December 28th Blog Post

Started today waking up at 6am. We arrived late last night in the Philippines and got around four hours of sleep after being awake for 24+ hours flying. Breakfast included some fried eggs, cereal, white toast with a choice of PB and Jelly, an interesting red colored sweet pork sausage, watermelon, coffee, and yogurt. As I walked out of the mens

sleeping cabin I was greeted by a few stray cats and a very noisy street packed with people, cars that never stop honking, motorcycles, and other vehicles. There are Jeepneys which are vehicles left by the American military now functioning as group open air taxis. After breakfast we loaded up the coach bus and headed to St. Lukes hospital for a tour. This hospital was the first in the Philippines to be accredited by the Joint Commission. Their next goal is to be awarded magnet status. We were able to see many different types of floors. Lunchtime came next at a restaurant called Abe. We ordered multiple large family sized plates and passed them around for everyone to share. Lunch included Lumpia which is young coconut stacks with carrots in a wrap (similar to spring roll), Pla-Pla (fish) which is tilapia deep fried, roast pork, gising-gising (spicy veggie with coconut milk. Most people ordered a ripe mango shake, pineapple shake, tamarind shake, or watermelon shake. For desert we had Halo-Halo which includes sweetened fruits, purple yams, beans and ice cream. After lunch we went to 'Market Market' and exchanged our American dollars into Pesos (1 American dollar=47 pesos) and went shopping. One of the favorites of the market are pearls. They are much less expensive than in the U.S. After the market we headed back to the college and ate dinner. We ate pasta and banana egg rolls. After dinner everyone headed to bed around 8pm to get some well needed rest. By: Luke McKenzie