{"id":1396,"date":"2016-05-21T07:28:32","date_gmt":"2016-05-21T14:28:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/?p=1396"},"modified":"2016-05-21T07:28:32","modified_gmt":"2016-05-21T14:28:32","slug":"this-is-how-filipinos-greet-strangers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/2016\/05\/this-is-how-filipinos-greet-strangers\/","title":{"rendered":"This is how Filipinos greet strangers"},"content":{"rendered":"

I travel a lot. Everyone who knows me knows that. But ever time I embark on a new trip, I forget how exhilarating it is to finally land at my destination. In the last couple seconds of flight, I couldn\u2019t help but grin, I\u2019m here! I\u2019m in Manila!<\/span><\/p>\n

My plan originally was to find the shuttle to my hotel, but I did exactly what anyone would tell you not to do: hop into a car with a stranger. Mom and Dad, I know you\u2019re probably freaking out right now, so let me explain\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

During my flight, I was sitting next to a Filipino lady who invited me to dinner with her friends after arriving. I have yet to regret any impulse plan I\u2019ve made, so here I go.<\/span><\/p>\n

After dropping my bags at the hotel, we sat into the car and started driving. I knew not where, but looking around, I was astounded to witness the craziness of traffic: motorcyclists passing inches away from the side of the car and in between trucks with only a couple of feet between them. The surprise vehicle of the day was a truck full of sleepy-looking chickens. <\/span><\/p>\n

\"sleepy<\/p>\n

Construction even at 9pm on a Friday night made the roads even more unpredictable, with lanes shut down, traffic going every which way, cars and Jeepnis* stuffed with breathing bodies, with some more hanging on the roof. As the cherry on top, we were forced to avoid the not so occasional pedestrian popping out of nowhere.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Jeepni\"<\/p>\n

Regardless of the kind of situation that would drive any American up the wall, everywhere I looked, the Filipinos were smiling, even laughing: no sign of any road rage! Perhaps it has just become the status quo. I have much respect for them.<\/span><\/p>\n

My new friends and I arrived at our destination after about one hour: it was a Filipino restaurant attached to a meat\/fish, or “wet” market as they call it. This was the first time I had witnessed this sort of arrangement. We went over to the market, picked out crabs (they were still moving!!), shrimp, and fish to be cooked to order for us.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Wet<\/p>\n

The live music started as we sat down, and had a round of mango shakes. Wow. I can never go back to US mangoes. These shakes, made exclusively of ice and mangoes were the best pick me up: flavorful and sweet, perfect as jet lag was kicking in.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Mango<\/p>\n

By the end of the night, I felt humbled by the incredible hospitality of these ladies, especially when I told them I came to help out the community in Tacloban as part of the post-typhoon efforts. They thanked me for helping out their people, paid for my part of the food, and even drove me home afterwards. With a large smile, I hit the bed like a log and slept until awoken in a confused daze by housekeeping knocking on my door. (It was 11am). <\/span><\/p>\n

*Jeepnis are the method of public transport in the Philippines. They are like a Jeep from the 1990s, but extended in the back like a bus with no windows, and usually fit from one to 20 people, or more if the roof is used.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I travel a lot. Everyone who knows me knows that. But ever time I embark on a new trip, I forget how exhilarating it is to finally land at my destination. In the last couple seconds of flight, I couldn\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,204],"tags":[200,86,208,88,205,206,32,207],"class_list":["post-1396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-events","category-iesc","tag-200","tag-airport","tag-fish","tag-friends","tag-iesc","tag-philippines","tag-sleep","tag-traffic","clearfix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1396"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1396\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1402,"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1396\/revisions\/1402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ildikototh.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}