Travel To The Philippines! Part 3 - MANILA ITINERARY

I highly recommend seeing the first two parts of this series / segment. Click the links below!

• Part 1 - Tourist Spots   

•  Part 2 - Famous Food

Here is the long-awaited part three!

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I can honestly tell you that there are A LOT of awesome sights in Manila, but you might not want to stay in Manila for that long. You don't want to get drowned by the sea of people, don't you?

But seriously, if you are planning to travel in Manila, I recommend only travelling for one, to a maximum of two-three days. With this, I prepared some kind of "itinerary" that comprises some of the awesome spots you can see in Manila!

• Rizal Park {Luneta} (free admission)

I don't remember if I already talked about this in a previous post, but Rizal Park is one of the most iconic and recognizable places in the Philippines. It is a monument dedicated to our national hero, Jose Rizal. The base of the monument stands is where he was shot by the Spaniards. {Photo on right, courtesy of wikipedia.org} 

• Manila Ocean Park (General Admission: PHP 550) 

The Manila Ocean Park is an oceanarium. It is located near the Children's Museum (Museo Pambata) and houses a large number of diverse marine species. It's oceanarium contains different sections, such as "Agos" (the flow), "Laot" (fishing grounds) and "Bahura" (the reef). 

• Fort Santiago (General Admission: PHP 75, Children PHP 50) 

Fort Santiago was built in the 16th century, during the colonial period of the Spaniards. The Fort itself is used to symbolize the bravery and heroism of the Filipinos throughout the centuries. Step inside its gates to see a very unique historical and cultural feel of the Philippines. 

The Spoliarium. | Photo from wikipedia.org

• National Art Gallery (Admission fees unknown) 

The National Art Gallery contains lots of art, sculpture and cultural-themed exhibits that can give you an insight of the Philippines during the eras of the Japanese, Chinese and other influences that brought the Philippines today. You can see Juan Luna's famous painting, The Spoliarium here.

• Binondo: Manila's Chinatown 

The Philippines is also heavily influenced by the Chinese culture. Binondo is the oldest Chinatown in the world, and features colorfully decorated streets and uber-cheap food from street vendors / hawkers.


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Travel To The Philippines! Part 2 - FOOD

Before you continue to read this post, make sure you read part one. Read part one here.

So in my previous blog post, I talked about the fun and exciting things you can do in your visit to the Philippines. Now, I shall talk about gastronomy!!

• Pan de Sal & Ensaymada

These are the most iconic Philippine breads. Pan de Sal is a simple, small bun. That's it. Just a small bun. Filipino's like this in the morning with some Dairy Creme (butter) or some Cheez Whiz (cheese spread). Ensaymada, on the other hand, is my favorite Philippine bread. It's basically like a brioche, but it's topped with cheese and sugar. Simply amazing. 

• Kwek-Kwek & Fishball

Now for the Philippine version of street food. Street food vendors typically have a bicycle with a cart that has everything needed for them to cook tons of varieties of street food. Fishball is a typical example. These are basically fish, flour and other stuff mixed together, before being deep-fried onto the cart of the vendor. These are very cheap indeed. 1 piece typically costs 50 Philippine cents, which is about a U.S penny. 

My personal favorite street food is Kwek-Kwek, which is basically a quail egg deep fried with an orange batter. I also like Tokneneng, which applies the same principle, but uses a normal sized egg. 

Tokneneng (image by ph.news.yahoo.com) 

• Batchoy 

Oh my God, Batchoy. One of the most awesome inventions of mankind. It's basically noodles, chicken stock, crushed pork cracklings and beef loin. I have nothing left to say. Batchoy -- best there is. You can buy these in some restaurants (mostly family owned). There are also some hawkers by the sidewalks, but I don't buy this from them... 

• Lumpiang Shanghai 

Another one of those things that you just need to try. It's basically pork mince, carrots and other vegetables mixed together, stuffed inside an edible spring-roll wrapper, wrapped and deep-fried. You can see this in most Philippine restaurants that have a predominant Filipino or Chinese menu. My family once went to this fast-food place in Tagaytay and I ate a whole serving of this. That's about 15 spring rolls as big as your ring-finger. 

• Turon 

This basically has the same method of cooking as Lumpiang Shanghai, but is stuffed with banana slices and is covered with brown rice before deep-fried. I really like this because it's a hot dessert, and is not typical. Recommend buying this from hawkers. If you do purchase some, make sure that there's a lot of brown sugar coating that is not burnt. Turon can be gross if the sugar is burnt. 

• Sago't Gulaman 

You know that craze "boba tea"? This is basically like boba tea, but replace the "boba" things with squares of gelatin. And the liquid is basically some kind of infusion of pandan leaves and brown sugar. I have a family relative from Cavite in the Philippines that makes this and the smell of the pandan infusion and the sugar drags you to the kitchen (literally and figuratively). Do not buy this from the street / street vendors.

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