I Keep Coming Back to Manila
This isn’t true. I actually don’t get to go home as often as I’d like but despite the craziness going on in the world — more on that in another post, I went home to Manila for a couple days for one of my childhood friend’s weddings. I can’t imagine planning a wedding or anything in this climate, but the lead up to this wedding has been fraught with cancellation and the like so I’m glad she still managed it.
I was really paranoid about this trip. Planning for it, I booked my very first Singapore Airlines flight in my life because I wanted that assurance if shit hit the fan, I knew they would take care of me. And I’m glad nothing did but also, damn. This is a way to fly. One day, when I’m swimming in money, SQ is the way. It was a luckily uneventful flight and I was just glad to have survived one leg of the trip.
Saturday I spent with my friends from work. I usually meet a couple groups of friends when I’m in Manila and because I was strapped for time, I joined friend groups (this was pre-social distancing directives) which I was a bit skeptical about but we all worked in the same company so it was obviously a pretty good experience. I’m sure it’s just me but I just prefer smaller groups but time strapped means making adjustments. It was nice to see everyone and have them trek up north to see me.
My friend’s wedding was pretty sweet and I’m really glad I flew in for this. I’ve known Hannah since I was four years old and I know that time isn’t necessarily the only way to ascertain the strength of a relationship but it is one of the markers and we’ve literally been through crazy ups and downs together so seeing her evolve as a person and turn into her best self with Carl really just made me want to be there. I also may have had too much to drink and there may be videos of us tearing up the dance floor but that’s neither here nor there. I may also have lost my voice for 2 days after but that’s just normal me.
On Sunday, my dad had a family gathering in Pampanga (where his family is from) and I was a bit nervous about this lunch because I haven’t seen extended family in a while and usually you get the usual questions/comments from family of how you’ve gained weight or why you’re still single. But luckily, these uncles (my dad’s first cousins) had none of this and instead we laughed our asses off for a couple of hours.
Because it was in Pampanga, we also had the worst possible food for my cholesterol, so I tried my best to stick to the non-pork and non-deep fried dishes. There really is a disconnect between heart health and the Kapampangan cuisine. And everyone in the table had a heart disease issue. Yes, it runs in the family.
It was strange to go on a road trip (that wasn’t a traffic jam) with my parents as an only child but I had my knitting and my dad drove and it was a nice break from the usual sitting in traffic. I hope I can do more of these with the parents in the future. I should probably get my drivers license renewed.
On my last day in Manila, I took Monday off from work thinking I’d have an entire day left (my flight was supposed to be at 7pm — but it got moved up to 5pm which means I lose half the day with travel to the airport etc.), I had the Future Media Empire gals over to my house. You’ll see a pattern here — I try to never leave my area whenever I’m in Manila. I haven’t had friends over in forever and it was nice to eat a home cooked meal from my mom. Macy and I had our Lenormand read by Chinggay and we just caught up outside our usual WhatsApp group and it was just nice.
And because times are strange, there was no traffic going to the airport — a possibly 2.5-3 hour drive took an hour and so I caught up on all my 10K steps in the airport walking the entire length of Terminal 3 while waiting for our boarding call. A short and sweet trip to Manila that literally was literally under the wire. This week, they announced 14-day stay home notices for those entering Singapore from Manila so I’m glad I missed that.
I wonder when I’ll be able to travel again — definitely not in a while.
