Philippines - Countdown Back To Reality

I finally made it to Manila! Philippine Airlines kept canceling flights from Iloilo City to Manila. We started getting scared. Normally there are about 5 flights to Manila a day, but during the week PAL was canceling flights and rebooking people on later and later flights. This would be such a problem except this week was a major event for the city. According to the mayor, every hotel was booked. With all the festivities over, many people are leaving. I was in the first wave of flights out. I was originally booked on the 4:00p flight to Manila. That was cancelled and I was moved to the 6:30p flight. THAT was cancelled and I was rebooked on the 8:10p flight. I was scared that I wouldn't get off the island till tomorrow - if I was lucky. Luckily, my flight out of Manila isn't until Tuesday, so flying to Manila on Monday wouldn't have been a major problem for me. Unlike my brother, who's flight back to the US is tomorrow morning at about 9am. He couldn't risk not getting off the island late, so he took the early morning flight out - which was full.

After figuring out that debacle, I thought it would be smooth sailing. I packed (after sleeping in - so yes, I missed church), visited with relatives for the last time, double & triple checked my luggage, passport, carry-ons - everything except my ticket. I didn't remember my ticket till we were about 5 minutes from the airport. So we had to turn around and get my confirmation printout and made it with minutes to spare. Except this is the Philippines and all sense of time is chunked out the window. So "minutes to spare" actually translated to 15 minutes before boarding the plane. Filipinos and their sense of time make the Spanish mañana attitude look punctual.

So now I'm in my hotel in Manila, winding down and getting ready to go to bed. FYI, I'm staying one of the 4-star hotels and it's FABULOUS! If y'all need recommendations on accommodations here in the Philippines, talk to me.

Some random pics from the trip to keep you entertained:





The drill field & chapel at CPU. This is a cheer competition they had during the anniversary.












Engineering students on the roof of the engineering building, rooting for their cheer team.

The ice cream man stopping by our boat at Boracay. No, really! It was the equivalent of the ice cream truck going through the neighborhood. Just replace the streets with the open waters and replace the houses with boats and voila! The nautical version of the ice cream truck!