Visiting Fort Santiago - and on cities and other things
Posted by: Fats in: Fats, Vitamins & Minerals > What and WhyAlthough we didn’t need to be at Immigration until next week, we decided to go today just to make sure since there seem to be quite a number of non-working holidays coming up - the upcoming elections and All Soul’s Day.
It was the usual commute to Manila, for our 2-month’s worth dose of carbon monoxide. It’s not as difficult for me anymore, as I was getting a bit more used to the pollution, although I still feel nauseous as soon as I get down from the jeepney.
We decided to go to Fort Santiago again to wait out the 4-hour processing for the visa extension. It’s quite nice there, a distance from the pollution and the noise of motors. On the way there we decided to buy some bottled water at MiniStop and two kids asked us if we could buy them some doughnuts. I saw the doughnuts in the shop, they were not really shaped as doughnuts but were shaped as holloween motifs - ghosts, witch’s hats, pumpkins, etc.
We got the kids some doughnuts and chocolate drink. Then when we went to the nearby Chinese fastfood for some lunch take-aways, the kids were there again, cheering us, and then said goodbye.
They were one of several regulars in the area - a bunch of kids collecting garbage in that part of Intramuros.
We had our lunch and then a bit of rest at Fort Santiago. Quite a surprise to see a number of tourists - Americans, Japanese, Koreans, etc. - when two months ago the place was all quiet. The entrance fee seem to have gone up too, I don’t know if it’s permanent or only for the peak season.
The horse-drawn calezas were all busy - nice for the cuchero and plenty of exercise for the horses. Even with all the foreign travel advisory I guess there are still some tourists who like coming to the Philippines, although it’s not very clear what might be there to see in Manila compared to other parts of the country like Cebu or Palawan, apart from foreigners coming over perhaps because they have family or maybe because of business.
Anyway, here’s a photo of myself and Edward, wearing clothes worn by Filipinos from early 19th century Manila. 
The clothes were perhaps drawn from Damian Domingo’s watercolor albums from the 1830s, called “Tipos del Pais.”
And here’s a photo of Trevor as a Spanish friar.
In the meantime, I’ve managed to do some crocheting at Fort Santiago and at Immigration. So at least, work is progressing. I am making a smaller version of the red roses purse for our landlady’s daughter. 
Then I got an email and a really lovely photo from an ex-colleague now based in the US. Beautiful environment, in Georgia if I’m not mistaken. Earlier I got an email and photos from an old BBS friend now living in Canada - some really lovely photos of himself and little daughter at a beach in western Canada.
I feel so envious, that in other countries a clean environment is still accessible to the public whereas here you have to be rich or a tourist to enjoy such things. The cleanest enclaves here seem to have been fenced off by rich resort developers or bought out by foreigners, and the air polluted by motor cars and waters and earth polluted by industrial development (many of them foreign investments) … Whoever said the best things in life are free must be joking or just being cynical.
If the countryside aren’t polluted by mining, industrial processing and monocrop agriculture, cities are quite horrible too. I was just thinking some time ago after the Glorietta 2 mall explosion in Makati City - if it really could be gas explosion, not gas from cooking but gas from sewer, since police investigators seem to be getting sick. I remember some 3 years ago I went to the new Ayala Museum, went to the toilet, and then when I flushed, water and shit swam out of the bowl, luckily I was able to jump out of the cubicle in time!
Big cities can have real problems with sewage systems, and perhaps especially Makati which used to be all swamp…
