So, it’s our last day in the Philippines, and I was looking for a fitting culinary send-off. Thank God for Cabalen, a Filipino buffet restaurant. We tried it on Sunday and it was packed so we went back today for lunch. Needless to say, I laid a hurtin on that buffet. In the Philippined they say “eat all you can” instead of calling it “all you can eat”. I was obliged by the imperative form…just being obedient you know. I finally got my ginataan kuhol (snails in coconut milk), the dish I’ve been dreaming about for the last 10 years.

It was a fitting send off…on a side note, the lechon was lame, but at least it made for a good picture.

Excuse any mis-spellings, Dan is not with me right now to be my spell check! 🙂

Can't leave a country without getting some henna!

Lichon... all the locals took all the crispy skin before we could get some!

Dan eating Chicken insides (isow)

The locals have to find creative ways to make money... they build these awesome castles every day just to make some money from the tourists!

On our last day we found the local fish market!

Well, we made it back to Manila today. We had the chance to go out with some locals last night and paint the night red before we left the island. (if painting the night red consists of getting home before 1:00 am)  We have really enjoyed getting the inside scoop on what real life is life from the locals. True to Dan’s traveling history, he is not shy at all when talking with people here and making friends with everyone!  It is kinda nice to change roles… I am the friendly one in the States, and he is the friendly one when we travel. 🙂

  anyways, heading back tomorrow.  we have so many stories to tell but will do that more from the comfort of our home.  We are looking forward to getting back with our friends… and Chai!

Got the semi-permanent mark yesterday of livinlavidalechon. Sweet huh?

So we are back from Carabao Island…here once more in Boracay. After two days on such a remote, unspoiled place, Boracay seems like the big city…well almost. The truth of the matter is that we did see more people in the two minutes after we set foot on Boracay, than we did the last two days.

A bit of a background for you all about Carabao Island…tag line it seems for the island is “An Emerging Paradise”. It’s an island a couple of kilometers northwest of Boracay, about a 40 minute boat ride away. From the north end of Boracay, it almost seems like you could chuck a rock and hit it…but as our boat ride there proved, it’s farther than it looks. Let’s just say another 45 minutes on that boat on the choppy channel, I would have been hurling my breakfast.

The it’s so close but so far away also extends to the way of life on the island, when compared to its more elustrious neighbor Boracay. While Boracay has had an influx of foreign and local investment which has led to numerous high end resorts, along with its original local cottage type resorts, Carabao island has only a handful of resorts on the entire island. Carabao Island gets its name from the fact that it is shaped like the back of a carabao (water buffalo), the Filipino beast of burden of choice.

When we were leaving Boracay, we told the people at the B&B we were staying at that we were going to Carabao, and the overwhelming response was, “I’ve never been there, let me know how it is.” Carabao Island has been getting press lately because there is a plan to put an international airport on it to serve Boracay. As it is right now, Boracay is served by two small domestic airports that can only be accessed by small planes. When we talked to the locals in Boracay and Caticlan, they overwhelmingly said that the airport plan was dead, it wasn’t going to happen. It’s just idle talk during election time. It’s just interesting that an island so close is such a mystery to so many.

Anyways, after much searching on the internet to try to find a place in Carabao, we found the Nipa Hauz in Lanas, on the southwest coast of the island. It seemed nice, reasonably priced and had the only restaurant on the island (good news). The place was beautiful, the beaches not as pristine as Boracay’s white sands, but the water was cleaner and clearer, if that was possible. In our two days we were able to motorbike around the island with our tour guide, go to visit some caves and just relax with a beautiful ocean view. On Carabao, you are really able to see rural Filipino life. Electricity and running water are now there (thanks to a loan from the World Bank), but the current only runs from 4am-6am and from about 1pm to 11pm. Who needs electricity anway?

But just like any place in the world, the true story of a place isn’t complete without the stories of the people. We met so many kind and wonderful people on the island that really made the place beautiful. Here’s a snipet of three of them:

Gimar: I assume Gimar got his name because his mom was Gina and his dad was Mark, or something, I don’t know, just conjecturing…that’s how Pinoy’s do it. He was our 16 year old motorcycle tour guide (there are no cars on the island, and motor bikes just arrived thanks to the paving of a few roads). He was quiet, unassuming, with a psychedelic ball cap worn backwards. All three of us piled onto his 110 cc motorbike and he took us around the island. We saw the town, the schools, the water sources, some hidden beaches, and the site of the new airport. We ran into a huge bulldozer clearing a really wide road, so it looks like they are planning on continuing the airport project. Anyways, two hours later, we paid Gimar Php500 ($11) for his services and he went off to school. He was a good kid, you could tell, happy to help out his family by lugging a couple of sunburnt tourists around. He was a good driver too. Boy was my butt painful after that ride though…was worth it though.

Lonsio (sp?): Maybe Lonsio’s mom’s name was Lonnie and his dad was a siopao…I don’t know. But he was the first to welcome us to Carabao island. He was the man in charge of the restaurant at the Nipa Hauz. He spoke great English, but felt way more comfortable as soon as I spoke Tagalog with him. He told me a lot of the things that were going on on the island, and tips for things to do. He was born an bred on Carabao, his family owned tons of land on the island. We later visited his house, met his mother, sister and a bunch of kids that I guess were related to him. The second day we went by paddle boat to some caves formed by the ocean waves on his family’s property. Even though his flashlights failed, we had a brilliant time (thanks to the light on our video camera). The pictures don’t do it justice…it was dark…and rocky, but worth it. You could tell he was a man who loved his home, even though he had to leave it for a bit to finish school in Boracay (otherwise it was walking 7km back and forth from the only high school from the island everyday), and he genuinely enjoyed showing it off. He was also the last person to bid us farewell and wished a quick return back to visit him.

Merelyn Gonzaga: Tita (auntie), I called her immediately. She was the owner and proprietor of the Nipa Hauz. What an amazing woman…entrepeneur, cop, cook, world traveller, cancer survivor. She was the first person to invest on the island 14 years ago, after coming back to the Philippines from Germany where she was a restauranteur turned police inspector (yeah, I know, random). Her money was responsible for putting electricity on the island. She is the only Filipino resort owner on the island now (the rest are German, Norwegian and Swiss). She is the kind of woman who everyone respects…maybe even fears, but she has hospitality down to a “t”. She cooks everything from her diverse Filipino/German menu, and we were able to have some great conversations with her. She loves her little slice of paradise, and it shows. What a relaxing woman, loving the simple life.

This is getting long, and it’s difficult to describe all we experience, but let me say we’re a bit different having spent two days on the island…I guess we’re more relaxed, and more informed about what life is really like in the Philippines.

Yesterday Sarah and I made some contacts at the Luna Rossa resort to go sailing and snorkeling. Our captain Jonathan and his cousins, the crew of Francis and Jackal, took us out in their Filipino catamaran called a paraw. We sailed for two hours and caught the sunset.

It was really satisfying to interact with the locals on a personal level. It was cool to hear their stories and see their love for their country and keeping their oceans and beaches pristine. Everytime we sailed past a piece of trash in the ocean they would pick it up. “Discipline,” Jonathan would say, “it’s what we need.”. It was good to help them out by hiring them. We paid about $30 for the excursion, and it was their only income for the day. He also told them how their was an association in place that for a small % would help with fees and repairs.

It was a really inspiring conversation. I’m reading Muhammad Yunus’ book right now about micro loans to the poor. How great would it be to help these people live a better life. We easily forget how privileged we are in the West. But sometimes I wonder, are we really better off? The simple life here is so…well, simple. But in reality, we are better off. Never hungry, always with a roof over our heads. If we have that and our family and friends, we truly are rich.

Last night we hung out on the hippier side of the island. We listened to some unbelievable cover bands. Can you imagine rocking a Linkin Park song with just an acoustic guitar? Well, they did. It was a good time.

We’re off to Carabao island today. About an hour away by boat. A little more remote, quieter. Should be great.

Well we can’t for some reason post pictures on this blog today so please see link below to see pictures!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=163898&id=574381836&l=efdc86a807

Well we had a little adventure getting to this beautiful Island. We had the opportunity to ride a little putter airplane (Zach you would have liked it i think). It had propellers that ran it, and fit around a dozen people. We arrived at the airport at 4:30 am and our flight left at 6:00 am. We noticed a very interesting epidemic. Many of the people at the airport were Korean couples, and almost all of the couples had matching clothes on! (matching Mickey mouse shirts, boy flowered shorts matching with girl cut ones, same hats, etc…) Had never seen that before! Dan’s reasoning behind it was so people would know which couples were together and if they were seen with a companion not dressed the same they would be “outed” for cheating on their spouse! don’t know if that is accurate info, but we will try and get the scoop while we are here.
Our hotel here (The Lazy dog) is wonderful! we were greeted by a lovely (but stinky) golden retriever named Whiskey. Our hotel room is nice (with a fabulous air-con). We have 2 twin sized beds pushed together (which Dan likes cause then I can’t take up the entire bed for myself by sleeping in the middle) There is a really nice area to sit in a courtyard, where we had breakfast this morning.
Today we will be having a full day! we will start with a pedicure, then go sailing. while we sail we will go snorkeling (yea!). Should be a lovely day! We have wireless internet at our hotel so we are able to check e-mails on Dan’s i-phone. (still amazes me that we can sit on a little island in the PI drink a beer in a courtyard of a little bed and breakfast and you can pull out your i-phone and surf the internet) pretty crazy!
well lets cross our fingers that this posts (you never know if this will work!:)
–2 days later… Good thing I saved this text cause it didn’t work.. 😉

As I attempt to post pictures and get frustrated with the speed, or lack thereof, of the internet (or maybe it’s this darned wordpress site–should’ve gone with blogspot), I realize how rushed and impatient our world in the West is. Honestly, who cares if it takes a long time or, I don’t get to upload as many pictures as I wanted. The bottom line is that I am in a beautiful country with my wife, on one of the top beaches in the world…and I’m on a paid vacation. The speed of the internet is secondary. What am I doing in front of a computer screen anyway? Shouldn’t I be out there enjoying the sun…and it’s ill effects on my lilly white half-white skin.

But then I remember, this whole posting business is for all of you at home. This is for those who can’t make it out here. Maybe I can help my home country a bit by making people want to visit it, through my ghetto little attempt at a blog with messed up pictures and captions that don’t make sense.

Next time…I’m bringing my laptop.

Well we made it to Boracay safe and sound. We took a very little airplane that fit about 12 people in it! We checked into our hotel and it is lovely! The island is so beautiful! Will post pictures in a bit!