inching toward completion

No, the house is not yet ready -- it's still a "work in progress." We just extended our condo rental for another month and hope to be able to move sometime in January [just don't ask what year].

Friday, we moved in our first piece of furniture -- a custom-made dining table that should seat a few of our visiting friends and relatives. The wood is "balayong" and I'll have to find out how that translates into an English tree. It's kind of heavy, to say the least. It took 12 people to carry the tabletop into the house. Prior to the delivery, I had told our contractor to make sure that all groundfloor doors had locks as I did not want anyone to run off with our new table. After seeing them carry it, I no longer am afraid that anyone will still it. Oh yes, the table is a housewarming present from a very, very, very good friend. Once the house is finished, I hope you will come to see and admire it.

The other pictures show some of the rod-iron work at the house, the ceilings with beams, and the house for the pool pump and filter.

we love New York

Manila is really going out of its way to make us feel at home. We can now walk to New York -- it's only a few steps from our Roxas boulevard condo. Look carefully and maybe you can figure out where you are.

It's truly amazing with the movies can do for you.

Then, if you are hungry, you can go to McDonald, BurgerKing, KFC or Shakey's. And, if you need clothes, you can shop at the Gap, GUESS, or Calvin Klein. You name it and it's almost always here.

is there light at the end of the tunnel????

By popular demand, an update of our blog. I did not realize that it had been quite a while since the last posting of pictures. One of the reasons, I guess, is that things are moving along rather slowly and there are no major changes to photograph.

Our house was supposed to be finished by 8/8/08 but, given the pace of things, that has come to pass. The latest word for completion is mid-November. Sure hope so.

The place is really taking shape and should be very nice when it is finished, when it is finished, when it is finished ....... whenever that may be.

patience, patience, patience

It's easy to get frustrated when you build your house and things, well, they get done a little differently from what you expect. You hear a "yes" and that could mean a real "yes" or just mean "maybe." You learn to roll with the punches. The house was supposed to be finished 8/8/08 but, obviously, that deadline done come and gone. I would guess now maybe sometime in October. We'll see. As you can see, though, there is progress. I've been talking to our neighbor across the street and we've been discussing the idea of a book on our construction experiences.

Kitchen and Roof

The roof tiles have been delivered, the struts to hold the tiles are being installed, the slab has been poured for the kitchen/dining room floor, and the kitchen walls are going up ... we're getting there.

a bigger roof over our head

When we visited the site on Monday, June 2, the roof [g.i. sheets] was maybe about 40 percent done and they were digging for the maid’s quarters and ‘dirty kitchen’ – the dining room, next to the living room, and’gourmet kitchen’ will serve as ‘roof’ for that area.. Hopefully, by tomorrow, June 6, when we go back, the digging will be complete and cement work for foundation walls and pillars will have been started.

Tomorrow, we also have to decide on the type and color of roof tiles. Noel has a certain kind he likes but we found out that the price differential is considerable and delivery time (120 days) not acceptable.

We have settled on wood planks, narra, for the bedroom floors and the rest of the hosue will be mostly stone or ceramic tiles. So many little things we have to start worrying about and deciding – door knobs, shower heads, toilets, sinks, faucets, etc. etc.

......our visa trip

Where are we now??

Once a year, our visa requires us to leave the country. It can be for any length of time, just as long as you get out.

We opted to go to a nearby place where we’d feel somewhat at home and see the Wynn casino, Venetian, MGM Grand Hotel, etc. No, it wasn’t Vegas but you certainly would think you were there given the names on the casinos. Right now, Macao has some 30 casinos with many more under construction. Our local tour guide said the government gets about 70 percent of its income from the casinos …. and, at least for now, it’s the only place in China with casinos. We tried our luck .. oh well, next time.

Macao or Macau used to be Portugese territory and in the old part of town you can see the Portugese influence on the architecture. Many restaurants also serve food with a Portugese twist.

The Butanding

One of my volunteer jobs here in the Philippines is my work as a VP for the Peace Corps Alumni Foundation for Philippine Development (PCAFPD), whose work here is supported by Peace Corps volunteers [plus some others] who served in the Philippines. PCAFPD supports college scholarships for deserving students.

In Manila, we helped set up the PSAA or Peace Corps Scholars and Alumni Association. With this group we developed plans to begin making visits to “clusters” of scholars and alumni to help them develop into mutual support groups. When we started talking about visiting the “Bicol Cluster,” I right away decided that this would have to coincide with the Butanding season (January-May) when these giant whale sharks can be sighted in Philippine waters near the province of Sorsogon in the Bikol region. Not only do you get an opportunity to see these huge fish but you can swim with them. Of course, I had to give that a try.

We had planned to drive down there and do sightseeing along the way. However, at the last minute, Noel changed his mind and so two of us took the overnight [12-hour] bus trip from Manila to Sorsogon City where, after meeting with the scholars on Wednesday, we proceeded on to the town of Donsol later that same afternoon. We stayed overnite at a very nice beach resort and early the next morning walked to the next-door tourism office to register and arrange for our whaling trip.

Thankfully, we were on one of the first boats out and soon spotted our first whale shark. We quickly put on our fins and snorkeling gear and jumped into the water. Sadly, the water is not all that clear and you have to swim around a bit to find the fish. I certainly did – I managed to swim right into him (or her?) and could not avoid a collision. Sighting and touching were almost simultaneous … I’ll never forget looking right at that huge animal and only then realizing we had collided face to face, staring each other down. Luckily, they prefer to dine on plankton so I’m still around to tell about it.

Our first butanding measured probably 30 to 40 feet (they can get up to over 50 feet); it really is difficult to grasp the size of it -- suffice it to say that it is huge and awesome. According the literature, they are the largest fish in the world. After seeing some eight of them, I can only agree with that description. The underwater pictures you see in this blog are not mine but were copied from various internet sites.

By the way, the cone-shaped mountain in one of the pictures is the famous Mout Mayon Volcano.

Later, when we returned to our hotel in Sorsogon, we noticed two ladies watching a video on a computer. After a few minutes, they turned it off and I said it looked like nice footage. It turned out that one of them was a producer for ABS-CBN television in Manila doing a whale documentary with one of the well known local female TV hosts (Karina). Actually, we had seem them from our bangka, filming the whale-watching scene. The clip will air tomorrow evening and then we can see if we can identify our boat among the 10 or so that were in that area.

What goes around, comes around, and around, and around

When Noel and I first moved to Harmon Cove, we were among the first residents or really pioneers in that community. It was a great experience … everything new, including all the people. Both of us were active in the community … serving on Boards, organizing parties, etc. It was a great time.

We are about to repeat that experience at Ponderosa Leisure Farms in Silang, Cavite. It’s a new community – some 500 housing lots and with maybe 30 or so houses built so far; not sure how many are occupied (fulltime?).

Of course, we will be active. Noel started it by running for the Board of Directors and getting elected at the April 2008 annual meeting. Just prior to the annual meeting, I got a hold of an e-mail list of lot owners and sent them all a “campaign message.” As you can see from the “vote count” shown in the election picture, my campaigning helped out. The other photo shows the candidate inspecting his property in Silang and in the other he is busy composing his campaign speech.

He heads up the Building and Grounds Committee and recruited me to help him out. Will it never end???

When in Rome, do as the ...........

Following that sage advice, we decided to follow local traditions in terms of building our house.

One custom is to sprinkle chicken blood around where each house pillar will go up. Our contractor arranged for some chickens, however, being more experienced with construction rather than with chickens, we soon ran out of blood and had to send out for some more chickens.

Another tradition is to sprinkle coins around the foundations, prior to the concrete being poured. Noel performed this task. Not all concrete got poured the first day and when we returned a few days later to inspect progress, we noticed that, where the concrete had not yet been poured, the coins were missing. At least we had the right intentions.

We didn't see what happened to the chickens but later heard that the construction crew appreciated this addition to their simple meals.