Seriously?

"Shit happens. Doesn't mean you have to step in it.
But if you do I would buy a new pair of shoes."

~Kilburn Hall, American author

While he was in Manila, my cousin (see yesterday's post) stayed with us and spent some time walking up and down the main street of our neighborhood checking out its myriad small restaurants and shops. When he saw this sign, he had to take a photo just to prove that it really exists. It's in Tagalog/Filipino and says, "Throwing shit here is not allowed." Why the sign is necessary, I don't think I want to know.

The smaller green and blue sign lists the phone number of a tubero (plumber) named Rey. Someone told me that these tubero aren't really plumbers, though. They supposedly provide a wholly different kind of service—which I am not willing to describe here. Whether that's true or not, I will never find out. Even if they were real plumbers, I wouldn't call someone who advertises by nailing an ugly handpainted sign on a tree.  • PHOTO BY JOSE

Sharp objections

Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process,
gradually changing opinions,
slowly eroding old barriers,
quietly building new structures.

~ John F. Kennedy

Despite the presence of the Mendiola Peace Arch (see yesterday's post), barbed wire barricades are still clustered around the gate leading to the district around Malacañang Palace, the official residence of the President of the Philippines, ready to be deployed at any time.

Hope for peace

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible
will make violent revolution inevitable."

~ John F. Kennedy, Remarks on the first anniversary of the Alliance for Progress,
13 March 1962

Mendiola Street in the City of Manila has been the site of many protests—some of them violent and bloody—against the government because of its proximity to Malacañang Palace, the official residence of the President of the Philippines. It is also within the informal district known as the University Belt, so named because of its high concentration of colleges and universities. In 2010, the schools around Mendiola Street, including Centro Escolar University in the background, pooled their resources to build the Mendiola Peace Arch. The consortium hopes that the arch will remind protestors that the area is also the home of many schools and will encourage them to conduct their rallies in a peaceful manner.

Tiny icy panes

CITY DAILY PHOTO THEME DAY: STREET LAMPS • The street lamp in front of The Wedding Lounge is probably part of the design of the RFM Corporate Center building, where it is located. It seems too low and too small—more decorative than utilitarian—to have been placed there by the city of Mandaluyong. Unless that little lamp is fitted with a very strong light bulb.

Twenty for half

An itinerant fruit vendor on the sidewalk outside the Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish church was selling green mangoes, sampaloc (tamarind), and kamote (sweet potato). Green mangoes are sour and those who like them eat them with bagoong (fish or shrimp paste) or sea salt. Tamarind is also sour but it can be candied, and the fruit is also used for the soup base of one of our most popular dishes, sinigang. It was the tamarind that was selling for twenty pesos (less than 50 US cents) for half a kilo.

No vendors allowed here!

Vendors outside the Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish church selling peanuts, corn, dried fish, suman and kakanin (Filipino delicacies usually made out of sticky rice), and palabok (a rice noodle dish). I guess the church's rule against vendors isn't very strict.

Love triangle

Carlo loves Jane, and so does Cherry. I wonder who Jane loves.

Games (street) children play

What looks like a checkers-like game with the board marked on the sidewalk and bottle caps as playing pieces. It was beside a restaurant, so it is probably played by watch-your-car-boys. Unfortunately, there is a big possibility that gambling is involved. Smoking definitely is.

At your own risk

CITY DAILY PHOTO THEME DAY: PEDESTRIANS CROSSING • A few people use the pedestrian crossing on Buendia Avenue near the corner of Taft Avenue (both major roads in the City of Manila and the site of two light rail stations), but they are more the exception than the rule. Most drivers don't mind the crossing either.

What a mess!

How our utility men can make sense of this jumble of cables—power, phone, cable TV, internet—I have no idea.

Bump

 
During weekends, all the roads which lead to SM Megamall, which has three other malls nearby (Shangri-la Plaza, St. Francis Square and Robinson's Galleria), have bumper to bumper traffic. In Manila, the phrase is almost literal because only a foot or two separate cars from each other.

Red plastic

CITY DAILY PHOTO THEME DAY: CAFE CHAIRS • Nothing pretty today, just some of those uncomfortable plastic monobloc chairs. At least they're a cheery, cherry red, and not the plain white ones that get so dirty-looking after only a few weeks. Metro Manila has lots of these tiny, streetside eateries which we call carinderia or turo-turo (from turo, to point, because that's all you have to do to tell the server what you want to eat), especially around public transportation terminals, whether for taxis, buses, jeepneys or tricycles. Obviously, you won't find them in posh neighborhoods.

The colonel

The balcony on the second floor of the Regis Center wraps around two sides. Yesterday's photo was the view from the building's long, main side on Katipunan Avenue. The view from the shorter side on Fabian dela Rosa Street is that of a 24-hour, 2-story KFC (and some of the thick utility cables which give the Regis Center its power). Many of the KFC branches in Metro Manila also deliver, and this one does. How about the ones in your city?

Across the street

And this is a view of the northern end of the Ateneo de Manila University from the Regis Center. The red-roofed building is the Ricardo and Dr. Rosita Leong Hall, the home of the School of Social Sciences. The field on the left, which is separated from the property of Miriam College by a tiny creek, is soon going to be developed for the museum, theaters and offices of the university's arts and creativity hub.

The road to temptation

I don't know if the owners of the Regis Center (see yesterday's post) paid for it or not, but the footbridge across Katipunan Avenue between Ateneo de Manila University and Miriam College now has an extension that leads directly towards the commercial building. I just wish the kids wouldn't leave their trash on it, no matter how neatly they set it down.

Walk!

Back in October, I posted a photo of a portion of the concrete sidewalks in the Ateneo de Manila University. Just three months later, that same sidewalk is now wider and paved with bricks. The workers aren't quite finished with the entire university yet, but they're getting there. I love it.

Orange

Near the entrance of an alley which leads to a poor community, the water meters of a row of apartments are locked in a metal cage whose base is cemented into the ground. The cage helps prevent three things: coconuts falling on and damaging the exposed pipes, illegal tapping into the water line, and stealing of the steel meters for resale.

Walking on fire

A flame tree blossom-covered sidewalk at the Ateneo de Manila University.

Stepping into history

Calle Crisologo is the best-preserved Spanish colonial era cobblestone street in Vigan, Ilocos Sur. Most of the houses have been turned into shops, cafés and inns, but a few family residences—which still contain their original furniture and artwork—have been opened to the public as museums. Calle Crisologo is closed to cars but pedestrians still have to share the street with horse-drawn carriages.

Still necessary

A metal fence separating the loading bay for public transportation and the highway has a sign which says "Walk and wait on the sidewalk. Not on the road." Both commuters and drivers of public transport here need to be constantly reminded of this. And if no government personnel is around to enforce the rules, they usually don't get followed anyway, with public transport vehicles taking on passengers in the middle of the road.