From SFO to MNL

It was already 6pm in the afternoon when my dad and his wife picked me up at my mom's house to drop me off at the San Francisco airport. We dropped off my car at the storage, which I had arranged the previous day. Traffic was thankfully lighter than usual so we arrived around 7pm.

The line was already long and I was feeling out of place. Most people were in traveling with families. Lots of kids and teenagers and grandparents. And I was the only one with a single check-in baggage. Everybody else had carts loaded with balikbayan* boxes.

It is a Filipino tradition to bring gifts (pasalubong) home after being away. Having been away for more than two decades, I had no idea what to take back. My mom said to just bring cash; there's a duty-free shop close to the airport in Manila where I could shop within days after my arrival.

I had dinner at the airport and waited a long time. There's a 15-pound limit for handcarry bags, so at one point before boarding, we were required to get in line and weigh our bags. In return, we got an orange tag slapped on our bags. The flight was scheduled to leave at 11:45 pm, fly non-stop, and arrive at 3:15 am two days later. My original reservations said it was supposed to leave at 10:00 pm, stop somewhere, and arrive at 5:00 am. So, it was a shorter flight but a longer wait at SFO.

I got an aisle seat with a nice older lady and her teenage granddaughter. They were headed to Davao, which is further south. And the grandmother turned out to be a nurse. When someone on the plane needed help, she went up front to volunteer.

We were fed dinner (my second one) almost as soon as the plane started cruising. I had the fish filet, which turned out to be a very small serving of fish with lots of carbs for side dishes (rice, bread, and pasta). But the pound cake dessert was decent.

We also got headsets and a packet containing a toothbrush, toothpaste, an eye mask, and a pair of socks. I regretted leaving my Bose headset behind. The engines were very noisy and the headset sound quality was terrible.

But the engine noise had its benefits. I slept almost the entire time, so the noise covered up my snoring. :-) And I had earplugs with me so I slept fairly well. Since I usually sleep on my tummy, it was a bit uncomfortable, but I was very tired.

I woke up halfway through the flight when I felt my tray table as I was shifting in my seat. The flight attendant had set it down and left a bag of chips and a pork bun (siopao). Then I watched the movie "The Pacifier" with Vin Diesel, which happened to be starting just then.

A couple of hours before landing, we were served breakfast. I chose the sausage omelette with mushrooms, a slice of tomato, and tater tots. There was the bread roll again, which I didn't touch, and a few cubes of cantaloupe. But there was a blueberry muffin that turned out to be very good.

We landed in Manila at 3:25 am and the immigration line was short, but my luggage took a while. It was a fairly easy process getting out of the airport. There were so many airport employees in uniform even as we got out of the plane. There were also a number of ID'd porters helping out in the baggage claim area. I didn't even have to wait in line for customs.

I saw someone wave in the crowd even before I got my baggage checked against my claim ticket. I had warned my cousin Derrick that I would wear a bright orange shirt so he could easily find me.

Traffic was light, being so early in the morning. I had to smile the first time I saw a jeepney** again.

We found a money changer hole-in-the-wall place that was open 24 hours. The black market money changers seem to be as common as check-cashing places in the US.


My room at the Camelot Hotel. more pics

Then Derrick took me to the Camelot Hotel in Quezon City (less than $30/night). He was just going to drop me off but we decided to have breakfast at the hotel restaurant. Two eggs over easy, three skinless longanisa (sweet sausage), garlic rice, mango juice, coffee for him and tea with calamansi, instead of lemon, for me (total: $9 for both of us, 20% tip included). And we started chatting and catching up on news. It was almost 11:00 am when he left to go to work.

I watched the Disney Channel for a while until I fell asleep. Woke up around 9:30pm from the loud music playing upstairs. I might go for dinner, then go back to sleep.

I'll need a couple of days to get used to the time change and the currency change.


* A "balikbayan" is a Filipino emigrant (usually to the US) who returns to the Philippines (usually to visit family). "Balik" means to return; "bayan" means country.

** The jeepney is a public transportation vehicle that is uniquely Filipino. Its predecessors are actually the GI jeeps left behind by the US military after WWII. They were first modified to take passengers and later evolved into the elongated, brightly decorated versions of today. However, because of the current state of the economy, the decorations and the brightly painted designs are now old and fading.