Villa Escuderos

After we woke we traveled by Jeepney, tricycle, bus and tricycle to a place called Villa Escuderos (spelling may be wrong). This is a home of a rich family and huge coconut plantation that is now open to the public. The grounds are open, not the house.

Here we went to the family museum, wandered around the gardens, rode on a cart pulled by water buffalo while being sung to, had a snack and rode on a raft made by only 4 or 5 pieces of bamboo.

We then had lunch in a restaurant at the base of a manmade waterfall (the dam that held back the manmade lake that we went on the raft on) where the tables were in the water and so as we ate we had our feet in the water.

Then there was a cultural show with dance and music from various regions of the Philippines .

We traveled back to Los Banos and went to visit some of Donna's friends but they were not in. Others from IRRI were away because it was the Christmas holiday. So we decided to go to the cinema in Manila . It took a long time to get a bus to go there. Finally we had a minibus. They have a system where companies take minibuses to various places like a taxi but they wait until it is full before they go. That way the price per person is low but we had to wait a while. Once we were moving the journey was quick - about 50 minutes.

When we got to the area, Alabang, where there were big shopping centres and a big modern cinema we found that today was a special day that only Filipino language films were being shown. So, we had a meal and drinks in a Mexican restaurant/bar instead and then went back to Los Banos. We slept there and next morning it was time for me to get my plane.

we had breakfast in a fast food chicken place called Max's and then got the bus (a normal one) to Manila and a taxi from the bus stop to the airport. It was a long queue to get into the airport and to check in but that was about that. The journey was uneventful and by the evening I was in Dhaka after less than an hours stop in Singapore .

In Dhaka passport control was quicker than usual as if they knew what they were doing and the new improved exit from the airport was complete. The only problem was the lobg wait for baggage. The plane had landed at 8:40pm but it was 10:10pm before I had my bags. I even heard them announce that the plane I'd arrived on was leaving with it's new set of passengers. But tehre were some people in the airport I knew who were also returning from Christmas in the Philippines .

Outside the airport Badul, my driver, was waiting and took me home. The apartment looked beautiful except for a thick layer of dust that accumulated. Home.