The Philippines

I remember that when we started talking about a rough travel plan, Lea and I agreed that after spending a great chunk of our budgeted time in Asia, we would try to visit Latin America, too. But then, after six months on the road, we decided to rather spend more time at each place than to push for the maximum number of destinations. And so we changed our plan and crossed Latin America off of our list. But then we came to the Philippines and the place reminded us so much of Costa Rica and Ecuador that we couldn't help but feel that we had made it to Latin America after all.

People who travel the Philippines will most likely go to either Luzón, more specifically to Palawan and El Nido, or to the Visayas. We did the latter, mostly because we were told that Palawan and El Nido were the country's touristic hot spots and avoiding these had been one of our main goals throughout our journey. We stayed on five out of the six main islands and our first impression was fueled again and again: judging from the superficial point of view that one can obtain in a period as short as 4 weeks, the Philippines are culturally and visually much closer to Latin America than to other countries in Southeast Asia.

I mean sure, its jungle and its beaches could have been anywhere around that latitude, in Southeast Asia as well as in Middle- and South America. But the Spanish colonial influence on the country's culture, something we found was very unique in Southeast Asia, gave it a Catholic touch that ran like a thread through all public life. We saw countless churches on our way, ranging from scruffy remains of formerly majestic colonial area church buildings to wooden sheds with a few chairs and improvised crosses. Tricycle drivers decorated their vehicles with bible verses and the public buildings were named after biblical characters - a circumstance that led to the name being painted on the wall of said buildings along with a graphic depiction of the corresponding stories.

And then there was the food. Just like the Ecuadorians the Philippinos loved chicken or fish as long as it was deep fried and came with additional greasy foods like fried eggs or baked potatoes and a side of rice. The overall motto seemed to be: 'the greasier the better'. Not surprisingly this led to the streets of the cities being lined with fast food chains like Jolibee, McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's, Cinnabon, Pizza Hut, etc. The only chain missing from that list was Subway Sandwiches. Which seemed kind of logical since the Philippinos didn't like bread or salad or anything fresh for that matter. For us, however, eating right had been one of the main sources of physical well-being on our trip. Needless to say, food-wise at least, we didn't have the best time.

This was especially true during the first few days we spent on Negros. We flew into Bacolod from Hanoi and traveled to Dauin for a workaway gig at a local dive center. The place sounded fantastic. It was founded by an American guy who wanted the locals to learn about environmentalism and acquire the skills necessary to make a living as a dive guide and or instructor. He financed the whole thing by inviting Westerners to Dauin and charging them reduced prices for dives and certificates if they were willing to help out around his shop. Unfortunately the place didn't meet the expectations. Not at all.

The living conditions that the guy had described as "rough" turned out to be unbearable at best. In more than ten months on the road we hadn't seen an accommodation that was equally tiny and overcrowded (10 people were sleeping on bunk beds on less than 8m2 of space), equally crammed full of people's cloths and personal things (there was no space for the people's backpacks and belongings so everything was being tossed all over the place), equally gross and sticky (there were countless ants crawling through little piles of sand and garbage) and equally smelly (the toilet was built into the room, had probably never been cleaned and was only separated from the beds with a shower curtain). How the eight remaining volunteers, all of whom were brought up in Western civilizations, could live under circumstances that were noticeably worse than those in the poorest families' bamboo huts, will always be a mystery to us.

Needless to say, the next morning we grabbed our stuff and practically ran out of there. And once we had crossed the sea gate to Siquijor the Philippines finally started to keep their promises. The island was exactly what we expected. It gave us palm trees overlooking paper-white beaches, turquoise and crystal clear water, scooter rides through the lushest jungle imaginable and more than 12 hours of sunshine per day. Plus it was a little more touristy than Negros, which meant that there were restaurants and food joints catering to Western travelers' needs (i.e. they didn't only serve deep fried meat and sides). In fact, there was only one thing that didn't go entirely smooth: this local old man cut us off when we were riding our motorbike, I hit the breaks and our rear wheel slipped away. Luckily we were going slow at the time and thus only got a few minor scrapes when we fell on the side. Still, we couldn't go in the water on our last day. Disaster, right?

The rain started when we left Siquijor. And it didn't stop for two weeks. We sat in the common area of our hostel on Panglao Island and planned our travels in Japan. We met with Babsi and Lukas, the Austrian couple we had met in Vietnam, on Bohol Island and played cards. We went to Moalboal on Cebu Island where I spent the majority of my time preparing the release of the full-grown band-versions of the project's songs. Except for a few short walks on the beach and a very wet excursion to the Chocolate Hills on Bohol Island we barely left our various bungalows. Instead we engaged in an activity that seemed to be quite common during a rainy period in the Philippines: drinking rum. Not a bad thing to do at less than 2€ per liter.

On Cebu Island we spent a week in a two-floor bungalow with its own kitchen. We went to the market and to the mall to buy groceries for a few days. We stayed in and looked at the rain falling outside, me behind my laptop working on the project's music and visuals, Lea conducting fancy food experiments in the kitchen (she even figured out how to bake our own bread in that broken pan we had). It felt exactly like being back at our flat in Hamburg. Well, except for the palm trees in our backyard and the ocean view from our windows.

The rain stopped about a week before we had to catch our flight to Japan. And it was a good thing that it did. After all we had come to the Philippines not only to visit the country, but to try out diving and eventually get our Open Water Dive Certificates. This plan was in serious jeopardy as we were both feeling under the weather. Lea had caught a full-grown cold and even popped antibiotics during our last few days. On our last day she tried and managed to survive an hour of snorkeling. But apparently fate had decided that this was about enough underwater-fun for her.

When it became clear that she wouldn't get better we decided that I should go ahead and do my Open Water Dive Course without her. I spent the last four days in the Philippines either in the offices of a local dive shop to learn about the theory and do the final exam, or I spent them under water with two fellow travelers from Austria and Sweden and our German dive instructor Peter. Sitting on the ground of the ocean in a depth of about 3 meters was just as terrifying as it was amazing. It was a special perk of doing the course at this dive shop that they didn't do the exercises in a swimming pool but went out into the ocean right away. This meant seeing all sorts of marine life, from corals to crabs to fishes of all sizes and colors to giant sea turtles while practicing our breathing and our buoyancy in the shallower depth of the school's house reef.

However, I was still recovering from a minor cold and although I hardly felt any impact when being on the surface, as soon as I tried to descend into deeper waters and equalize my ears I had severe problems. One day my ears started to hurt so bad that I had to abort the dive and float on the surface, waiting for the others to return from a depth of about 15 meters. It was weird and scary and amazing that at 31 I would have to re-think and re-feel everything I thought I knew about sensing a blockage in my nostrils. In the end I managed to push through and finish the course right on time. This was mostly possible because Peter allowed me to take a long rest and re-do my last missing dive to a little more than 18 meters of depth after the others had already finished the course. The things I saw on that dive alone were worth all the trouble and the money. Coral fans standing out from the reef and waving back and forth in the current; sea turtles of more than one-and-a-half meters in diameter swimming right above my head; spiraling swarms of sardines that were so tremendously huge that they covered the sun and enwrapped everything in a black darkness; all sorts of fishes looking at me with their empty eyes. The underwater world is nothing short of marvellous! And I'm glad that I can now go and discover it anywhere in the world.