Manila and Boracay Island, Philippines

November 13-25

Manila Spirits Final Match - Ringers of Fire vs Shanghai

Manila Mall entertainment - lightweight kickboxing matches

White Beach, Boracay

It is so emboldening stretching the line over fine powdery sand. Doesn't hurt nearly so much to bail off comapred to over the paving bricks in my Seoul apartment's coutyard. I think this is what the inventors of slackline had in mind all along :)

Philippines

Manila, capital city, was an experience rich in apparent disparity between the have-nots and the more fortunates, and also a whole hell of a lot of fun. Justin and I spent the first few nights in Malate, an inner city neighbourhood known for its seedy night clubs and cafes, street kids, and crappy western fried food. The latter, to which I have been (disgracefully) giving into increasingly often, attests to the larger number of obese people than I've observed anywhere else over this last year in Asia. Still no match for North America! Anyways, I digress.....

Towards the end of the week we started hanging in other, much more affluent neighbourhoods with Ultimate Frisbee players who began streaming into town, for the much anticipated Manila Spirits International tournament. A last minute decision had me fitting into a team of Hong Kong players, and heading into my first truly competitive ultimate frisbee event. After each of the 2 sunny, sweaty and muddy days of playing various Asian teams was a seriously wicked party, very demonstrative of the hugely generous, friendly and chilled mentality of Philippine people I've observed so far. This part of town featured houses out of Belair, fresh prince style. A very cool and fortunate introduction to Ultimate, and to the Philippines.

After the tournament, I've found myself with about 15 others from the tournament on an island paradise known as Boracay. This place features beautifully cerulean and warm ocean waters, palm trees, perfect white sand, sweet parties and lots of Korean couples. Something I had forgotten about was that Koreans LOVE to honeymoon at this place, a target clientelle possibly seconded only by western backpackers. So it turns out I STILL can satisfy those late night kimchi cravings. If I were having those, that is. Seriously, this place is beautiful! While I'll keep my date with destiny and a PADI scuba diving cert course for Thailand, I can get lots of work in here on my slackline between palm trees and a new project, skim boarding.