bisita iglesia (part 1)

On Easter Sunday (March 23), we went on a road trip. Before I even left the US, we had already planned to do bisita iglesia on this day. Literally, bisita iglesia means church visit but, more accurately in sentiment, it is more like church hopping. When I was growing up, this was something that we used to do (that is, when I was allowed to go) on Holy Thursday. After dinner, we would visit 5 (I think) churches, and we would pray a mystery of the rosary at each church. I remember it as being a fun event, maybe because it was at night and I was a little girl who was being allowed to go with the young men and women.

So, for Easter, we had planned a whole day of visiting old churches. I was excited about this because it was a road trip and because we get to see old churches (and I like architecture). In the Philippines, where old buildings were primarily built of wood, the churches are pretty much the oldest buildings still standing. And there’s really something about visiting ancient, sacred places...

Our original travel partners (including the car owner/driver) backed out at the last minute, but we fortunately still had access to my uncle’s vehicle and driver. So, the day before, we asked someone else to join us and we did some research at Fully Booked and on the Internet. With our map and lists of destinations, we were set. [find map]

We woke up at 5am, so we could shower, eat breakfast and leave by 6:30am. After picking up our new travel companion, we were on our way to doing a loop of Laguna de Bay. But, before we did so and since it was on our way, we passed by Antipolo Church, which is dedicated to Nuestra Señora de la Paz y Buen Viaje (Our Lady of Peace and Good Voyage). This church is very well-known in the Philippines, and many people make pilgrimages there. Our Lady of Antipolo is an icon, especially in Luzon, as are the dried flower leis that you buy there. As it was Easter Sunday, it was crowded. Mass had just started (before the first reading) when we got there just after 7am, and the church was overflowing. We didn’t get a chance to take pictures of the façade of the church, but we took some of the inside.

We proceeded to three town churches that are pretty close to each other: Morong, Baras, and Tanay. As with all of the churches we visited on this day, these churches were built in the 17th and 18th centuries but, due to fires, earthquakes, they have been reconstructed or added on to. It’s difficult to make out which portions are original, so I’m including on here the pictures that we took of the historical markers. You can figure out how old these churches really are.

When we got to Morong, services were also under way (it was the offertory when we got there and communion when we left). There were churchgoers in pews outside, on the side of the church. The most striking part of the church is actually the belfry but that actually was added in the mid-19th century, 200 years after the original church.



We got to Baras between church services. I really liked the look and feel of this church. After Morong, this one seems so much older and off-the-beaten-path. Our driver said that he knew about Morong and Tanay, but he didn’t know about Baras. (Our map actually has asterisks for some of the churches on our lists, including Antipolo, Morong, Tanay, and couple of others. I think that means they are well-known and/or bigger churches.) But maybe the fact that it wasn’t crowded with churchgoers enabled us to enjoy it more. I liked the façade of the church, as well as the altar. I also liked the festive plastic streamers that lead to the church; these indicate that it is or almost the town’s fiesta or feast day.


When we got to Tanay, it was about 9:30am (if the clock inside the church in the picture is right), and it was already getting quite hot. Church was also underway. The altar is gilded and quite ornate. There is an inner courtyard, where some people were listening to the services. We didn’t stay there too long.


(This is just the beginning of our day, so there will be one or two more parts coming, but I'm not sure I'll be able to post before we leave for the Mountain Province tonight. And I don't think I'm posting when I'm up there.)

oh, the good life...

On Saturday (March 22), tempting as it was to stay in again, we proceeded with our plans. I had brought cheap ($1) kites from the US, and we wanted to fly them at the University of the Philippines campus. My companion had tried flying one from the balcony of our 21st floor apartment, and it was sturdy. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much wind, so we couldn’t actually fly our kites. Not that I really tried. But my friend was running around trying to get it up in the air. When she did get it to fly high, she ran out of string. (We shall have to add more string to our kites.) I mostly just sat around. We also people watched and, later, ate snacks. My friend had taho (soybean curd with sago or tapioca on top), and I had banana-cue.





After lunch, we went back to The Fort. I had wanted to do high tea at Tea & Therapy. It didn’t live up to my expectations, though. Some of the finger sandwiches/savory stuff were good. We had grilled soba in curry soup, farmers ham and cheese sandwich, grilled salmon and cucumber sandwich, roast beef and caramelized onion sandwich, and Melba toast (with bellpeppers). My favorites were the Melba toast and the soba. The sweet stuff (brownies, cookies, coconut panna cotta, green tea lemon crème brulee, chocolate crème brulee) were not so great, though. Of the cold teas, the peach one was good, but the lychee one was too sweet. The hot teas were lemongrass and rosemary; the rosemary one tasted much better than the lemongrass, though it was too strong later on. I think we were really supposed to have a choice from all their teas of the hot or cold tea we wanted, and that would probably have been better.

We then went to Fully Booked where we did research for the next day’s adventure. On the way to the car, we passed by Xocolat for a cup of hot chocolate. (Ever since I had this cup of decadent hot chocolate—almost like a cup of melted dark chocolate—at Naked Chocolate Café in Philadelphia, I have been wanting to taste it again.) At first, I thought it just tasted like our native hot chocolate. When I drank it later after dinner at home (it was too hot and difficult to drink while in the car), it actually did taste quite good. I’d definitely say it’s up there.

We were supposed to go to Antipolo after The Fort so we could look at the city lights, but it was late and we had a long day ahead of us on Sunday.

food

While at my uncle's house, I was spoiled by the food. Whenever we were ready to eat, the food would already be prepared and on the table. The helpers prepared delicious food despite our dietary stipulations (i.e., I don’t like fish but my friend loves it, while I love pork but my friend doesn’t eat it).

When we arrived from Tagaytay and even though we'd already eaten, there was dinner for us, but I didn't take pictures. On Friday morning, we had quite a spread. We had biko (sweet sticky rice) with sikwate (native hot chocolate)--one of my favorite breakfasts, though I usually have budbud or suman (white sticky rice wrapped in banana leaves), instead of the biko. We also had mini-hotdogs and eggs. And I think there's some fish there for my friend.



For lunch, we had a soup with malunggay (moringa, or horseradish tree leaves--that's the green rounded leaf thing) and calabasa (squash), kinilaw na puso ng saging (heart of the banana, or banana bud, cooked in vinegar), and fish in tomatoes. This meal, at first, presented a bit of a problem for me as I'm a meat eater. We had to ask for some of the meat leftovers. But I did also have the soup and the kinilaw. I'd never had kinilaw before, and it's good!



For dinner, we had a different kind of fish dish (though it kinda looks the same), ampalaya (bittermelon) with eggs and ground pork, and bistek (beef with onions). The ampalaya dish presented a bit of a problem, as I don't like ampalaya and, while my friend likes ampalaya, she doesn't eat anything with pork. But I did eat it, and it wasn't bad; the ampalaya wasn't bitter, so that was good.

On Saturday morning, we had corned beef, eggs, and fish paksiw (vinegary soup). We had sweet and sour meatballs for lunch. We may have had something else, but I didn't take pictures, so I don't know (maybe it's more fish). For dinner, we had corn/egg drop soup, fried chicken wings, fried fish, and leftover kinilaw.



And that's what we ate over two days at my uncle's house. Were we spoiled or what?!

design and relaxation

When I called my uncle, he said that we should stay at his house, but I told him that we already paid for the apartment. He said that we should come over anyway and see the house and decide. So, when we went to his house for dinner, I asked him for a tour. I’d been to his house years ago, but he had bought the adjoining lot since then and extended the house and garden.

He has a beautiful house, and I mean beautiful. I have always liked architecture and interior design, and I could just look at magazines and books on those and daydream (seeing as I don’t have my own house). His house could be featured in one of those magazines. (I think one of his friends actually offered to have his house featured, and he said no. So, I hope he’s okay with my posting a couple of pictures on here.) And the great thing about it is that he designed it himself.

The main design and decor of the house (i.e., the living room, dining room, and master bedroom) is Southeast Asian, with an emphasis on Southeast (instead of Asian, which is often Chinese and Japanese). For example, my uncle explained that the division between the living and dining rooms may look like a pagoda, but he was actually emulating the beam and pillars of a Filipino house (and he used old electric company poles for the pillars). Also, the curtain separating the dining room from the kitchen is actually made from Igorot (a mountain tribe) bahags (loin cloths). I like that about my uncle—I like the fact that he appreciates his own culture and goes with his own vision, instead of subscribing to what’s popular or fashionable.

To highlight the Southeast Asian-ness of the design, he used dark woods in the architectural details and the furniture. The color scheme is primarily brown and orange. The furniture and decorations came from all over: some were bought from throughout the Philippines and Southeast Asia; some were gifts; and some were taken from my grandmother’s house or from other relatives.

The Southeast Asian theme continues outside in the covered patio that has long wooden tables and a bar and in the garden with the native plants and wooden gazebo. The koi pond underneath the gazebo and the related water elements would probably be more Japanese, though. The garden is beautiful and peaceful, with the sound of trickling water and birds. The amazing thing about it is that my uncle didn’t hire anyone to do the landscaping (though it would have been cheap to do so); instead he and another cousin of mine did it themselves.

But the house has all the Western amenities. Every room has heavy duty airconditioning. There are hot showers. There is wifi. The main guest room has an en suite bathroom and looks just like a hotel room, except with bigger closets. There is also a movie room in what used to be the attic, and it opens up to the upstairs patio.

It didn’t take me long to decide that I did want to stay there, even for a few days. It would be like having a vacation within my vacation. I would be in comfort. And I would be pampered, as the meals would be prepared for us. So, after our Tagaytay trip, we went to stay at my uncle’s house.

I wanted to enjoy the house so much that, instead of going out as planned on Friday (March 21), we stayed in instead. We lounged around, watched some movies, and did some work on the computer. When we were hungry, the food was already laid out, and we would open to door to the garden, so we could see it and listen to the sounds. It rained a little during the afternoon, and we tried to take pictures of the rain. We thought of taking a bath in the rain, but it wasn’t raining that hard or that long. Plus I didn’t really want to bathe in Manila’s pollution.

When we first visited, the gazebo didn’t have curtains. By the time we returned, it did. On Friday evening, we untied the curtains so that it was more like a mosquito net. There’s a lantay (bamboo bed) in the gazebo, and we were tempted to lay there for a little bit. But it was a bit too warm for me in there. It might have been nice to lay on the grass and look at the stars, but the grass was wet and then we would have to deal with the mosquitoes.

I enjoyed staying at my uncle’s house. I was spoiled while I was there. We are planning to stay there again for a couple of days next month, after our trip to the Mountain Province. It should be a treat, especially after the more basic accommodations up there.

tagaytay

When I saw my uncle on Tuesday, he offered that we stay at his house and take advantage of his car/driver as he and his family weren’t going to be there for a few days anyway. We weren’t sure about staying at his house, but we sure weren’t going to say no to the car/driver. We immediately began to think of places to which we could go. So, on Thursday (March 20), we had the driver pick us up at our apartment at 7am.

We were going to Tagaytay, a tourist destination in the mountains, just an hour away from Manila. But that’s an hour away if there’s no traffic. In the Philippines, people are off from work on Holy Thursday and Good Friday, and most people go home to their provinces during that time. We had hoped that most people had gone home on Wednesday night and that we wouldn’t have much traffic on Thursday morning, but that was not the case. It took us 2 ½ hours to get to Tagaytay.

It was crowded there. What I hadn’t counted on is that Tagaytay is the province so, if people were going home to the provinces, then some of them were going home to Tagaytay. We went to People’s Park, and at 9:30am, it was already full of families having picnics. (This concept of people having fun/vacation during Holy Week is foreign to me, though apparently this is common. I always remembered Holy Week as being such a solemn and religious time for us.) From that vantage point, we saw Taal Lake and Volcano. This is pretty much the view for which people come to Tagaytay.

Taal Volcano is a dormant volcano that is in the middle of Taal Lake. At People’s Park, and everywhere else in Tagaytay, many people offered their boat ride services to the volcano. But, even though, it was already early, it was quite hot already. And, when you get to the volcano, you can only get to the crater either by horse or on foot. Neither my companion nor I were keen on the horses, and I didn’t think I could do the steep walk in my flipflops and in the heat. So, we decided to go have lunch instead and then go to the spa.

We went to Nurture Spa, still in Tagaytay. There were many treatment choices, but as it’s so cheap here, we decided to make the most of it. We got the Kagandahan (Beauty) Treatment, which consists of a one hour massage and a one-hour facial, and added on the one-hour foot spa. We were first led to an open air nipa hut (hut with a roof made of palm leaves), where we had our foot spa. Our feet were soaked for 20 minutes, then scrubbed the rest of the time. As we were hungry (our lunch left a lot to be desired), we had tea and snack while this was going on. Then, we were taken to the massage room, where we got our massage and facials. Afterwards, we were served tea. Mmmm… it felt good. I should really get more while I’m here. Those 3 hours only cost us about $75 per person.



The spa treatments got us hungry again (and plus we had a long drive ahead of us), so we decided to eat again. We ate at Gourmet’s Café, which is an organic restaurant that serves produce from its own farm. You could tour the farm, but we got there too late. The driver ordered some kind of tuna paninni; it looked good. We shared a fruit and nut salad and a pesto calzone. The salad, which had mixed greens, watermelon, mangoes, dried cranberries, and caramelized walnuts with a lychee dressing, was good, but the calzone was just so-so.


Then, we were off to the city. It was a long drive. We didn’t get home til about 8 or so. Another long day.