Baguio, Benguet

Friday, February 23, 2007

Thursday, February 22, 2007- From Santo Tomas, La Union, the hospitality of Marietta C. extended to the next FtH Mission in Baguio City by offering the FtH volunteers a place to stay in their new, big townhouse in Brentwood Village. We left Santo Tomas, La Union after partaking a hearty breakfast prepared by the housekeeper of Marietta. With Manny driving his Honda CRV, with Pablito as the navigator, passengers Fely, Tessie and Eve had a good time talking all the way to Baguio City. Armed with a sketch of the direction to the townhouse (some landmarks but no street names), with the name and telephone number of the caretaker, we tried to find our way to the house. After several twist and turns through the winding street of Baguio, after stopping several times asking for directions, after finding ourselves in the same street twice, Manny and I admitted that we are lost and we decided to stop at the Botanical gardens, and requested the caretaker to take a taxi and meet us and show us the way. It turned out that the house is not too far away as the caretaker, Roy, just jogged his way to meet us. Roy is a graduate of fisheries and waiting for a regular job when he decided to take the job as the caretaker to support his sibling’s studies. Roy cooks and keeps the house spotless. After assigning us to our rooms, we decided to explore Baguio. The taxi cost Ph50 for the five of us, from the house to the SM Mall in town, about 15 minutes away.

Friday, February 23, 2007- Gift giving for the 250 children will be at the City Health Office (CHO) at 2:00PM. This is a project of the Association of Philippine Physicians of America (APPA) Auxiliary who is having a medical mission in La Trinidad, Benguet and in coordination with Feed the Hungry and CFO. We decided to leave early and locate the venue and after finding the place and meeting with our contacts, we decided to leave the car there and took a taxi to SM Mall for lunch. We had lunch at a roof top restaurant with a panoramic view of the City. We went back to the City Health Office before 2:00PM and soon after, the APPA Team of Lottie, Annie and other APPA Auxiliary members with Dr Willie arrived to join in the program.

After some introductions by the local health staff, Eve spoke about CFO, Lottie spoke about FtH and Annie introduced the members of the APPA. There were 2 dance numbers by the staff of the CHO, followed by the gift giving to the 250 children from 125 barangays of Baguio. The kids were from different Barangays, some from remote places and were very very happy to receive the gifts from strangers from the US.

After the gift giving, Eve, Manny and Fely went on their own to meet some friends; Pablito and Tessie went back with the APPA team to their medical mission in the Benguet Provincial Hospital in La Trinidad, about 30 minutes away from Baguio. We met with some familiar faces from Washington, DC like Drs. Fangonil (Pres. of APPA), Bacarra, Rivera, Lopez, and Dr. Cueto from NJ. We were then invited to the Closing Program in the Open Gym, Capitol, La Trinidad. A feature of the program is the sacrificing of a pig by killing ‘Babe’ in the middle of the court, after some ritual of thanksgiving prayer. A female foreigner left her front row seat and went to the back of the line to avoid seeing the sacrifice. I followed her to check her condition and she asked me “why do they have to do that?” The husband is Ok since he ate some of the pork, after it was boiled and cut up, and went back for a second serving ( must taste good!). After the “CANAO FESTIVITY”, the doctors went back to their accommodations at the Baguio Country Club and we went back to the Marietta mansion.

Saturday, February 24, 2007- The fourth week in February is the annual Panagbenga Festival in Baguio City. Saturday is the street dancing participated by students in costumes from the different schools and Sunday is when they have the floral parade like the Rose Bowl parade in Pasadena, California. We met with Fely and Manny at the corner of Session Rd and Cathedral St. and staked our place in the street to view the parade. Is this just a coincidence but sitting right besides us in the street is the family of the Dean of Engineering of St Louie University that I met yesterday concerning the engineering scholar of the Philippine Association of Metropolitan Washington Engineers (PAMWE) ! The parade was very colorful and entertaining but after sitting on my butt on the hard asphalt pavement for 2 hours, shoulder to shoulder with the other viewers that are about 10 rows deep, I had to give up and walk around to exercise my stiff legs and look for a better place to view the parade. We ended up having lunch in the balcony of a restaurant with a good view of the parade but just as we are about to eat lunch, the parade ended.

Manny and Fely decided to extend their stay in Baguio; Evelyn is going to see and stay with a friend so, we check Victory Liner for our trip back to Manila. We walked to the ‘old’ station only to be told that there’s a new station “just pass” the SM Mall. I left Tessie at the Mall and walked to the new bus station, about 10 minutes away, on hilly road, in the heat of the sun. We were thinking of seeing the flower parade on Sunday but ALL the bus seats for Sunday were already sold out. I went back to Tess and told her the situation and we decided to leave the same day. We went back to the house, picked up our luggage, bid Roy Thank you and goodbye, and went back to the bus station and took a “De Lux” ticket to Manila, about Ph550 ($11) leaving at 4 PM. “De Lux” is air conditioned express service to Manila, no stopping to pick up other passengers, with TV, rest room equipped, no pillows, no blankets; with a stewardess in short tight dress, who served us one small bottled water and one cookie. We sat right behind the driver but we cannot sleep because the driver is flirting with the stewardess, talking sweet nothings all the way to Manila. The stewardess was also sitting in front, near the door; adjusting/changing the DVD movies during the trip, trying to do the impossible of pulling her miniskirt down to her knees, checked the comfort room (CR) when I asked if it is working, plus other duties, as assigned.

It is amazing that the bus driver was able to drive almost 6 hours straight, just stopping once briefly to check the tires, checking his cell phone a couple of times, and almost talking with the stewardess all the time. We arrived at the Victory Liner Bus Depot in Cubao at past 10:00PM. There are a lot of taxis waiting but they are charging a flat rate of Ph500 for the trip to our place in Paranaque. I hailed a taxi with a meter cruising on the road and the trip only cost us Ph210. We got home safe and sound by 11:00PM.

Pablito
Tuesday, March 13, 2007