Yesterday afternoon we flew back to Manila from our 24-hour stay in Boracay. I had arranged a few days earlier to get together with Bien Cruz, the quite guapo brother of Luis’ relative Emily who lives a few minutes’ drive from us back in the States. He offered to pick us up from the airport so we had a wonderfully smooth time getting launched back into the Manila urbanopolis. We took him out to the Havana Cafe pub near our newest hotel the Malate Pensionne, after he and his family offered their gracious hospitality at their home in Paranaque City.
We had a couple more highlights in Boracay on Friday. At breakfast, we ran into a friendly group of older gentlemen who spent an hour with us. A dozen of them were preparing for an annual gathering of their Rotary Club group. Two of them even insisted on giving me their phone numbers. Then during a walk on the beach (this time to the south end), we saw two tourists and a local up ahead; the Filipino tourist recognized me from the evening before and asked if we were staying at Orchids Resort. Turns out they are a gay mixed-race couple, 13 years together, not too different from us. They are (recovering) Mormons who met in Salt Lake City and now live in Seattle. Yet another mobile phone number added to my growing list of contacts here!
Luis wanted to recover his sunglasses from our predatious boatman of the day before – he’d tucked them into a life vest and forgot them on departure – so after many text messages back and forth, we were reunited with the glasses. And of course the boatman! We are both enamored of him and his “crew” (three cousins ranging from 17 to 25 years old). We decided to hire them to take us directly to the airport, yet another terrific reminder of how easy it is to arrange for private transport. A sailboat directly from your hotel to the airport, that’s how I always fantasized the way Pacific islanders can live their lives! Alas, most of them can’t afford it – I am forever getting reminded of the gap between haves and have-nots in our world. I’m glad that I am equally comfortable (if not more so) spending time with people at the bottom rungs of the ladder as with those near the top.
This morning we had our Saturday morning coffee-and-newspaper routine at the Figaro Cafe here in Malate. The news is filled with the upcoming Philippine senatorial elections. The business section noted that Smart, one of three major cell phone companies, has reached 25 million subscribers and has coverage reaching 99% of the country’s population. These are numbers that would make American companies stand up and take note. The numbers I like are the subscriber fees and service policies: take those 2-year contracts and 15-cent-per-SMS fees and shove ’em!
On Boracay I noticed a handful of for-sale signs along the commercial strip. Two ideas occurred to me: one, I could buy one of those and open the very first gay guest-house and probably make a killing; two, the local government should buy up as much land as possible to create some public park areas from which street vendors are restricted.
Tomorrow Luis leaves for the States. I have a wide-open agenda, starting with a trip early this coming week to the United Airlines ticket office in Makati City to confirm my return date. Luis suggests a side trip to Baguio. The weather forecast shows rain and chilly weather so I’ll have to look into it some more before deciding. Meanwhile my cell-phone address list full of friendly Filipinos’ numbers beckons!