Sick room
A few weeks ago I had to go on sick leave. Crazy weather, hot in the morning, freezing cold and rain in the evening. I got caught in a sudden downpour on the way home one night, and sure enough I woke up with a fever.
The weather was good on that day, which made these boys climb up the roof of the house next to hours, and I couldn’t help but shoot them through the cheap blinds of my bedroom.
The new graduate
Maui’s high school graduation, Olivarez College Paranaque, March 27, 2009.
Unaccommodating accommodations
Maui and I went up to Baguio Friday last week for his medical exam at UP, and to look at the possible places where he could board during his freshman year there. For some reason I had expected to find old American style houses with spare rooms that a student could rent, with enough space for a study table and perhaps even a tiny kitchen. Perhaps it was because these were the houses that I remembered we visited, when I was a child and my aunt would take me along with her barkada, for summer. When her mother, my grandmother, would follow suit I would even get a free hotel stay for a night when we kept her company where she was checked in.
What we found last weekend was definitely the opposite of this image. What we looked at were closets with double decker beds stuffed into them, with monthly rates as high as P3,500. But my niece Wanda, who lives and works in Baguio, said this was to be expected within city limits. We could probably find more accommodating accommodations in areas a jeepney ride away from the city. In fact she said she herself had to make to with a bed stuck in a room no larger than two meters in length, in the first few months of her stay in the city.
Needless to say we have not yet decided on where Maui should be billeted for the first semester, but we do have a fallback place in New Lucban in case the offerings at Engineers Hill prove to be too unappealing. We have a couple more months time to do this.
The Vistro Pensionne
The Vistro Pensionne was where Maui and I stayed last weekend in Baguio. The Vistro is actually a large house that has been converted into a pension house. It sits quite conveniently at a stone’s throw away from the Victory Liner terminal, just a step away from the blue and expensive Microtel. The Vistro offers clean and spacious rooms for very reasonable prices. Guests can share the living room and the kitchen, where the kitchen faucets are shiny and never run out of water. The photos you see above are of the front entrance to Vistro and the room where Maui and I stayed, for P1,500 a night.
Some may say that one can get lower daily rates in other places in Baguio, but the Vistro’s location—walking distance to practically everywhere in the city—more than makes up for the above average rate.
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