Intramuros is a key historical site for the Filipino people, an original part it of the Spanish colonial city, once the pride of the Spanish empire, but with only a small part remaining due to bombing during WWII.
We meet up with RC Paranaque Central at Starbucks - which is great as the free WiFi allows us to contact our families on Dane's iPad. We also meet our new host briefly as we swap cars and luggage.
If you don't hear from us for a while we have simply hopped into some random car and Filipino hospitality being what it is the unsuspecting family has probably taken us home and looked after us.
Once at Intramuros we meet with the Undersecretary for Tourism Regulation, Co-ordination, & Resource Generation - it seems tourism faces many similar issues in the Philippines as it does in Australia, infrastructure, competition, and maintaining appropriate standards to meet the expectation of visitors.
Once we leave the office we are taken on the Jose Rizal tour. Jose Rizal is the hero of the Filipino people, an intellectual and writer, who was eventually executed by the Spanish for his treason against the colonisers.
As part of the tour we are transported around the site by Kalesa, a small horse drawn carriage, with an even smaller horse, probably only 12 hands high at best (a pony) and very skinny. The carriages, and the poor horse, are not designed for 5 Australians and the tour guide....
We went on to tour Casa Manila, a reproduction of a typical home during colonisation, which included some antique furniture, the features of which were pointed out by our dynamic guide by laying his hands on it and at one point even a boot!
We were treated to lunch at Barbara's restaurant, complete with a chandelier in the bathroom and a three man band that serenaded us with their interpretation Waltzing Matilda.
We then loaded up in our respect vehicles, with my Rotary host, Gerry Morales, negotiating the Manila traffic driving a manual vehicle and juggling two mobile phones as he attempted to manage a shipment from Shanghi. We are rapidly coming to the conclusion that Manila drivers are the best in the world.
We arrive a the Mall of Asia for some quick shopping, or in Jo and Frank's case, ice skating, before attending the End Polio lighting of the globe in front of the mall.
Jo wins Anim today, as the ice skating rink was cleared to enable a machine to come on and do some maintenance, but Jo didn't hear the announcement and kept skating until she noticed the staff getting a bit excited and the machine following her!
The lighting the globe was big event with Rotary with all districts represented by club members in uniforms and complete with war chants.
More photos, with some people it seems taking photos simple because others were.
Diner in a Japanese restaurant and then on to our new host families. Once again we are made welcome and feel completely at home with our new Filipino families.
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