Day 8 30/11/16 (Wednesday)

Today the Philippines celebrates a national holiday called Bonafacio day. It is to celebrate one if the Filipino’s who stood up against the Spanish rule. Today is the anniversary of his death.

After a 5:30am start I went on a 5km run with Sir Lem. I have to call him that but I always think he’s been knighted. We caught a jeepney with one of his friends and this jeepney was truly funky, it had shiny blue LED lights and Ariane Grande blasting from the subwoofer system. Jeepneys are completely unique  and at the same time all the same. This jeepney clocked 80kmh in the absence of traffic and I don’t think I’ve travelled that fast since I’ve been here. The run took place at a 2.2km oval which surrounded a misty glade. Because of the holiday, hordes of people had turned up to fight in the noble but inevitable battle against our mortality. This run wasn’t actually too strenuous, we ran against the general flow and so I spent a good hour in a real life version of space invaders. Except I couldn’t blast the old Filipino lady with a laser gun, that’s just too mean. And I didn’t have a laser gun handy so….

 

Once back at the dorm I had my first dip shower which mostly involves pouring cold water over your head with a green plastic ladle. Surely I must be running out of new things to try here… It was actually a refreshing way to wash, a blissful escape from the humidity. However the light switch broke so I had to do all of this by torch light.

I prepared to go to the conference with the others, the sessions  were interesting but I was even more tired than yesterday, in addition to that I became quite dizzy in the heat and I fear that I may have overdone it a little. Today was hot even by their standards, the difference being that the sun wasn’t hidden by the clouds as it usually is and so we had no protection today. I gave up and went back to the dorm to have a nap. Sir Lem came in just before lunch and we discussed dieting, exercise and motivation. He’s been a fantastic guy, taking care of me and showing me around.

Some of the boys arrived back at the house and together we created the ultimate Merienda
Lunch was something quite special, to me, I brought out the early Christmas gift….the toaster… It wasn’t my best toast, I had no real spreading knife, the peanut butter was a little oily, and the toast had a slight taste of ‘new toaster’. But by the powers… it was toast at last! It was scrumptious. And Filipino peanut butter tastes (at least to my palette) like it’s had a bit of honey added to it.

Some of the boys arrived back at the house and together we created the ultimate Merienda (snack). Chocolate spread on pineapple chunks. I’ve spent part of the afternoon lying outside typing away at my iPad, there is a rustling Filipino wind which is most refreshing. I’ve written my journal in some “off the beaten track places” but I’m currently in a suburb where my views look like this:

The schedule then read “piano lesson”. Given the limited time I have available to me it was more of a question-answer session including instruction on various techniques and how to form different chords. Normally I’d crave “hands on” type of practice and learning but this is the best use of the time I have.

I walked around the suburbs a bit with Sir Lem, exploring what there is to see and coming across a real supermarket (at last!), with the exchange rate being what it is I was more than happy to buy a packet of chocolate biscuits.

Finally I went to a 7pm prayer meeting at the college and that truly set me up for bed