Filipino Time
The Philippines.
Certain elements never change, yet each trip offers a different experience. The past weekend was no exception.
The trip was planned four months ago. Our flights and hotel were booked. Everything had been set when idiot rebels started bombing buses and buildings in Mindanao. Then they bombed shopping malls in Manila. Added to that fun was the threat of being kidnapped. When we checked with our friends, they told us security had been tightened throughout Manila, so we went.
Leaving the airport, we hailed a cab and got the first surprise of the trip. We were blessed with Alfredo, a driver who spoke fluent English, and was helpful and friendly. On the way to the hotel we noticed a woman holding a plastic bag filled with Coke. A straw poked out the top. Alfredo explained it was cheaper to buy that way. He was amused when I labeled it Coke-In-A-Bag.
Despite the chaos that is Manila traffic, we arrived at our hotel unscathed.
We stayed at the Discovery Suites in Pasig City, a brand new hotel in a newer business district. The staff waited on us hand and foot from the moment we arrived. The desk clerk escorted us to our room personally.
We were impressed. Normally, everything in the Philippines runs on Filipino Time, which means things get done whenever they get done.
We were shocked when we walked into the room. The suite was bigger than our flat. It had a full kitchen, a dining area and a lounge room along with the bedroom and bathroom. The bathroom was five times larger than ours. This was the nicest room we'd seen in the Philippines, far above the horror that was the YMCA in Makati City.
As we had time to buy groceries, we walked to the mall one block away. Since we were hungry and had no time to cook, we stopped at McDonald's.
A security guard stood inside the door. Why in the world would anyone want to bomb McDonald's? Yet there he was, checking bags and frisking people as they entered.
The security was a joke. As obvious foreigners, we were given a cursory glance and waved through. The bags the guards did check weren't searched well. I could have had wads of C4 taped to my legs and they'd never have known. We later learned this was the same mall where someone had been killed by a bomb a few days earlier. As we were already there, we decided to make the best of it.
Our next adventure came in the taxi ride to our first meeting. Manila is rife with beat-up vehicles disguised as taxis. We flagged down one such pail outside the hotel. The driver was clueless; we explained several times where we wanted to go, but his English was non-existent. A hotel security guard helped explain our destination, and we were off.
This was a ride to remember. A combination of crumbling, pot-holed roads and the car's destroyed shock absorption system gave us a great kidney-punching on the way to the venue. Thank God we didn't have full bladders: that would have been excrutiating.
Then the cabbie pulled one of my all-time favourite Filipino taxi-driver stunts. He pulled into a gas station and filled the tank (and added water to the radiator) while leaving both the engine and the meter running.
Don't get me wrong, an extra five pesos on the fare isn't going to kill me; it would equal about US 13 cents. But I don't like being taken advantage of, and I didn't want to die in the back seat of a crappy little cab in Quezon City, had the car exploded.
As we continued, we encountered heavy traffic, a word that, when said by our driver, came out as 'trappic'. When caught in a Manila trappic jam, avoid eye-contact with the people wandering in between cars hawking everything from cigarettes to newspapers.
Once we cleared the jam, we entered the university, with buildings scattered over a large, green area. Away from the noise and the clouds of toxic air, the university was an oasis.
The driver didn't know the area. At every street corner, he stopped, rolled down the passenger window and asked pedestrians for directions. He called it the Pilm Center.
Each time he drove over a speed bump, he stalled the engine. He apologised and said he'd only been driving for one week. In this case, I believed him.
The next day, we had the pleasure of riding in the back of a jeepney. It's incredible people use these to get around. The air was so bad we had to cover our mouths with handkerchiefs in a vain effort to filter the fumes.
The rest of the weekend passed with no major challenges and no explosions. We had a great time; the shock of viewing life in the Philippines must have faded over multiple visits.
Yet the wretched poverty was still difficult to take.
We'd booked Alfredo to take us from the venue to the airport. On the way, he pulled into a gas station, but this time my concern wasn't with the stop or the car, but the crowd of seven small faces peering through the window, begging for money.
Alfredo explained the worst thing we could do was give the children anything, as it encouraged them to continue engaging in this dangerous behaviour. We looked at their sweet faces, knowing we could part with a few pesos and not miss it, yet knowing at the same time it would hurt them in the long run.
Then Alfredo told us more good news. A bomb had exploded in a conference room at the old terminal at the airport in the morning, but as we were flying out of the new terminal, we'd have no delay. Despite the news of the bomb and the atmosphere surrounding the trip, we never felt endangered.
Until we got on board the 747.
The plane was ancient; it had to have been more than 30 years old. The more I looked about, the more concerned I grew. The walls had holes punched in them. Some overhead bins had broken handles and wouldn't latch shut. Maintenance staff used duct tape to seal one of the bins.
We were seated in an exit row. I looked at the door and saw the noise reduction gasket was loose and separating. When the rubber padding on the armrest of my seat came off, I said to my wife: This doesn't inspire me with confidence.
Given the condition of the plane and the lackluster security I'd seen earlier, I wondered how safe this flight was going to be. As long as the engines worked and the cabin stayed pressurised, the rest be damned; all we wanted was to not become shark food.
We've planned another trip to Manila. As long as the bombings don't increase and the political situation remains stable, we'll be going back.
But on a newer plane, I hope.
June 6, 2000
Next Tale: Going Postal
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