Hangin' in the BGC

Now that Noel and I are back in Manila we are renting a condo in the new hip "Bellevue" of Manila called Bonifacio Global City or the BGC. It is surrounded by new high rise condos and bank skyscapers with hip restuarants and 3 beautiful malls Bonafacio High Street, Segera, and Market! Market! BGC was Fort Bonifacio a Filipino military base, and now that is not being used anymore its a new place for the crazy 12 million person city to expand into.

Today we had coffee at Noel's favorite Austrian (Japanese) coffee shop UCC, then off to shop at the malls for a couple hours.

Then we had a long crazy hour long taxi ride down to old town Manila called 'Intramoras' for a 2-1/2 hour long walking tour of the last 400 years of Philippino history. The tour was awesome, very informative. I learned alot about the Spanish colonization and the Catholic churches strong hold (1571-1898), and then the American occupation (1898-1945), and the Japanese/American massacre during WWII.

So interesting and brought a lot of light to the subject, like the reason the Filipinos don't speak Spanish today is because for the 300 years under Spanish rule it was ran by the bishops of the church and not by the state since they were too far away. The priests decided to learn Tagalog to spread the gospel instead of teaching the Filipino people Spanish. I also

learned that there was never a flag flown over the Spanish Philippines since it wasn't even considered a colony of Spain but instead a province to the colony of Mexico. Manila was simply a stopping point for the Spanish between China and Acapolco Mexico. Weird!

Then we learned the good and the bad of the US running the Philippines from 1898 to 1945. Manila was the most forward and beautiful city in the Far East, the best architecture, water and sewage, fashion, food, etc. The Americans also switch over all the governmental documents and roads from Spanish to English, so there was 30o years of history erased. Everything seemed perfect in what they called the Pearl of the Sea. Then in WWII the Japanese came in to occupy the Philippines. in 1945 they massacred 75,000 people of Manila, so the US flew over and bombed the old town killing a total of 120,000. Poor Flips were in the middle of the Japanese/American battle, and the ones who lost were the Filipinos and their land.

After WWII Manila had to start over culturally and with their physical architecture. Interesting and sad. The Philippines also were campaigning to be the 50th state in the US, but by 1959 Hawaii became it instead...and the Flips went independent instead.

After the tour we zipped back up (hour in a taxi again, in the worse traffic I have ever been in) to BGC, and had dinner with Noel's Mom, Dad, sis Magic and bros David and Jun. Very fun, and yummy Flip food. After the family left Noel and I found a awesome wine bar on the way to walking back home. I am loving Fliplandia!