Manila

Before Sam and I head to any new place we try to minimize our expectations. I have mentioned this before, but it really is a theme of our trip. We had high expectations for Bali, and we were somewhat let down. We had no expectations for Malaysia, and we were pleasantly suprised. Before coming to Manila we both had zero expectations. Manila has turned out to defy every non-expectation we have had.

Our friend who lives in Cambridge and grew up in Manila put us into contact with his buddies. One of his friends, Jerry, owns a hotel in the area Makati. Jerry and his family have been so kind as to put us up for the week. The hotel is right across the street from the most amazing mall Sam and I have ever been to (it even shames Singapore's malls). Between the crystal chandeleers, the hundreds of dining options, and high to mid end shopping (LV, Prada, Hermes, Top Shop, etc.) it's an amazing space to observe. That, and a majority of the mall is outside. It's a beautiful space. Very well thought out. (there is even a church in the middle of it!!! Talk about shop and pray).

Manila appears to be a city of "haves" and "have nots". Some people are very wealthy--they drive fancy cars, live in condos near the malls, and wear genuine Hermes. Others appear to be very very poor, encouraging their children to begg, sleeping in parks all day, and even bathing in the public fountains.



(Jerry, "King of Balls" was pretty funny, but we also liked this one)

Sunny and Jerry are friends of friends and on our first night here we went out with them and had a blast. We dined at a Japanese BBQ resturant, and laughed for hours about Phillipino tendncies, mutural friends (you know who you are), and American culture. We had so much fun and are looking forward to returning the favor when they visit the states.

Our second day we did a bus tour, to help us get our bearings straight (it wasn't a doubledecker tour so it wasn't quite as good as the one we took in Singapore) but we still had fun seeing the different neighborhoods and walking around the old city. We also learned that one could walk about 2km through 5 malls!!! Which we of course did. All of the various malls near our hotel connect.


(Jollibee... Sorry Manila, it's not better than McDonalds. The fries tasted like fish, and you don't even serve fish on the menu)

Day three, dum dum dum... GREENHILLS!!! Ultimate shopping complex. Okay, so Greenhills is pretty amazing. And they do have a ton of selection at good prices. But compaired to the rest of South East Asia it's "Same Same". All of this crap comes from China anyway. While shopping in Asia, one must always remind themselves that knock off Prada's are a dime a dozen. And the longer you wait, the better they get.

Sunny was kind enough to take us on a fieldtrip to the Taal Valcano/Lake. The Volcano was beautiful, and included a nice little hike (which was much needed after all of the tasty eats). We enjoied the view and chatted for a few hours at the top before heading back down. That night for dinner we enjoied authentic Phillipino cusine, which was very tasty!

Our trip is at an end. And Sam and I are completelly dreading the flight home. We would rather just live here than have to endure the 25 hours of flying. The thought of getting to see Mikey will help us get through it!

Final Leg

Sam and I are in the final stretches of our trip--and are gearing up to fly back to the States.

We have been having a relaxing time in the Phillipines, but in all honesty have not been the dilligent bakpackers we were earlier in the trip. We spent 4 days in Bacolod City on the island Negros. Spending most of our time eating, researching, sleeping, and enjoying Phillipino smoothies! We opted not to go on any tours, hoping to save some money. In our defense, the Phillipines isn't the most backpacker frendly country. The people are very kind, but manuvering between the islands can be expensive and challenging. But for the backpacker who seeks not seeing any other backpacker's this is the perfect place--we were the only non-native tourists in all of Bacolod. To the point where the locals started to recognize us and say "hello!" like we knew who they were.

Sam and I have taken a liking to how "green" the Phillipines are, and wanted to share.


(a used cell phone/battery/charger power plug, recycle drop box in a mall... What a good idea!)

Pro-Green Propaganda. Lining the highways are "pro-green" sings. One of which read "Be a savior of Mother Earth, plant more trees" other signs reminded litterer's of the fines associated with trash dumping. These signs were printed on wood, painted white, with hand painted print (meaning it didn't look like these were mass produced and shipped from China).

Clean water. About 90%of the rivers we passed were immaculately clean--no trash. This did vary from place to place, but we were happy to see significantlly smaller amounts of litter and trash floating around. Also, Sam and I have been drinking tap water here (yeah!).

Reuse/recycle. This is a big theme throught all of Asia that we have noticed. TV repair shops, reused catalic converters, older cars and vans (some converted into bigger vehicles to accomodate more people), tailors and cobblers on nearly every corner, the list goes on. Asia is a culture of "one mans trash is anothers treasure". Nothing becomes trash until it is truly beaten to death. To our suprise, TV's cost nearly double what they cost in the US. Thus promoting TV repair over TV replacement.

Carpool. An American past-time. Very few cars lined the roads of this island. Instead busses ran the main road every half hour/hour--and it was ALWAYS jam-packed full.

Supermarket bags. This is changing in the States, but quite honestly it could change more. Recycled boxes from products shipped into the store double as grocery bags (like what they do at Costco). A few of the things Sam and I would like to see in the states; BPA free bags (biodegrateable bags), that cost .10 each (will encourage the customer to remember their own shopping bags).

Glass coke bottles. I know glass coke bottles has equal pros and cons. But overall we think glass coke bottles are better than plastic (especially after learning about garbage island in the Pacific ocean--please google this!). Asia almost only has glass coke bottles, which tastes better anyway.

Cock-a-doodle-doo. Farm life is a reality. And in Asia the people know where they get their food from, because chickens roam almost every street. Eating local is a reality here. Again, we realize that there are pros and cons to urban farm life (chickens eating plastic isn't good for the ultimate consumer). But when you think about all of the crap pumped into the chicken in the states anyway, I'd rather risk having my own chicken in my back yard. It's cheaper, less fossil fuels are used in it's delivery, and there is a direct relationship between food and the consumer.

Okay, so Asia isnt perfect--there are some pitfalls to the system. Allocating propper trash removal and recycling is a major change that needs to occur. And while driving old cars and motor bikes is a form of recycling--motor bikes don't filter the CO2 (dirtier polltion) and older vehicles also contribute to poor air quality. We also noticed individual packaging gaining steam.




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Bacolod city

Maggie and I are currently staying in Bacolod city on the island of Negros in the phillipines. We have 8 days left on our trip and we fly to Manila on January 21st, overall this trip has been an amazing experience for both of us and we have learned alot more about eachother.





(random budha wall). Anyways, Bacolod city has alot of roasted chicken on the streets, for 3.75$ US you can get a whole chicken that has been roasting for hours, cut up with a meat cleaver, and bagged with a sauce of your choosing, an awesome lunch when your looking for something healthy.

everybody here in the phillipines is a big Manny Pacqiao fan and basketball is the national sport. Seriously, it's like an obsession here, there are three basketball channels on tv. One for broadcast of old NBA basketball games, 90's bulls, early 2000' spurs/lakers etc etc., one for the phillipino league, and one for current NBA games.

Every town, I mean every town has a nice basketball court
And I have never seen so many guys wearing basketball gear and heading to or from hoops games. I'm hoping to get to play in a game or two in Manila before we go home.

so were off to explore Bacolod for a few days before heading up to Manila. Have a great day everyone and looking forward to seeing everyone soon.

Samuel Jacob Kachmar

Travel Day, Fun Day

Sam and I are in the middle of a grueling travel day. We have been going for 30 hours and we are not at our final destination yet! We are both completelly delerious and exhausted. I will try to fill you in as best I can.

On the 11th Sam and I traveled from Ubud to Kuta--Kuta is the large city in Bali that was devistated by 2002 terrorist attacks. As a result guards with large guns monitor the streets, especially banks, resorts, and night clubs.

Kuta can best be describe as Kao San Road (in Bangkok) on the beach. Thousands of tourists, millions of things to buy, and tourists acting a fool. Tragiclly awesome.

I know I didn't give Bali the best review before. And what I said before still holds true for Kuta. A spectacle worth a few hours of observation, but nothing more. Ubud did change our percepetion of the island as a whole. The landscape was beautiful, the people were friendly, and the shopping was AMAZING (as a result Sam is now lugging around a 20 lb stone Ganesh--always a topic of conversation when going though security check points). If we had to grade Bali; Ubud would get an A-, Sanur and Candidasa would get B's, and Kuta would get a C-/D (we disagree on this one!). Our final thought, the farther away from Kuta you go, the more enjoyable the island becomes.

We only traveled to Kuta to be closer to the airport, and on the morning of the 12th we woke up at 4:00 AM to catch a flight to Jakarta.

When we arrived in Jakarta we paid $10 to store our packs for the day (20 lb Ganesh included). We took the bus into the city and were immediatelly amazed. Jakarta is like a mix of Bangkok and Hanoi--but with even worse drivers! The traffic is so bad the tuk-tuk's and motorbikes often resort to riding on whatever sort of sidewalk they can find. This is really scary as a pedestdrian. Most of the time there wasn't a sidewalk and we were forced to walk in the streets, with crazy, fast traffic zooming by.

Sam and I had read that Jakarta was a difficult city to tour, so we thought we would just walk north through the middle of it. We trekked from Gambir to Kota, about 3 miles (but we estimated we did it in 5, between all of the mall pit-stops, detours, and street navigating).

Basically by the end of the day we had seen a million plastic knock-off handbags, pirated DVD's, and more car parts than there are cars in the world (probablly a reflection of the high accident rate due to reckless driving). At 6:00 PM we were exhausted--and we joked that Jakarta gave us asthma in 7 hours. Being the genius' that we are, we figured it would be safer (and less tiring) inside a tuk-tuk than on the side of the road. This was a death defying experience to say the least.


We made it back to the airport at 8:00 and our feet were killing us. We spent the rest of our Indonesian money on foot reflexology. Much deserved! We stayed up all night, on the Internet, having dinner, etc. And left JAK at 1:00 AM. Jan 13th

We Arrived in Manila at 6:00 AM, departed for Cebu at 7:00 AM, and finally arrived in Cebu at 9:00 AM. But the fun didn't end there. We hopped into a cab to the port, where we are now on a 4 hour boat ride to Dumagete, on Negros. We are expected to arrive at 7:30 PM. Where upon which we will find a hotel and sleep as much as possible!

Sam and I are being supportive of one another, laughing at our slowness, the fact that he has a 20 lb Ganeshi with him (that we now refer to as the egg, since he is so careful with it).

Thus far the Phillipines... It is very Christian! (we already walked trough a big religious festival). Half of our encounters with locals have been agressive and not so nice (an man threw money at Sam because he didn't have any change) and our cab driver was kind-of a shyster (he tried to rip us off, but we had our trusted Lonely Planet!). But the good experiences have been great. The Phillipinos on our plane were super nice and we had lunch at a cooking school where the people were kind. Such a mix! One thing is for sure, they are not used to Western tourists down here the way they are in other countries. We have yet to be haggled or propositioned!


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Indonesia Photos

Indonesia

From Bali to Flores and Back Again ( The triple wallace crossover)

Hey Everybody,

Maggie and I are up in Ubud, the main city on the island of Bali, and we just had fried duck for dinner, Awesome. The last week has been a fun an exciting blur, i'll try to summarize as best I can, please bear with me.

New Years eve (Dec 31) We took the ferry from bali over to Gili air, and found a homestay for the evening after hiking around in 100 degree heat with our backpacks seeming heavier and heavier. After dropping our packs we explored the island and went for a swim. To our dismay, the island was surrounded by a shelf that makes the water about half a meter deep for 20 meters outs from the island on all sides, making it almost impossible to go swimming and superheating the water so it feels like a nice warm bath. Not what we were looking for after a hot and humid search for accomodations. Regardless, we enjoyed the swim as best we could and had dinner at a technicolor rave with blacklights, sitting by the ocean, with a majority of the rave participants on some mind altering substances, we finished dinner and were in bed reading before 11pm, man we are boring!!



(Gili Air)

Anyways, New years we head over to the island of Lombok via ferry and Crossed Alfred Wallaces line. I believe it is a line that depicts a major change in the landscape, animals, plants and fish. It runs along the lombok straight, a very deep channel between bali and lombok, anyways, it was a big change. much drier climate, more volcanic than balis lush jungles.



(Resort in Lombak, much deserved after the places we have been staying in)

After a few days at a hotel in lombok, We booked a boat tour to flores to see the Komodo dragons and left on January 4th for a really amazing trip.

Day 1 ( Jan 4th) we get bussed across the island with 24 other people from all over the globe, Sweden, Germany, Britain, Holland, Canada, singapore, malaysia etc. we arrive to the eastern Port of Lombok and head out on a short cruise to an island for snorkeling and a welcome dinner. The snorkelling had all sorts of neon coral and some really crazy looking fish as well. After a welcome dinner we set sail overnight and we discovered that we would be sleeping on the floor of the boat, not bad until the cockroaches came out in the middle of the night and we discovered these new passengers that would be sharing the boat with us.



(interior of the boat. Also our bedroom)

Day 2 ( January 5th) We arrive at beautiful tropical island of sumbawa for more snorkelling and beach time, as we got to know the different people from around the globe, it was great to get to learn about different cultures, governments and people. Many of the people we met changed our perception of what a certain people or country is like. We all had a good time but hit some rough seas on the overnight sail and no one got a good nights sleep.

Day 3 ( January 6th) arrive at Komodo island and national Park. We see 4 Dragons out in the wild of the national park while accompanied by two guides and find many more down by the national park restaurant. The Dragons grow to be 3.5 meters long and can live for more than 50 years. pretty much the closest thing to a dinosaur that I have ever seen, again, awesome. we drop off some passengers in Flores and pick up some new ones the same evening, and start our journey back towards lombok.



(don't worry mom, the guides had sticks to fend off the dragons)

Day 4 ( January 7th) a Trip to Rinca Island and many more Komodo Dragons, luckily no one was eaten or attacked :). and more snorkelling.



(morning light off the bow)

Day 5 (January 8th) more snorkelling and sailing, great fun with a great group of people, the crew included, we all made it back to the east coast of lombok by 1030pm, staggered to our hotel and got some sleep.


(January 9th) Hopped a morning ferry to Bali, took a minivan up to Ubud, and found a great hotel that is tucked into a mini forest in the center of the city, really liking it here so far and we are off to Jakarta on the 12th of january and then up to the phillipines on the 13th.

be well everyone, see you all in just a couple of weeks

Sam + Maggie

Dear Bali, clean your beaches

Sam and I have had a whirl wind of a few days. We arrived in Bali on the 28th, and stayed in Sanur Beach for two nights. Our first impressions were that Bali was over developed and very touristy. I don't know what either of us expected, but maybe our expectations were too high?



(this is like a non-polluted beach)

Voulenteering didn't work out. The organization was not what we anticipated. We made a decision that it was not for us, and made arrangements with a "hote"l near-by.

The hotel was more of a hippie convent... The owner Tanaya, grew up in Indonesia, but is of Dutch origin. She lives in Padang Bai, operates a hotel with her Balanese husband (Lompak), and three beautiful children. The oldest of which, Tanya disclosed, was concived on the nigh she met her husband.



(the chicken Lea would want)

Tanya was a radical; loud and opinionated, but very entertaining. She felt strongly about having a chemical free home (I decided against mentioning the deet I had in my pack), she hated all politicians (even Obama), she KNEW that terrorist attacks were all inside jobs, and that flouirde was a deadly killer.

Tanya didn't wear bras, she breast fed her 3 year old, she simultaniouslly was running an animal orphanage (with 10 chickens, 12 cats, and 4 dogs), she often left large sums of money lying around, and when she gave us the opportunity to stay in her home with her family (all of the bungalows were occupied) Sam and I were thrilled.

While Tanya was totally out there, she was also been a wealth of knowledge for us. She helped us arrange boat tours (and get off of Bali, which we are both thrilled about). Sam and I will never forget Tanya and her family. It was a pleasure observing the inside outs of it all.

The highlight of Bali has surely been Tanya and her family. And while Sam and I are so happy to be leaving the over crowded, polluted, and less than average vacation destination we are very sad to be leaving Lumbung Damuh (aka the hippie convent).



(yeah beach trash!)

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