Day One

March 6 Travel/Arrival
The flights were very nice. Asiana Airlines is a first class operation. The 1.5 hour layover in Seoul was just the right amount of time and Seoul airport is a beautiful modern airport (it makes LAX look like third world).
Bo’s brother and wife meet us at the airport. Our first impression of Manila traffic was that it is chaotic. The most picturesque part of the traffic are the many very colorful jeepneys, which serve as minibuses that take people all over the metro Manila. Some of them are lavishly decorated with pictures, statuettes, embellishments, etc. The fare is only 7 pesos (about 15 cents). They are called jeepneys because originally they were converted American army jeeps.
Wojtek and Phoebe’s house is in a gated community. The gated community is large and not just homes. There are many shops within the community. The house is nice with all the conveniences we are used to. In addition to the nice modern kitchen there is a ”dirty” kitchen. We were told this is common here. This is a separate room behind the kitchen used for dirty tasks. It contains a sink, cooktop burners connected to propane, and a barbeque. The stove in the kitchen is modern electric but there are power outages so the gas one can be used as a back up.
After lunch our hosts took us into Manila where we toured the oldest part of the city called Intramuros with an old fortification which was also used during WWII. We also saw the Manila cathedral, which was originally built in the 16th century, but then destroyed and rebuilt several times so the current building is not that old (1953). The oldest (or one of) church in Manila is St. Augustine church, which we also visited. In the old town, there are many kalesas, horse driven carriages that are a popular way to visit attractions within the old city.
We then drove to a mall called Greenbelt in a modern business part of the city called Makate. Immense place with hundreds of stores and dozens of restaurants, both indoor and outside and lots of people, lights and music. The line to get into Chilli’s was long so we went to an Italian restaurant which was excellent. After 34 hours of travel we were happy to hit the sheets.