam's cast of characters) in his truck for over an hour over bone jarring roads to a parking place at the end of the side road toward Batad. Then we were convinced to take the short cut trail rather than the long trail, at least for me this was a mistake. Imagine the steepest staircase possible, partially made up of slippery rocks, and going on for what seemed like forever. Adam claims it was only a kilometer, but what does he know. Of course, when we reached the top we discovered that we had only reached the beginning of the trail to the overlook where the best views were located, so off we went again, this time the trail was largely downhill and 4 or 5 km long, which, of course, meant that it would be uphill coming back. We arrived at the overlook, which was truly great, almost worth the work getting there, had a little lunch and rested a bit. Now we had several options, we could go down further, near the village at the bottom of the valley and terraces there was a waterfall to see, we could take in the view from where we were and rest a bit or we could start back. Adam and Reggie took the first option, they headed out right after lunch for the waterfall, Johnny decided to wait at the top for them to return and since I was the slowest of the group I waited until I saw Adam and Reggie about half way to the waterfall and I started back toward the top of the trail, at the head of the steep staircase. To my satisfaction I reached the top of the trail about 20 min before the rest of them caught up with me, I thought sure I was moving slow enough that they would catch me before I got there. All that was left at that point was to take the long way back to the truck, I insisted on this, and the bumpy drive back to Banaue for dinner and a sound sleep. I'm sure this was good training for our trekking in Nepal but I know I have a long way to go before I'll feel comfortable doing this for days in a row, though I'm not sure how this Philippine trek compares to the ones in Nepal, but we'll see soon.

I've also been left to tell the improbable story of our encounter with the Bontoc Police Dept. We boarded a Jeepney Tuesday morning in Banaue headed for the large town of Bontoc where we would transfer to a bus to our destination for the day the large mountain city of Baguio, during American colonial times the summer capitol of the Philippines. The trip was rather uneventful, the jeepney not very full and the view poor because of the cloudy, foggy weather. Toward the end of the trip three women, one of them with a little baby, got on the jeepney and we talked with them a little mostly answering questions about who we were, where we were going etc, etc. All pretty standard fare conversation for this kind of trip. When we arrived in Bontoc people got off here and there, we got off near where the buses to Baguio started their trips and went to wait for the next bus. We had been waiting for about 15min when the lady with the baby came running toward us yelling and crying, so much so that it was near impossible to make out what she was saying. She was looking for where the jeepney had gone because she had left a bag on it that she said contained money. We pointed her in the correct direction and she went running off, but within minutes she was back, she had found the jeepney and driver but no bag. By the time she came back the crowd waiting for the bus had grown to include a lady from the local mayor's office who told her that instead of begging all of us for help, which we really couldn't provide that she go to the nearby police dept, which she eventually did. A few minutes later the bus loaded up and was just pulling out when the police stopped it, boarded and asked us, and at least one other person who had been on the jeepney, if we would come to the police dept and allow them to search our bags. Since we had nothing to hide, except some very dirty, smelly and sweaty laundry we agreed. We unpacked our packs in the police dept office, much to their amusement at our less than organized and folded packing style, nothing incriminating was found and we were released to wait for the next bus. As we were pulling out of town on that bus we saw the other passengers from the jeepney and the driver as well as the lady and her baby leaving the police dept. I guess we will never know what happened, though neither of us can remember her having a bag on the jeepney. Maybe she left it where she got on or maybe it was a scam to try to get money from foreigners, we will never know.

We will be leaving the Philippines on Friday, it's hard to believe we've been here almost three weeks. It is also hard to believe how much work I have to do before I leave, so you may not here from me again till we get to India Friday afternoon. I will however try to get our pictures posted with a link before the end of the day. My fingers our tired of typing, so that's all for now.

Guess What?

We've got Typhoid!!!

The Super Long Post

Adam November 21, 2008

Cast of Characters:

Bahbi (pronounced Baby)—The woman we are staying with. Bahbi manages the woodcarving export business (known as JP Artcraft) in the Philippines.

Mavich—Babhi’s friend and accountant for JP Artcraft, and Screw King, grew up in a small town 30 mins south of Vigan City.

Screw King—Mavich’s friend and owner of a screw store, known as “The Screw King”, we never figured out her real name so we just call her Screw King.

Dale—Screw King’s driver

Mo-Moy—Jim’s good friend and supplier of carvings for JP Artcraft\

Vanjee—Mo-Moy’s wife.

Piaga—Sister of Mo-Moy, Mother of Susan and Louie, our hostess in Banaue

Jonny—Susan’s husband supplier of carvings for JP Artcraft

Susan—Piaga’s daughter, Jonny’s wife

Louie—Piaga’s daughter currently attending medical school in Baguio City, our hostess in Baguio City.

Preface: I have to apologize for the insanely long post I got a little carried away at the beginning and then got tired at the end so skimped on some details which Jim will fill in.

Back from the journey through North Luzon, and much to report. First things first since I have some down time while Jim is doing work and a computer I can use for free I made a little map of our trip…probably won’t ever happen again but everyone can enjoy it this time. The trip started out on Tuesday night with us pulling out of Mavich’s parking lot in a rather nice Isuzu Trooper accompanied by Bahbi, Mavich, and Screw King with Dale behind the wheel. How we ended up in the Trooper is no simple matter. Earlier in the week we had decided to visit Vigan city in order to obtain some pottery samples for a dealer that Jim and Paul met in SC. The whole ordeal started out with Babhi, Jim and I taking the bus there, when Mavich heard we were going she insisted on going with us, having her husband drive us, and us staying in her mother’s house. This was all well and good until Mavich’s husband had to go to the hospital with heart problems (he’s fine), so we were back to taking the bus. Enter Screw King, turns out Screw King has a car, a driver, and an urge to visit Vigan, so we agree to pay for the gas and were back to driving up. As I was saying we pulled out around 8pm (driving at night is preferable in the Philippines since traffic makes NYC look pleasant). Now we planned on a peaceful drive up to Vigan City, what we got was far from it. Jim and I affectionately refer to Dale as Dale because of the Dale Earnheart Jr. tee shirt he was wearing that night. As we began driving it became apparent that he thought he could drive like Dale Earnheart as he quickly accelerated to 150 kmph on single lane road weaving in and out of oncoming traffic. Our speeding Trooper Sent tricycle drivers (essentially dirt bikes with a side car attached) and pedestrians running for their lives while we had close encounters with oncoming busses. By some miracle we safely arrived in Mavich’s Mothers house at around 2am where in true Pilipino style we were quickly force-fed a snack and then shown to our rooms.

The next day we awoke and went for a short walk around the fields owned by Mavich’s family where we harvested some bananas and picked up a chicken to be butchered later. After our walk we proceeded to Vigan City, once again in the suicidal hands of Dale. In Vigan we had lunch and then Jim and I were shooed away by our Pilipino companions since our presence at the pottery would instantly increase the price. With our free time we walked around Vigan city, which features some of the only Spanish buildings, not destroyed during WWII or allowed to fall into completely disrepair. After a few hours we met our companions at Baluarte a so called wildlife preserve owned and operated by extremely corrupt Governor Chavit Signson. The tiger preserve was one of the more disturbing things we saw all the tigers were in cages with barely more than twice their body length to walk around in either direction, when we arrived the tigers were anxiously pacing back and forth. From there we returned to Mavich’s for dinner quickly followed by bed as we would be setting out at four the next morning.

The next day Jim and I were dropped off in Carmen to take the bus to Solano where we would meet Mo-Moy and his wife and go with them to their house in Lamut. Travelling took most of the day and once we arrived at Mo-Moy’s we took a short rest and then sat down to dinner. The following day we visited one of the two tree farms purchased and by JP Artcraft and reforested in order to help compensate for the trees cut for woodcarvings. The next day Jim and Mo-Moy discussed business and then we went by Jeepney (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeepney) to Banaue where we were warmly greeted by Piaga. During dinner Susan and Jonny came up (they live just next door and down a little) and we decided to go on a little hike to Batad the next day with Jonny and Regi (Piaga’s grandson). As for the hike to Batad I know that Jim wants to write about all the details so I’ll skip to the following day or November 17^th in case any one has lost track. On the 17^th Jim was still feeling good even after the hike so we decided to walk along the road to a view point above Banaue. At the top we stumbled into the Noah’s Ark Orphanage operated by a Canadian named Linda from the Canada Pentecostal Church. Linda showed us around the very impressive orphanage and then showed us a shortcut down.

On the 18^th we departed from Banaue via Jeepney heading to Bontoc and then to Baguio, this was the long way but we decided to take it for the scenery (which there was none since we were in clouds the whole time). In Bontoc we proceeded to find the bus to Baguio, unfortunately an encounter with the local Police delayed our journey…which you can read more about when Jim decides to post (I’m getting tired of typing). Despite our little hang up we successfully made it to Baguio where we were greeted by Louie and brought to a house shared by her and some number of cousins (we never really figured out who lived there). By this time Jim had suspected he was sick and a thermometer at Louie’s confirmed his suspicion. Jim ate a few spoonfuls of dinner and then promptly retired, I chatted with Efrin (one of Louie’s cousins) for a while and then watched the end of Made of Honor and the entire cartoon version of Balto (both of which were horrible). The next day Jim rested for awhile and then boosted by some Tylenol ventured out with Louie, another one of her cousins and I for lunch and a walk around Baguio. By that night I came down with the same thing as Jim (basically fever, and feeling bad, no cough or anything). The next morning (November 20^th), we got a bus back to Manila, and then returned to Bahbi’s in time for dinner. Phew sorry for writing so much hope everyone enjoys, we’ll be posting pictures in the near future.

Adam-11/10/2008

16 hours on a plane turns out to be a rather long time, especially sitting next to two young gentlemen who are trying to care for a baby. That being said the flight was not too bad. Our route took us over the North Pole, down over Russia, Mongolia, and finally over western China into Hong Kong. Neither Jim nor myself were seated near a window but we occasionally went to the back of the plane to look at the windows at the world below. We were fortunate to get some clear view of ice near the pole, desert in Mongolia, and mountains in China. The flight made me think about how large the world really is. Anyways enough with flying on to the Philippines.

Our first few days here have been spent taking care of business related things, trying to get sleep patterns normalized, and eating way too much food. I have enjoyed learning more about where all of the wooden carvings we know so well come from. Its has also been fascinating seeing the challenges of running a business which involves people from different cultures. We have yet to stray too far from the house we're staying at but tomorrow night we set out to Vigan in order to find a potter with red clay. After that its off to the mountains to visit with the carvers and see some more of the country. That's all for now more later.

Jim, November 5, 2008
I flew to New York City yesterday, election day, in preparation for leaving Thursday for the Philippines. Staying with my friends Shannon and Jamie was a great way to spend election night, especially when my choice for president, Barack Obama, won so strongly and graciously. This will save me a lot of explaining overseas. Today is a day off, there is nothing I have to do, which in many ways could be the definition of what a vacation should be like. So I walked uptown this morning to a store specializing in maps and travel books and stocked up on maps of India and Nepal. I didn't buy any for the Philippines as I lived there for four years back in the 60's and have been there frequently since. This afternoon my friend Adam will arrive in the city from Massachusetts and we will meet and split up the weight of the quide books I've collected over the past few months and weed out the ones we really dont need. Adam will stay at his sisters in the Brooklyn tonight and we'll meet around 7AM at Kennedy Airport in the morning for the first and longest outbound leg of the trip, New York to Hong Kong, 14 to 15 hours of discomfort in coach.