4: Train Poetry

Tuesday, 15 September 2009: V. Mapa -> Recto (LRT 2) / D. Jose (LRT 1) -> Blumentritt (LRT 1) -> Monumento (LRT 1) -> Baclaran (LRT 1) -> EDSA (LRT 1) / Taft (MRT 3) -> Araneta-Cubao

Day 2 of me using and abusing the LRT/MRT Flash Pass (get one for Php250/week...it's worth it if you keep on switching trains!) For the hell of it, I went down Blumentritt Station just to take photographs of the nightscene. Then, headed off to Monumento to start off the end-to-end trip. As I got to Baclaran, I went back in and went down to the EDSA station (to move to the MRT and went from end to end).

The scene in those trains I rode in was surreal. The coaches were half-empty and everyone in there were already in their own baubles, unmindful of anyone else who are stuck there with them; a direct opposite to the packed rush hour trains. And out of this experience, I was able to compose "Observations at the 7:45 PM Train" (Catch is, for you to get to know how that poem goes, you'll have to attend my gigs).

(Photos to come later on)

3: Malls are deathly boring.

Monday, 14 September 2009: Shaw Blvd - Magallanes - EDSA/Taft - Baclaran - United Nations Avenue

However you say it or package it, malls are boring places to go to. Period. This was the day that I got my LRT/MRT Flash Pass, which gives me UNLIMITED train rides for one week for only Php250 at Shaw Boulevard MRT station. Not bad for someone like me who goes to different places unexpectedly.

For quite some time now, I've passed by Magallanes on the MRT and noticed the Alphaland Southgate Mall. I was quite curious about what was in there and how it differed from other malls out there. So, I decided to make a stop there. And boy, was I disappointed. It is just like Greenhills in a smaller package and in a different place. How useless to stop by.

For a moment there, I forgot my personal mantra: MALLS ARE BORING, MALLS ARE USELESS UNLESS I NEED TO BUY STUFF. Well, so much for that.

Next stop was Taft Avenue. For a change, I thought of walking from the Taft MRT station to Baclaran LRT 1 station (yes, those two stations are actually near). The last time I was there (around the Baclaran LRT 1 station) was years back when we supposedly were to have a gig somewhere around Baclaran, got lost, and didn't end up playing the gig anyway. Unfortunately, things haven't changed a bit. Even worse, the underside of the railway has more leaks than a sinking ship, and I was walking on the road due to a non-existent pedestrian walkway that has been taken over by hawkers.

From there, I proceeded on to United Nations Avenue to surprise my girlfriend and didn't disappoint her. :)

2: Silence is unsettling in a populated city

Tuesday, 11 August 2009

After a day being a unpaid employee at a local governing body of a sport, I head on out to Binondo for a long overdue snack that I have been craving for months. Turns out, it wasn't as good as I envisioned it to be. I got disappointed after having a bowl of my favorite Beef Knife Shred Noodles, but it's okay.

When I was having a walk towards the bus stop at Quiapo, I can't help but notice this trend that I've encountered from the last time I took this route. Simply put, it's creepy to walk around the streets of a place where it is very much crowded and noisy by day.

Cases in point: (1) Raon in Manila, (2) Hidalgo, (3) Makati Central Business District [CBD], and (4) Quiapo. Visit these places by day, then stick around until around 10 in the evening to know what I mean.

The idea of a noisy marketplace at night, devoid of the screaming vendors, is just unsettling. Moreover, what kind of denizens would be settling around these places when the sun goes down?

1: You can never go home again.

Thursday, 30 July 2009

This day, I called in sick for my OJT and I just watched UAAP basketball on TV that afternoon. After the games were over, I had to go over to Cherry Foodarama somewhere along Shaw Blvd. to pick up a pair of shoes I had sent in for repairs.

To get there, I had to pass by my old neigborhood (Bgy. Addition Hills) which was a good 5-10 min. walk away from our house.

And there I was.

The street was almost like how it was when I left it a decade ago, however a bit decayed from years of heat and rain and cars passing by. The neigborhood almost looks the same as I left it.

It was around early evening when I reached it, and I saw a familiar face inside a familiar sari-sari store. It was my old friend named Mac-mac. Having a small chit-chat with him revealed that he's been working for quite a while now in a cruise ship that sails along Spain, but is now unemployed. Also, he told me that most of our gang now have kids of their own.

A lot of things have changed after a decade since we moved out of our old apartment, but sometimes the faces don't.

I never got back home again, I went back to a place that is no longer familiar.

PS: Oh yeah, I ended up in Cherry by around a quarter past 7 to find out that the shoe shop was already closed.

06.14.09: introduction

this is a walk around town. this is a blog that i would update whenever i walk around the streets of metropolitan manila in the philippine islands for the hell of it. the stories that i would be posting here are accounts in which a photograph will never come close to giving the trip justice.

though most of the trips i make will be only with bare essentials (footwear, clothing, spare change as bailout money), there will be times that there are accompanying photographs that would give a view of what was the trip.

and now, the journey begins...

-diego