Wednesday, February 10 (2)

The first week or two of our trip to the Philippines fell in to its usual pattern: a few days with Geoff and Chit in Manila followed by some time with Kit in Calamba.  Each host tries hard to find something interesting for us to do and this time was no different.  Chit flew out on our first night there on an inaugural PAL flight to New Zealand so it was left to Geoff to plan our visit.

We had a number of meals out, a Xmas party with an Expat group he belongs to and a trip to the movies, but the highlight was a visit to a relatively new enterprise being set up in an area called Bataan.  Bataan is almost a sacred site in the Philippines as it is where a forced march took place during WW2.  It's called the Bataan Death March and has the same significance for filipinos and Americans as the marches we commemorate, like Sandakan or the Burma Railway.

A wealthy businessman has taken upon himself the task of obtaining, dismantling and re-building some of the most historic houses from Old Manila.  He has a huge expanse of land and, it seems, unlimited funds.  The houses are wonderful and his plans are monumental (that sounds suspiciously like a pun).  You can stay in a re-built hotel or book a complete house with room for 16, including a grand piano and a butler.  

Because we had arrived in December, there was a lot of Christmas activities to enjoy.  One of the best was an end-of-year performance by students of the University of the Philippines.  It was based on traditional filipino cultural dances and blew us away.  We were fortunate that Kit was also hosting an exchange student from France and she was keen to show him as much filipino culture as possible.  We were happy to tag along.

I've become a little obsessed with my weight since losing so much and have got into the habit of weighing myself before bed and again in the morning.  I'm amazed that I can lose up to 2Kg overnight.  Even though I'm also prone to get up in the middle of the night for a trip to the bathroom, it;s hard to explain.  I'm told that, when we lose weight, it removes itself from the body in the form of carbon dioxide but 2Kg is an awful lot of gas.  No wonder we're struggling with climate change if all the people on diets are generating 2 Kg of ozone-layer-attacking gas, every night!