By Delfin Mallari Jr.
Inquirer

SARIAYA, Quezon–With vegetables she herself grows in the cool climate of Mount Banahaw in Quezon for her daily sustenance, Filomena Remojo Relativo is only three years short of hitting the century mark.

Her body is crouched and her face wrinkled from years of hard work, but the old woman still tends her farm planted with vegetables, medicinal herbs and ornamentals.

“I’m not deaf. I can still hear you loud and clear,” Relativo shouts in Filipino in jest during the interview in her house in Barangay Mamala Uno at Banahaw’s base, also known as an abode of divine spirits.

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Ruby de Vera
Inquirer

MANILA, Philippines–Ever since I was little, I’ve had itchy feet. My mother would go crazy looking for me during mealtimes, finding me in some house several blocks away from ours. I’d reason, “I just wanted to see their place.”

All throughout my student life, I was limited to seeing the world within a five-mile radius. Except when I lied through my teeth that I was working on a project, when actually I would be eating at friends’ houses several towns away. I paid dearly for those lies.

When I started earning my own money, suddenly the possibilities exploded. The thought of being able to go anywhere I wanted, as long as I could afford it, was too much that for the first five years of my working life I was almost always broke.

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HONG KONG is such a busy city (I remember being there on a Sunday, wondering why the heck everyone was running up and down the escalators when it was a weekend) that people almost have no time to greet each other, let alone (gasp!) give each other hugs.

These young people want to change that situation.

Check out this video clip from Reuters.

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By Vicente Labro
Inquirer

TACLOBAN CITY, Philippines–Efforts to promote Guiuan, Eastern Samar through a sports competition are paying off as more tourists and adventure lovers are coming down to sample the town’s delights.

Over a hundred surfers from different parts of the country are expected to join the 4th Eastern Samar Surfing Crown: Odyssey Waves Surfing Competition, which will run from Monday until Wednesday.

The three-day surfing event was organized by the provincial government of Eastern Samar headed by Gov. Ben Evardone, municipal government of Guiuan headed by Mayor Analiza Kwan, the Department of Tourism regional office here under Director Karina Rosa Tiopes and the Surfriders Club of Eastern Samar Inc.

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LAGUNA has its own version of Marikina City in this quaint little town called Liliw, famous for its handmade shoes and slippers. Liliw is among a cluster of towns located at the southeastern side of Laguna and sits at the foot of mystical Mount Banahaw, partly hidden by clouds in the picture.

As mentioned in Wikipedia, Liliw has a shoe industry that can rival Marikina. There are two main streets lined with shops like these on both sides. I bought my Grandma two pairs of abaloryo slippers, with sequins and have a soft feathery feel, which I found out from her, can rarely be found elsewhere.

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By Thelma Sioson San Juan
Inquirer

MANY people’s idea of a leisure trip today is going on a wellness pilgrimage.

In the ’80s, futurists predicted that going back to nature and cultivating spirituality and well-being would be the rage in the next decades. While we believed that prediction, we didn’t foresee the paradigm shift such a trend would create in today’s lifestyle.

Today, spas and wellness centers are the new mecca, akin to the shopping mall was in the ’90s. They provide the lifestyle business boom everywhere. Baby boomers — the biggest economic force worldwide — are moving heaven and earth to keep their body and mind fit. Their example is being emulated by generations X and Y.

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By John Silva
Inquirer

MANILA, Philippines–You have to psych yourself for the six-hour bus ride from Baguio to the northern mountaintop town of Sagada.

But, on the road, you don’t figure the added time for the stalled jeep laden with vegetables blocking the road. Or the bus having a flat tire. Or that it wouldn’t start after a pit stop. Or the bus screeching to a halt because of a landslide before it.

We got off the bus and in freezing rain climbed the muddy mound about two-stories high, to slip and slide down the other side to wait for another bus.

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HERE’S interesting news from Bangkok.

The latest fashion craze? The fishskin bikini, made from the skin of the tilapia fish.

Check out this Reuters video.

Hmm, how about our designers, what are they doing with our tilapia?

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By Ronnel Domingo
Inquirer

DAVAO CITY, Philippines–Marco Polo Hotels Management Ltd. is expanding its facilities here with a convention center and additional rooms as Mindanao’s largest city attracts the growing interest of convention organizers and business executives on leisure travel.

Stanley Lau, general manager of Marco Polo Davao, said in an interview the company had not yet set a definite amount to invest but that this was “easily more than P300 million.”

“We are still in talks with building designers, but the owners — the Dominguez family through Halifax Capital Resources Inc. — have given instructions toward expansion as soon as possible,” Lau said. “Money is not an issue.”

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By Augusto Villalon
Inquirer

MANILA, Philippines–Macau is a place of many contradictory realities, all happening simultaneously and almost independently of each other. Confined within a total area of around 25 sq km, the Chinese fishing village and former Portuguese colony is established today as the 21st-century gaming capital of Asia, its future anchored on the massive numbers of visitors attracted by its booming casinos.

Macau is a city in perpetual motion. Las Vegas-type casinos continually pump cash throughout the day and night into already fully loaded city coffers. Money, lots of it, and everything that newly earned wealth can buy is everywhere in abundant Macau today.

“The more the better” is the feeling that new Macau generates, and Macau definitely keeps gathering up more and more of everything.

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