My Philippines Adventure

Saturday, April 19, 2008

Work Trip Part I (Singapore & Malaysia)

I absolutely love Singapore so much! In fact, I think I would even live there. I had been there twice before (once for business school and once for work), so I was very excited to get the opportunity to go again. Rick, my former boss at Moog, and Roger, a colleague at Moog, had been trying to arrange a trip for all of us to visit various gear and machining suppliers throughout Asia. Rick ended up needing to be in Baguio at the end of February, so we decided to arrange our trip around that.

Our first stop was Singapore. I flew into Singapore on the night of 2/17/08. I really enjoy it in Singapore. It's so modern, clean, and at the same time full of culture. I spent my night shopping through one of the many malls and eating some amazing Indian food. Normally I get sick of malls quickly, but it was so nice being able to walk around and not being stared at by everyone like I do in Baguio. It was also nice to see familiar stores. Rick and Roger didn't arrive until early the next morning, so they were pretty tired, but it was so great to see the both of them. Although I had just seen there in early January, it still felt like it had been a long time.

On Tuesday, 2/18/08, we visited one supplier in the morning, and then flew to Malaysia around lunch time to visit one supplier there. Kuala Lumpur is only about a 45 minute flight, so it was just like flying from LA to San Fransisco. I was excited to go to Malaysia, because I had never been there before. Although, we were only there for a few hours, it was great to see a new place, and it was much different than I expected. We only made it to the suburbs, but from what I hear the city of Kuala Lumpur is amazing, so I hope to visit there sometime. We flew back to Singapore that night. After arriving in Singapore, we decided to visit Clarke Quay, a favorite spot for all sorts of nightlife. We chose a "tapas" place for dinner, which was absolutely amazing. One thing everyone loves about Singapore is the food. With living in Baguio, you don't get to experience a lot of variety when it comes to food, so it's always nice to visit Singapore, and experience it. Originally, the plan was to visit suppliers all day on Wednesday, and then fly back to Manila that night. This plan changed once I found out the Singapore Air Show was starting the day we go to Singapore. I had never been to an air and neither had Roger, so we really wanted to work this in our schedule. Also, we heard that the new Airbus A380 plane would be there, and we heard its quite the site. Moog had a booth at the air show, so they left tickets us. Somehow we pulled it off, but we got up early that morning, and managed to visit 4 different supplier locations, and make it to the airshow by lunchtime. The airshow was so exciting. There were so many planes, both military and commerical, and the A380 was bigger than I had heard it would be. It too was nice to see some familiar faces at the Moog booth, as well as meet some new ones.

The New Airbus A380 Plane

So huge...

Rick & I next to the Huge Engines

Rick & Roger next to the Landing Gear

We flew back to Manila that night, and since we arrived late, we stayed over at the Hyatt Hotel & Casino. We got up early on Thursday, and took the drive back to Baguio. Although, I've done this many many times, the 6 hour drive is still rough. Rick had done it before, but Roger hadn't, so he found it interesting to. We made back to Baguio by early afternoon. Although a short trip, I always love going to Singapore, and it was great to finally see Malaysia.

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Community Service with Brent School

On Saturday 2/1/08, I joined Tanya Liddle and others from Brent International School for a community service day that they had organized. There is a program ongoing in the Philippines (and other countries as well) called GK (Gawag Kalinga). Gawag Kalinga, meaning "giving care" is an integrated, sustainable, holistic program, which aims to address poverty in the Philippines by transforming and empowering poor communities through its various programs (http://www.gawadkalinga.org/). Through the GK program, there are communities all over the Philippines being built. On this day, we worked at the Rayville Treasure at Camp 4 off Kennon Road.

Rayville Treasure Village - Camp 4, Kennon Road

I was really excited to be a part of this day, because I have always enjoyed community service, and really want to get involved in the communities while I am in Baguio. This day was the 2nd day of 4 or 5 weekends that Brent was participating in. Our goals as a group for the day were to provide cooking lessons, paint the interior of the classroom, dig a composte pit, and level land for the playground. Being that it was hot out, and most of these tasks were manual labor, this was hard work. I personally helped with leveling the ground, and digging the composte pit. Without bulldozers or something of that sort, removing the dirt was quite the project. When we first started digging the pit, the ladies of the village seemed a little skeptical. After about 3 hours of Liz, Tanya, and I digging, the ladies could finally see that we were getting somewhere. They were so cute, and really into helping, that they started to kick us out when they felt it was their turn. Eventually, they completely took over. I think the most fulfilling part of the day was watching how the women bonded together to complete a project, both with the cooking lessons and the digging of the composte pit. Another fun part of the day was when Tanya started handing out candy that she had brought. When we first got there we only saw like 10 kids, but after the candy came out, I think there were like 30. They were coming from all over. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to make it to the community service days, but I hope to get involved with more projects like this in the future.

Leveling Land for the Playground

One of the Houses that was Built

Emy Teaching the Ladies How to Cook Fresh Lumpia & Mangoes with Sticky Rice

Pinoy Hot Pot!

A popular restaurant in Baguio is 'Pinoy Hot Pot.' It is popular not only for its food but also for the giant wood carvings outside the restaurant. A hot pot is basically a large pot that is used to cook soup and all sorts of other stuff (veggies, meat, seafood) right at the table. I had been to this restaurant before, but never had the hot pot. Jessie, a machinist from Moog Torrance, was in town for 3 weeks, and on his last night 1/30/08, we decided to take him here. It was me, Jessie, and a group of locals, and we had a blast. The hot pot was super good, and I can't wait to go back.