Duane and Heide Visit the Philippines: 4. The Ride to Baguio and Heide's Reunion

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Hi Everyone,

We're back in Baguio now. It was a long 7 1/2 hour twisty drive up the mountains. Along the road I saw a lot of little shops offering to "Vulcanize" tires. I think there are more vulcanizing places than there are tires to vulcanize. Of course the roads are often so bad that there may be a need for more tire vulcanization.

So far (1) we've gone by van from Manila to Baguio, then (2) bus back to Cavite (near Manila) then (3) took a plane to Iloilo and Passi (Maggie's mansion) then (4) a boat and a 8-hour bus ride to Andy's place in Dumaguete, (5) then plane back north to Quezon City (near Manila) and (6) now we took a bus back to Baguio. Everywhere we saw red posters of a elderly man in a goatee smiling back at us.

How many people in the Philippines relate nostalgically to this old country gentleman from Kentucky?

Or Ronald McDonald leading his people to one of the finest eateries around Baguio? I've come to the conclusion that the Philippines is a military state run by the KFC Clan headed by "Colonel Sanders" with Ronald as his first lieutenant.

Also I feel brainwashed by a continual barrage of red signs stating that "Tanduay is the number 1 rum!" Every other house has this sign as part of an exterior wall that helps hold the place together. Well, at forty-nine cents a bottle, it should be the number one rum!

On the ride back to Baguio, the oddest sign I saw was one announcing that "BOOKS ARE FRIENDLY DRUGS ARE DEADLY". It all blurred together so I read it quickly as "books are friendly drugs" instead of "Books are friendly (period) Drugs are deadly". I had to think about that one afterwards.

The oddest name for a little mom-and-pop store was "DA BOY AND DA GIRL STORE". Is that supposed to be said with a New York accent?

Since my internet access has been spurious at best, I've not been able to "fill in the blanks". So, I'd like to backtrack to the reason for this entire trip-- the Cor-Jessie 50th Reunion of Heide's Nursing Class in Iloilo. For five days we stayed at the Mere Monique Home of the Sisters of St. Paul of Chartres.

Here's Heide reuniting with Sister Angelica, one of her classmates.

And also reuniting with her fellow Cor-Jessie classmates-- almost all came from the states. (One Montreal and one residing in Switzerland.) There were a total of twenty-two who came for the reunion. All are in their seventies and notice not a grey hair in the lot.

The Sisters were totally charming and enjoyable. The meals they served were delicious and exotic. However, I'm not used to dipping my breakfast into rich liquid cocoa early in the morning-- or eating things that looked back at me. But that's ok. I gave all the heads to Heide.