Bye bye The Philippines

After three weeks I had to say goodbye to this most amazing, surprisingly, beautiful, divers, tropical, sunny country which wasn’t included in my initial travel itinerary but brought under my attention during my trip. I am so please I did visit it – to short – but at least I got a taster of the country which I will add to my ‘countries to visit’ list.

The country is heavily over populated as the Philippinos find families very important (most of them are Catholic) so they’ll have at least 4 -9 children. Another reason is that in this country the poorer part of the population needs the support from their children when they get older. Despite that the people are organized, willing to help you so things happen and most of it on time. There’s enough transportation to get you where you want with tricycles, jeepneys, bus, train, ferry, boat, van, taxi, motorbikes and planes. The streets are clean everywhere as you’ll see people sweep the streets many times a day; collect litter and recycle this; there are signs not to dump any waste; or asked to be environmentally conscious by signs in the street or in your hotel. But most of all the people are why I do like it so much and who make your stay a dream. It seems that they’re always happy and have a big smile on their face so when you asked them something they most of the time start with laughter before answering your question.  There is always someone who will help you or if they see that you look lost they will come over and say: where do you need to go? Once my travel companion hurt her leg while on a motor bike and people literally were pointing at her leg or stopping her to ask what happened and suggestion she had to go to the hospital. In the end she just had to put a band aid over it to avoid all these questions.
Many times people walked with me to a train station and waited till I bought a ticket to make sure I was safe and heading for the right direction. I never felt unsafe, vulnerable or that someone wanted to pull my leg, you could even negotiate reasonably with the taxi drivers regarding your fare.
I could go on for a long time but it all comes down to this; The Philippines and its habitants is an amazing destination and I LOVE it so will return at some point with lots of time and a big smile on my face to enjoy this part of the world again.