It was about 4:30 in the afternoon and we were still inside the classroom preparing to go home. When our teacher asked us to stand and say our “Goodbyes” for the day, it happened. The floor shook so hard, everybody was stunned. The school building where we were is built on a tilted land. Sometime during the ground was shaking, the floor was cut in half, the half remain untouched but the other half collapsed taking half of classroom furniture and half of the pupils. Fortunately, I was one of those who were standing on the remaining part of the floor. Right after that, she pupils started to scream and cry and when the ceiling posed to collapse, the teacher who was also stunned got her senses back and urged the students to rush out of the door. I was the last pupil to go out of the room. If my teacher didn’t drag me out, I would have just stayed there.

Oddly, I didn’t crying. I just sat calmly on the ground as instructed and I watched other pupils cry and scream while teachers are trying to calm them down. The school officials didn’t allow anybody to go out of the gate but the gate was open for those who would like to enter and stay on the school grounds. We have a wide open ground and it should be the safest place in the entire neighborhood.

I was there watching all the chaos but strange because I remember I was not feeling anything. Only when I heard my older sister calling out my name I felt my heart beat faster. My sister and I were the same school. I was in grade 3 and she was in grade 6. Like the rest, she was already crying but was calmed when she found me. We hugged and when she asked if I am okay, I didn’t answer. I cried instead. I cried hard. I felt weakened and I was very scared. I was screaming and calling out “Papa” and “Mama”.

After about an hour, we saw our papa rushing to us and the sight of him gave me the feeling that everything was okay again. We hugged and I heard him uttering a soft prayer thanking God that we are safe. Then finally he said we can’t go home for the night but he promised to build us a tent and we could play Indians. He instructed my sister to keep an eye on me while he gets some things to build our tent. He promised to be back and he made me promised to stay with my sister. After an hour or so, he was back with things he can use to build the tent, some warm clothes for us, blankets, canned good, and candies. He put up the tent while we watched him and I remember, it was a crappy tent but for me it was the greatest. It rained a little bit that night but I slept peacefully knowing that my papa is there and everything will be alright.

The earthquake left around 1,000 people dead in our city and 600 more in nearby municipalities. Just a few compared to how many died in China now but just the same, it was still a difficult time. We lived in tents for months because aftershocks happen so often and it was not safe to stay in our homes. Almost all shops were closed, medical help was difficult to get, and sanitation can’t be maintained because toilets are not enough for the number of evacuees and garbage are not collected regularly. It was the rainy season so that made it more difficult.

Now I pray for the people who are affected by the recent earthquake.

1. Jolibbee’s regular burger
2. Jolibbee’s chilli con carne burger
3. Kapeng Barako (native coffee)
4. Tupig ( a rice powder, coconut and sugar kind of cake wrapped in banana leaves)
5. Kakanin (rice cakes)
6. Rebosadong Calamares ( Calamari Fritters)
7. Mango Shake
8. Passenger Jeepneys
9. Private Staineless Jeepneys
10. “Home made” vehicles
11. Barbecued Pork Chop (my dad’s secret recipe)
12. Crispy Pata
13. Lechon
14. Tocino
15. Cockfighting (he doesn’t like to bet, the cockfighting atmosphere just amazes him)

There should be more but I can’t remember them. This is all I can say, it wasn’t just me who had a good time in the Philippines. Marcus had some real fun too.

It’s taken from our hotel room in Manila.

Makes me wanna sing the song that goes something like…

Manila, Manila
I keep coming back to Manila
Simply no place like Manila
Manila, I’m coming home

As you know well, we just had our holiday in the Philippines and to my mistake; I have let this incompetent travel agency book a resort for us. I have personal choices of resorts but since it was the Chinese New Year week, all those resorts were fully booked and so IslandsAccommodation.com recommended a resort which still has available rooms. Olman’s View, Bohol, Philippines—that was the resort they highly recommended. After hearing some of their praises about the resort, I asked a very particular question; “Does it have a beach where we can swim?” Sounds like a very stupid question but you see, the stupid bitch from IslandsAccommodations.com said that Olman’s View is a cliff resort so I wondered if they have a part of the sea where their guests can swim. The very same stupid bitch said; “Yes, ma’am. The sea is just a few steps down and there’s a small beach where you can swim.” I thought OK so I said, I’d take it.

Aileen (that’s her name), said they cannot fully confirmed my booking unless I pay the booking’s total amount. So I said “fine”. But this absolutely incompetent travel agency by the name of IslandsAccommodations.com, doesn’t accept credit card payments. They want the payment in cash. Duh! How ancient is that!? But because I was afraid that I lose the reservation, I agreed. I withdraw the money so I can deposit in their bank account in an almost non-existent bank. It took me a day to find a branch of their bank which is not available in the city where I live so I have to drive to the next province. Can you imagine? Transfer from my bank to their bank will take a few days and I can’t do that becuase they gave me a deadline.  

In good faith, I did what they instructed me to do—pay the full amount by depositing it to their bank account then fax the deposit slip to them. After that, they confirmed my booking.

To cut the story short, my husband and I got to the resort and we were like—how can IslandsAccomodations.com recommend a place like that? Olman’s View is so awful I also wrote a post about them in a separate blog. Olman’s View doesn’t have a decent beach to swim in. A harbour is about 200 meters in front of it so you can imagine how the water is like. Yep, it was totally disgusting. I didn’t complain to the resort because they were not the ones I talked to (although they are also evil). I complained to the freakin’ travel agency. I mean really, how can they recommend a place like that???!? Don’t they understand that for people going to the islands in the tropics, a beach to swim in is very important? And to think that I particularly asked them that question. What that does make of them? A money grabbing company who doesn’t care if their client’s preferences are met. They lie to their clients, take the money, send their clients to that next resort/hotel available and that’s it. How cunning and evil is that?

I complained. Very strongly. I point out their a-holeness and demanded that we be transferred in another decent resort. The stupid bitch from IslandsAccommodation.com denied that she recommended the resort to me. How pathetic and incompetent!

Anyway, IslandsAccommodations.com agreed that we get out from Olman’s and move to another resort. Olman’s View agreed too but not without taking the 50% cancellation fees. Hah!

So we transferred to another resort. We got a standard, non-airconditioned room with NO hot shower and NO freshwater (the water coming out of the faucet is salty) but in fairness, this resort have a lovely white sand beach. Anyway, the room cost 1240PHP/night. That’s the only available room in that resort so we took it. Based on the 3100PHP/night deluxe room we originally booked at Olman’s, I believe we are deserve a refund. But no were not able to get that. In fact, the thick-faced, highly incompetent travel agency wanted to charge us more!?!

I refused to pay the 50% cancellation fees at Olman’s. It wasn’t our mistake. We showed up. We didn’t like the hotel—yes but it’s because we were tricked into booking in that hotel. IslandsAccommodations.com. misinformed us so they should shoulder the cancellation fees.

I argued and fought with the a-holes from Islandsaccommodations.com until they succumbed and agreed to cover our accommodations at Alona Tropical (the resort where we moved into) and not charge us for more money. They refused to give us some refund but fine.

The stories about their stupidity and incompetence in all of my blogs will be the refund.

We started that day a little bit later than planned because we slept too long. We drove to the nearest neighbourhood to Mr. Pinatubo and there we registered in this small government office. We needed to pay for one of those jeeps while big wheels (hehehe don’t know exactly what to call them). They cost 2,500PHP. Then we also have to pay for a guide (500PHP), toll fee for road they call skyway (500), and passes—50PHP each for mom, dad and, me (because we are locals) and for Marcus they asked him to pay 1,150PHP. On the way, he kept saying that he cannot believe how big the difference he needed to pay all because he is a foreigner and that he felt that there was a little bit of racism going on. Haha!

Here some of the pictures:

the way

start of the hike

wait I am tired (pagod na ang beauty ko no)

continue (tuloy ulit)

finally, we made it. (mom, me, and Marcus)

lovebirds

That’s all for this part of the holiday, if you wanna see a more interesting picture, visit my other blog and check out “One Hot Sexy Blogger!”

Hahaha!

I don’t know where I got the nerve to call myself that. (Kapal ng mukha, no?)

Anyway, this was taken during our recent trip to the Philippines. This is just to give you a preview (kum baga e patikim lang yan!)… there will be more pictures to come.

Consider this short post a warning. Do not book your holidays with Islandsaccommodation.com or you will be so sorry.

I am looking forward to our adventure visit to the Mt. Pinatubo. I have never been there though it’s just 45 minutes drive to its foot from our house. It should be beautiful. My dad said we have to get a permit from the municipal hall before we can go there. Nobody is allowed to climb the volcano without the municipal hall knowing about it. Reason to this is that there were unaccompanied foreigners who went there before. Then they got an accident and they died because they were not able to get immediate help. I don’t know the exact story but it was something to that effect. So since were are going there with Marcus, it is specially a must.

In other news… our home computer is virus infected. My yahoo messenger is automatically sending ridiculous messages to friends in my buddy list. I have updated and run my AVG antivirus but no effect. I have uninstalled YM and downloaded and installed a new one but I still have the same problem. Did this happen to you? What did you do to remove the virus?

1. Mall hopping with mom and dad
2. Jolibbee spree with Ron, my nephew.
3. Karaoke (inside our house)
4. Renewing my NBI clearance
5. Eating all those food and fruits I so miss
6. Cleaning and preparing for Marcus’ arrival

In between those things, all I can think of are blogging and how much I miss surfing the internet. Yes, we don’t have an internet at home so my blogging is very irregular. I can post 5 entries in a day and 0 the next day. Every time I have a chance to use an internet connection, I grab it and then I blog until it’s time to go home in our remote neighborhood where the number of Karaoke stands are more than the number of houses with a television. Can you imagine how noisy it is in the evening? Our house is along the main road (like 75% of all the Filipino houses, hihihi) so imagine the sound of all those tricycle passing by adding up to the irritating voices from the Karaoke stands. Hmmm… not a very pretty thing to listen to.

I am so not used to this anymore. Of course, I will always welcome the opportunity to come home and see my parents but there are just some things which I wish I can avoid. And those are:

1. not having an internet connection
2. noisy surrounding
3. noisy tricycles that cause heavy traffic

But anyway, no matter what…I love Philippines and I will keep coming back.

We decided to go to Guimaras and I have today to arrange all our flights and hotel bookings. After that all will be finalized. I will be flying to the Philippines tomorrow and Marcus will follow after a week then off we go to Guimaras together.

I remember that I promised to post some pictures from our Christmas Holiday Vacation in Austria and I just realized today (when I was about to make a promise to post Guimaras pictures when I get back) that I haven’t yet. So here are some photos taken last Christmas in Austria.

The photo on the left side is a tower up in the mountains some where in Steiermark. Errr…I am sorry I am not very good in remembering dates as well as names of people and places.

This is me giftwraping the Christmas presents

Me and Benjamin ready to go the Uncle Franz’ house for dinner

Eating Afpelstrüdel up in some mountain

A church on the way to Steiermark

A town…I am not sure what’s the name…sorry.

Marcus and Benjamin getting ready for a sleigh ride

my favorite shot of our visit in Steiermark