Thursday, December 29, 2005

So long, farewell...

With only a couple of days left here, we have done our best to fit in as much stuff as possible in the last week before we leave. Starting on Monday, we headed to the south of Cebu to a place called Badian, famous for its white sandy beaches and Kawasan Falls. We arrived at the beach resort after a wet and bumpy three hour drive. It stopped raining enough for us to have a look at the place and rush our stuff inside our two-story beach-front cottage. The cottage was made entirely out of nipa (local wood) and was native-styles at its best! It was very quaint. The location was fantastic as the sand was literally at the door (and in our mattress, but that's another story) and we were six paces away from the water. Luckily the rain eased up and we swam and ate into the evening. Later that night, we drove about 25 minutes to the town of Moal Boal, which had plenty of great restaurants to choose from. There were heaps of restaurants and bars all lining the sea edge and overlooking the water. And at then end of the stretch was a gorgeous little bunch of cottages, which were fully air conditioned and had mahogany ceilings and furniture. And with a 30 second walk to the water we were kinda wishing at that point we were staying there (at only $40 a night or $500 a month it was a shame we didn't know about it earlier.), which was only amplified later on during the night while we were lying on our sandy mattresses!

The next day we got up early (not hard... SANDY MATTRESSES) and took the trek to Kawasan Falls. We were all a bit groggy and not in the best of moods after our night of little sleep so we failed to bring any swimming attire along with us... big mistake! When we got to our destination of cool blue/green water, we were dying to jump in. My cousins Sarah and Janine proceeded to raid the souvenir shop for t-shirts and shorts to swim in, but Luke and I thought we were satisfied with just walking around in the water. We ended up walking to the water's source where again there was a bunch of falls and ice cold water. Since there was no one except me and my fam around we jumped in the water in our undies! Woo! There was a raft that took us under the falls where you could have yourself quite a high pressured water massage! I tell you what, swimming in our undies was the best decision ever! Hahaha. We were very glad we took the plunge (har har) and went for a swim. It was great!

After our swimming adventures we went back to the van to get changed and went to Moal Boal again for lunch. On the journey back home, we ended up taking a detour to a place called Hidden Paradise Mountain Resort. And believe you me, this place was hidden. It was a good half hour drive into the mountains, which were all covered in palm trees, before we got to this place... and it was nice, but not really my idea of paradise. A fun trip up though! It was a while before we managed to get back home as we had more visiting and stuff to do, but when we did get home we were exhausted. Definitely a good kind of exhausted though. Kawasan Falls is probably one of my fave places we've been to here (at some stage I will do a top five places/things we've done here).

The next day we took a while to recover and slept in and relaxed for the day. Yesterday, however, we were back in action as we went on a shopping expedition to buy all the stuff we would need for VietNam and thermals for Europe. About four hours and many full bags later we made plans to go out with my cousin Jason and his friend for dinner (we went to a great place called Zoa resto/grill. We wanted to go to this particular Mexican restaurant, but they didn't have any beef... what Mexican restaurant doesn't have any beef?) and some “bikini bar” hoping! (Jason reckons it was important for us to see Cebu's seedy underbelly... I think he wanted to go see some half-nakie girls!) And it was quite an experience. You can't really call them strip clubs because the girls don't strip and are more concerned about their make-up and looking in the mirror than the whole pole-dance thing. It's very tame compared to home (or so Luke tells me ;) bahaha). They even danced to the Pinoy Big Brother song (kinda like how everyone knows the moves to the Macarena... it had us in hysterics). And at one bar we went to, the girls who did solo numbers “danced” (walked around, talked to the other girls at the side of the stage, i don't know... they don't take it very seriously here) to love songs. Like Celine Dion and stuff. It was so romantic! All in all it was a funny experience. At “The Black Hole” (the most strip-clubby of all the places we went to) four girls came up to our table and started talking to Jason. I though they would be asking about Luke as he is one of the few YOUNG white guys around... instead they were asking about me and where I was from and what my name was and stuff! Haha. Very weird and very embarrassing. Funny. I felt sorry for all the girls though because you could tell they were uncomfortable at times. Jason was telling us that some of the girls are as young as 17. It's sad really.

So today is another rest day and last minute chores day. We head off to Viet Nam on Saturday so this will probably be my last post in the Phils. It's been really fantastic and we're both sad to leave. I wish I had another couple of weeks to do stuff we didn't have time for, but I think we have done a pretty good effort as it is. I'm really going to miss everyone and am already trying to think of the next time we will be able to visit here!

I would also like to make a quick shout out to Akash Arora who wrote an article based on this blog for The Sunday Magazine (Telegraph) a few weeks back. If I get a scan I'll post it up here for all y'all to read! Thanks heaps Kashy! ;)

So I guess you'll be hearing from us next when we are in Vieters (my nickname for VietNam)! We will be in Saigon for New Years so that should be an experience and a half! Woot!

3 Comments:

At 10:16 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Keep those fingers rippling over the keyboards, you two...love your work!!
Happy New Year and safe adveturing
Lotsalove
Alex, Ann and the rest.....

 
At 9:25 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

LOUISE... You sexy thing! Your blog is getting so frigin pah-pu-laar! A friend of mine - Based in Mumbai (really, no exaggeration) - just emailed me an excerpt from your notes:
"I would also like to make a quick shout out to Akash Arora who wrote an article based on this blog for The Sunday Magazine (Telegraph) a few weeks back. If I get a scan I'll post it up here for all y'all to read! Thanks heaps Kashy! ;)"
He is wondering if you are talking about me... Yes, yes, Nishant she's talking about me...
Funny, eah? People are reading your blog so seriously all over the world...
Six degrees of separation!

 
At 9:37 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hey.....Whatever it takes to make the world a smaller place!!! Grettings from Mumbai. Nishant

 

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