Sabang, Palawan

Here it is, my first (hopefully of many) beach paradises. Soak it in, I sure did this past weekend.

We were on the bottom floor of this cabin.

A day in the life

I'm sure some of you are wondering what a typical day looks like for me. During the week, its pretty standard. Here it goes:

5:30-6am: Wake up, shower, make coffee

6:40-7am: Catch the shuttle

7:30-4:30/5: Work

5:30 onward: Workout, make dinner, laugh with the roommate, general life things, sleep.

The sun sets here around 7pm, which makes the nights feel really long, but good. I'm enjoying my time here, but its going so fast!

I’m going places!

Sorry it's been a minute, the internet here has been down for the last week. But its back and just in time for me to book some accommodations. I got my plane tickets before it went down for some upcoming travels that I'm very excited about:

First: Palawan – a western island in the Philippines. Picture white sand, clear blue water…just google it.

Second: Baguio and Banaue –a staff retreat and rice terraces. Banaue is also a UNESCO World Heritage site

Third: Ho Chi Minh City – I’m not going to have enough time to hit Vietnam in August and, to be honest, I’m craving a good pork bun J

Stay tuned for pictures. Honest, they’ll be coming.

2 weeks!

I've only been in Manila for a little over two weeks but time has flown by! I'm getting into the groove at work and creating a little social circle for myself. I'm hosting an intern dinner on Monday and helping through a bbq on Thursday. I've also started volunteering after work once a week at an orphange with several other foreign service officers.

This weekend I took a tour of Intramuros, the old part of Manila. It has a really interesting history and I took some photos -- I'll post on that later this week.

All in all, things here a great. I can't believe I only have 8 weeks left in Manila!

New favorite things

Pan de Manila. This Filipino bakery specializes in rolls and breadsticks that are some of the best I’ve ever had. The rolls come in several flavors – original wheat, pesto, pesto cheese – and offer the perfect chewy bit every time. Even when they’re a day old. The breadsticks are a bit softer than a normal breadstick and are really light and delicious. The pesto cheese flavor – pesto mixed into the dough with melted cheese on top – of each is definitely my favorite.

One of my coworkers met with representatives from Pan de Manila earlier this week and brought bags of bread back into the office. This was added to the box of goodies another coworker brought back from a meeting in Iloilo (south of Manila). Our office seems to always offer some kind of tasty treat, whether bread or cookies brought back from a meeting or a box of curious looking sweets brought back from a personal weekend out of Manila. And of course I need to sample everything I’ve never tried or can’t pronounce the name of.

Good thing my compound has a gym. J