First week in the Philippines

Ok, so to start this off, I am not promising anything as far as quality of writing or the ability to entertain you or to be able to get my thoughts and activity’s across to you through this. But, what mama wants’ she gets so here you have it. A blog by Will Iblings. So to start off for those of you who may not now, I am currently in one of 10 countries’ that I will be visiting throughout a 3 ½ month trip. The main thrust behind this trip was to spend Christmas with my sister and brother in law in Vietnam. But I thought since I am traveling over to Nam I might as well stop in the Philippines and visit my friend Jessica. I met Jessica at school in New Zealand last year and we made the plans then that I should visit her. So anyway, I am writing this as I am sitting in the Tokyo airport after a 11 hour flight from Seattle. I have about another 4 hours on a plane before I arrive in Manila, the capital of the Philippines.

So I guess I will start from the beginning. Leaving home was weird. I really didn’t feel like I was leaving for 3 months and don’t really know if it has hit me yet. It was a really good time to be home for the last little bit and have spent really good time with family. So leaving was kind of weird, I don’t know if I have seen enough people leave and have left enough people that it is really not that big of a deal for me but really, it wasn’t. It is such a cool thing to have a family that loves and encourages you (by this I mean loans me money for half the trip J ) to travel and have experiences. Like the fact that this Asian dude was just staring at me while walking past and I gave him the head nod and he gave me a big smile back. Traveling just puts you in situations and gives you opportunity to have amazing, funny, good, bad, hard times and everything in between. So anyway, leaving home was weird, the flight to here went well, long but well. It was during the day so I didn’t sleep at all; right now it is 5:45PM here and 1:45AM at home, so I will have a late night ahead of me. I watched some movies and read a bit, the great divorce is a very interesting book, and I’m looking forward to reading more. Saw the sunset as I was getting in here and so hoping to see the lights as I head out.

I think that I am going to try to sleep a bit this flight, then I will be sleeping about 4-5 hours tonight and leaving at 7AM tomorrow for a two hour drive on a bus to attend a college youth church camp thing. I really have no idea what it is or what it is going to look like but it is all good. I really don’t know how much I will add to this thing, I am honestly only writing this because I am bored as and wanted something to do while I charge my computer. So after today it might be more vague and uninformative but that means that I’m not bored and having a good time!

As I was talking to Jessica the other day she mentioned that the Philippines is a 3rd world country. I for some reason had never thought of this before and have never been to a 3rd world county. I really don’t know what to expect. She mentioned that a lot of times when we will be driving through the city there will be kids that will come up and beg for money or try to sell you food while you are stopped at lights. Something that I have not really had to deal with before. She also said that it is against the law to give these kids/people money because you don’t know what they will do with it, which makes sense. She said we could give them food if we want but that is about it. From what I have heard there is a pretty big difference between the rich and poor, either you have tons or you literally have nothing. Jessica said that here family is in the middle so it will be interesting to see how everything works and fits together when I get there, which is in about 5 hours. And speaking of that, my plane leaves in about 40 min so I am going to head out and get ready to go. So stoked to see the Short Philly!!!! Flip Ya!!
Christ in ALL.

So here we go, it is now Tuesday the 21th of October and I have some time to write some more. I guess I will just start where I left off before. I got on the plane from Tokyo and sat next to this older couple from North Carolina. We talked for a little bit which was nice since there was a light flickering in the cabin so we sat on the tarmac for almost an hour before we took off. Lame as. But we talked for a bit then I told them that I had been in New Zealand at a Bible school and they didn’t ask too many questions after that. It was kind of funny that they totally just shut down talking but it was ok. I watched some movies and got about an hour of sleep so that was helpful. So I got into Manila, I was so stoked for see jess and finally be done with traveling! I was walking to get off the plane and as soon as I stepped in to the jet way thing it hit me. The flipping humidity! It was crazy, hard to breath, hot as, just all around caught me off guard. I have never really experienced that before so it was a kind of crazy. Anyway I got my bag and for somebody to pic you up here you walk to a place that has a sign with the first letter of your last name. So that is how they find you and all that.

So since I was a little late Jess and her brother where there waiting for me. It was crazy, like I said before it felt like I wasn’t really leaving when I was at home but then seeing Jess it made it more real I guess. But so good to see the little Filipina! They texted their dad to come and pick us up and we drove back to her house. The driving here is pretty crazy, not a whole lot of lights more just whoever goes first goes first. I think dad would do well over here. If you want to cross a lane of traffic you just nudge your way out and the traffic from the side will stop and wait for you to get out of the way. There also are a lot of little motorcycles that have the mentality that if they can fit they are going to go. I have seen a few times where we are on a 4 lane road and there will be 6-7 lanes of traffic. Pretty crazy but pretty sweet as well. I probably won’t and wouldn’t want to drive but that is ok. We actually drove down a one way street the wrong way for a bit so that was pretty funny, Jessica’s dad was just like “hey, those guys are going the wrong way” then he realized that it was him so we turned to a side street. Got to jess’ house and went to sleep pretty soon after we got in.

So like I said I got about 5 hours of sleep then got up which was super easy with the jet leg and ate some breakfast and headed out to Jess’ church. There I met some of her pastors and a bunch of her friends that went on the camp thing with us; there were just fewer than 50 campers so it was not that big. The drive down was fun, everybody speaks English well just they wouldn’t use it if they were talking among themselves. But they were translating some of the songs they were singing into English so that was pretty funny. One Filipino joke is that when it is hard for them to do something or they don’t understand something they hold their nose and say they have a nose bleed. There is this one guy named Strong (no joke, if you translate his name it comes out “strong arm”) that the first thing he said to me was “um, h, hi oh my nose!” then held his nose and fell over. And every time I see him he does the same, it’s pretty funny. Anyway, the camp was good; I guess just your normal summer camp thing. I was good with the being tired until about 5-6 in the evening then I would just zone out. I figured out that I slept like 5 hours in about 50 hours so I had to recover from that and then get used to the time. So the camp went well, it was a really cool complex with a big pool and basketball court, exc.

It was kind of hard for me at first; I really didn’t like it that much the first day. I think that I was just really tired from traveling and I just didn’t want to interact with people and it seemed like they had to make an effort to talk to me. Which they were more than happy to do and so after the first day I got some sleep and had a really fun time. Then when we came back from that we ate dinner and then Jessica headed out for one of her friends debut (huge 18th birthday party) so I went with her brother to a benefit dinner for the breast cancer foundation that her mom is part of. It was in this big tent and you would walk around the edges and there were many different booths with different kinds of food or desert that you could buy. Then a part of the proceeds go to breast cancer research. I mostly just sat at a table by myself because Jessica’ mom was working and her brother was part of a choir thing that was singing for the benefit. Jessica and her brother both have really good voices so it was fun to be able to hair her brother.

One funny story from that night is that I was sitting there by myself just drinking my sprite and this lady next to me started talking to me about New Zealand, she had seen my necklace and she had been there so we were just talking about traveling and stuff like that. She was maybe like mid 40s or something and she was with 3 other ladies of which 2 of the other lady’s were around the same age and one was maybe late 20s. Anyway at one point after we had been talking for a bit she and her friend decided to go out for a smoke. But when they were heading out they kept asking me to go out and smoke with them and acted all sad that I was just going to stay and sit inside. So I don’t know if they were trying to pick me up or just wanted somebody to smoke with but I thought it was pretty funny either way. So the next day I slept in and we just hung around the house all day. Jess’ house is a really nice house, it is not that big as far as area covered but it is 5 stories high so it is a good size place. I have my own room and bathroom so that has been nice. All the rooms are air-conditioning hard core to battle the heat and humidity which is a really nice break from outside!

The next few days have been spent mostly going to malls and stuff of that nature. This area of Manila has a lot of mall in it so I got a new pair of flip flops and we just have been walking around in them. Yesterday we went to the Mall of Asia, one of the biggest malls in Asia I guess and I would believe it! That thing was huge! We got dropped off at the train station and took a train for a bit and then got in a jeep. A jeep is a like a little bus taxi type thing, it is smaller than a bus and it is one of the cheapest way’s to get around the city. They just have an open door in the back so you call them down and then you just jump in the back and there are rows of seats on either side. So then you wait until you cram as many in side and sometimes outside as you can and then we headed off. They wanted me to experience public transportation so that is one reason we did it how we did. It was pretty crazy but I thought it was pretty fun. The way home the train was packed crazy tight. Jess and I had a seat but her brother was standing and then to get out at our stop you just pushed your way through saying excuse me.

I lost my webcam I guess sometime on the planes so I ended up buying a new one. Also at the camp that I was at my camera wouldn’t turn on and when I put new batteries in it the light came on to say it has power but nothing on the LCD screen. So that is really not fun because I don’t really have a way to take pictures. Jessica has her camera but it is annoying to have to ask to use hers all the time. But I sent that away and they should be able to fix it for around P2000 (roughly $40) so I hope that work well and that I can get that back pretty soon. Anyway, that brings it up to today, October 22, 2008.

Today we went to an eco park and walked around there for a bit. Not to sound like a pansy but there was some pretty sweet as flowers and there was a lake and stuff like that. We hung around there for a bit then headed back towards home. We stopped at the UP (University of Philippines) campus and walked around a little bit. Then we went to a museum /memorial for the first president of the Philippines. The President was named Manuel Quezon. After that Jess and I went to a mall and grabbed some lunch and ended up going and seeing a movie. Then came home via a FX, which is like a bronco type car that they fit as maney people into as they can and us it as a taxi, then ate some fish and some random kind of bean soup. It's good stuff.

Anyway, I am doing good, liking it here and having a blast hanging out with Jess. Trying to learn some of the language and get used to the heat. Still kind of tired but that is something I can deal with. I need to make sure to get up and make time to read and have a time with God. Could be hard as I will be busy but is something I need to do. OK, enough for now,
Christ in ALL.
Will