Manila = Madness

Manila was one big shit-show of us having absolutely no idea where we were going, or what part of the city we were in, or if we were gonna get killed immanently, etc. I had been to cheap to buy a guidebook, so we literally had no idea where we were, I didn't even know that manila is several cities and not one city with a main downtown, which made things a little interesting for trying to figure out where to go.

We finally found somewhere to stay for the night after wandering aimlessly for 45 minutes, and went to the nearby ladybar to watch the inauguration / get a beer.. I was exhausted so I wanted to go to sleep stat, but Liam really really wanted a beer and didn't want to go to a ladybar by himself, as he had already been propositioned a few times, so he dragged me down for protection, I watched the inauguration, which I've never seen before, I'm a bad American, so I gues it was a good educational experience.

The next day we bought tickets to Cebu on the ferry, and then went on an oddessy through what I think must have been all of manila's malls to find Liam a surfboard. After what seemed like eons of wandering around in circles totally lost among the ice rinks and Jollibees, (I hate malls) we finally found a place with surfboards and ended the agony.


Taco!!

I found cheetos at 7-11 for the first time in 6 months!!! this picture is my idea of pure happiness

Ferry to Cebu
Pretty sunset
Typical of the philippines. They were also testing guns off the side of the boat for about three hours on the way down. Pretty ridic.

Fighting cocks are alowed on the boat. No other livestock. Or wellwishers.


Prettttttyyyy

Epic Journey to Koh Tao

After NYE / Full Moon partties, the main concern of the majority of party goers is to get off of koh phagnan with all due haste and go into rehab for at least four days. We were no exception, so we headed to the dock on the 2nd along with the other hundreds of people fleeing the scene, hoping to get a boat to Koh Tao. We arrived at the dock at 12 for a 1 pm boat -the boat was late, very late, one day late.

They kept pushing back the departure time until finally at 9pm they told us to go home bc it wasn't coming. So hundreds of us had sat on the dock for nine hours, eating pancakes and being subjected to the this horrible tune from an ice cream truck and all for nothing. The tune of the ice cream truck still haunts me. Seriously. We heard it once in the Philippines and we both had flashbacks. Kelly and Maz decided to go to Koh Phi Phi instead, leaving me a bit stranded, but as always I made new friends to travel with pretty quickly. (actualy, other people befriended me, I guess it wasn't really my doing :)

We came back the next day at the same time, to just as much uncedrtainty as the day before: they had stopped selling tickets, people were saying the boats were still canceled etc. Luckily the boat showed, and on time too! The ride there was CRAZY, huge waves, people were crying and wearing life jackets. I was completely soaked by the time we got there from the waves splashing over the rail, but over all it was fuuuun.

Koh Tao was the same as usual, pretty chill, good food and good times at choppers and lotus. Deon (one of the aussies) managed to split his head open and luckily coops was there because simo wanted to put band aids on it since he though going to the hospital would be too expensive. Coops knew you don't fuck around with head wounds so he took Deon to the clinic and 20 stitches later he hadn't died and was able to party the next night. champion.

Only picture taken by anyone I think....

My bag got stolen at lotus one night so I lost my camera, cell phone and liam's cell phone, which I feel a bit bad about, but whatevs, put shit in my bag at your own risk.