This morning (Saturday) when I woke up I felt like I had
just been shot through a long tunnel and popped out in Manila. I think it is
the same feeling Captain Kirk had when he was "beamed down" from the starship
Enterprise onto a planet. I guess that the feeling is more from the long
trip than from crossing the dateline.
Our trip was three legs: Austin to LA (3 hours),
LA to Tokyo (11 hours), and then Tokyo to Manila (4.5 hours). With the layovers
we were on the road for 24 hours. We left Austin early on Thursday morning and
arrived in Manila Friday night. Somewhere in there we crossed the International
Dateline and lost a day. I cannot seem to wrap my head around it, but when I
look at my iPad it says that it is yesterday.... so I guess I am living in
tomorrow. I wish I could explain it better than that. In Tokyo I saw this interesting sign on the wall of the bathroom stall.
At the airport we were met by our friend,
Maricel and Sister Ann (a nun), who took us to the retreat center for the
Religious Sisters of the Virgin Mary (RVM) in new Manila. We were surprised to
find out that we would each have a separate room with a single bed! So, we woke
up the next morning on our 39th wedding anniversary in our separate rooms! What
an adventure it has been to be married to Steve!!
Traveling this way is the best! We are tourists and foreigners, but we have a
connection to people who actually live here. We don’t stay in luxury hotels,
but we have really interesting experiences where we stay.
Here are some things that happened in the first
day:
- Waking up to the crowing of a rooster that lives at the retreat center
- Eating breakfast (an apple, a roll with bacon flavored mayonaise, nescafe) with Sister Ann
- Being greeted with a Welcome song by three young nuns
- Meeting many friends of our friend and being treated so warmly
- Observing all sorts of strange transportation (jeepney, motorcycle with sidecar that holds 3 or 4 people)
Tomorrow’s
blog will be about a visit to a part of Manila that most tourists do not visit.
