MANILA

Everytime on business trip, since the airplane fly past the Philippine sea, my eyes are concentrated on the screen of the satellite. Philippine is amazing lands of thousands islands. Especially, Manila appears with its luxury image. I wonder how Filipino can build their capital imposing like that.

This time, I have chance to visit Manila, in two different angles certainly, the rich and the poor.

Once I had a short talk with a Filipino student about the comparision of developmental speed between Manila and Ho Chi Minh City, he praised HCMC is potential city about economic, is the destination of many investers included him in the near future …lol. He said that Manila is the only place has this showy appearance, other provinces are poor. I agree with him about this view after a period of time I stay in Philippine. Even the distance between the rich and the poor in Manila is very long. Many poor people in this capital unable to earn 1usd per day.

Most of girls in Manila get married with Western boys and they still live in luxury Manila. Infrastructure of Manila is well - invested by Philippine government. In someway, you can enjoy everything there if you have a lot of money.

Manila was colony of Spain for over three centuries from 1565 to 1898, occupied by Great Britain for two years from 1762 – 1764. In 1899, the United States purchase the Philippine from Spain and colonized the whole Philippine until 1946. After a long time being the colony of many capital countries, culture and people are almost liken with western countries. The original native Filipino is small and unsight, but Filipino nowadays is mixed beauty with Spanish, Great Britain and Mexican a lot. This would be an advantage for Filipino in beauty contest.

National Museum of Philippine

I was really impressed with the map of trading of Manila. Manila was famous with oversea trading which lasted for three centuries and brought the goods as far as Mexico all the way to South East Asia.

Spanish Zone

Spanish Architecture

Near Manila Bay, Luzon

People do exercise in the early morning

This is the biggest mall of Asia

This is Pearl Market. I bought some sets of pearl jewelry for mum and rerlatives.

Must admit that I didn’t like traditional food in Philippine. I tried to taste several times, but still unable to enjoy it easily like others, except for Halo – Halo (sweetened porridge) and mango-juice.

Hence, Mac Donal, Jollybee and Chowking became my unwilling friends. Among of them, foods in Chowking seemed the most suitable thing for me to survive during the time I stayed In Philippine.

I wandered on streets on the daytime and joined in eventful activities in the nighttime at the area for the rich.

This is Greenhills, famous area for luxuries goods.

Boxing is the favourite sport Filipino loves, even more than football

Hehe… shopping is integral part of any trips

Looking for gifts for mum

A big problems in Manila is traffic jam. It’s extremely difficult to catch a taxi here. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry since I couldn’t catch the taxi to the airport for domestic flights. It was terrible moments to be jammed in that mess.

@ 23 May 2009