Manila Airport (Ninoy Aquino Airport, or NAIA for short)

NAIA is one of the busiest airports in South-East Asia. And one which is notoriously ranking among the worst international airports in the world (http://edition.cnn.com/2014/10/20/travel/worst-airports-2014-sleeping-in-airports).

 In short, here is how I experienced each of the three main terminals:

• Terminal 1: Old and run down. Cumbersome to reach from Makati City by car (traffic jam). Not enough restaurants.
• Terminal 2: I consider this the best terminal among the three. All personel is friendly and helpful. It's fairly small sized and walking distances are short. From the point where you get off the car to the gate (!), it's barely 100m-150m walk. The terminal is also easier to reach from Makati City than terminal 1. Choices of restaurants very limited.
• Terminal 3: Big and new. Seems to be built with good intentions and design. But is operated horribly: Most escalators are always out-of-duty. Elevators as well. Stairways are blocked off and only very few ones are accessible. Positive: Biggest choice of restaurants and shops among the three terminals. Very easy ad fast to access by car from Makati City (use Skyway).

A few days ago, my girlfriend and I arrived at the Terminal 3 coming home from our holidays in Palawan. We flew Philippine Airlines and we had a good flight so far, except that the aircon was too cold (but this is a common problem in the Philippines when travelling. Even my girlfriend found it too cold, and she is Filipina. So it can't be blamed on me being foreigner and not being used to the cold...). Once we had reclaimed our luggage (lots of, as we brought our dive gear along), we exited the arrival area. Knowing that the terminal is badly managed, and the queue of passengers waiting to get a metered taxi is always very long (waiting time around 1hr), we wanted to proceed to the departure area instead, and try to grab a taxi at the departure area. Hoping that the queue would be shorter there. So we used the stairs/escalator on the left side of the image below to access the departure area.

Once we were on the departure area (see picture below) we were looking for an exit to exit the building. Unfortunately all exits were blocked off or were exclusively used as entrances. So we had to walk across the whole terminal to use the single exit door at the other end. Once out, we saw that the queue of passengers waiting to get a taxi was extremely long, even at the departure area. So we decided to take our fate into our own hands and to leave the airport walking, to grab a taxi outside of the airprot (there are plenty of taxis in the area). So we were looking for a way how to get out of the airport and down to the public street. The guard said we had to go back into the terminal and go to the arrival area again. Unfortunately we couldn't use the same door we just exited from, because we had to go through the baggage screening again, which was at a different door (I never saw that on any other airport outside of the Philippines, that the baggage needs to be pre-screened when entering the airport). So we entered the terminal again through an entrance door and queued for a baggage screening. Then we thought that there must be a possibility to leave the building through the car parking. We asked the guard there, but he told us that there is no possibility to walk out of the building through the car parking (which is very weird. What happens if there is a fire?! I don't want to be there if this happens...). So we turned around again looking for the best way to go down to the arrival area again. Unfortunately the elevators were out of order. And there is no escalator to go down (only to go up). So we had to move all our luggage along the long stairway to access the arrival area again.

Back at the arrival area, we exited the building only to find our assumption to be validated: The queue of passengers waiting to get a metered taxi was extremely long. So we walked out of the airport, carrying all our luggage with us. We passed on foot through the car tollway station (see picture below) for the cars exiting the area. To the bewilderment of the guards and the car drivers. But there seems to be no other indicated way for pedestrians to leave the airport. Then we continued walking on the multi-laned road until the intersection where the public road joins the road exiting the airport. Just to wait for a public taxi there. It didn't take long for a free taxi to stop by, and it charged us P150 only to go to our destination in Makati City.

Tollway station at NAIA airport

My verdict: It is terrible how the metered taxis are managed at the NAIA airport. Terminal 3 doesn't have enough metered taxis. And terminal 2 would have a long queue of taxis waiting to load a passenger, but as there is only one person issuing the passenger tickets, and only one taxi can load at the same time, it still takes very long until each passenger can board a taxi. Everything happens sequentially, while it would be so easy to parallelize the boarding process.
I can't judge whether NAIA is truly one of the worst international airports in the world. But based on my experience with about 20 international airports, I can say it clearly *is* the worst airport of those.

Typhoon Haiyan hits the Philippines

Today, the super typhoon Haiyan has hit the islands of the Philippines. According to the news it seems to be a really seriously strong typhoon. Initially it was expected to hit Manila, too. But it changed its route and is now passing at the south of Manila. At the moment, there is heavy rain in Manila, but not that much of wind. I have not seen any flooding yet in Manila, but that might still come later.
Anyways Makati City is safe. I was only affected by the typhoon by our planned dive week-end which had to be canceled. But other people in the center of the Philippines are probably affected much much worse.

A weird traffic pattern: Turns on a multi lane road intersecion

I keep noticing this very often: There seems to be a weird traffic pattern in the Philippines, that when cars take a turn, that they basically skip one lane into the middle of the new street. It seems like sharp turns are unpopular somehow. But the consequence is, that the outermost vehicle will have to squeeze in with the rest of the traffic, while the innermost lane remains unused.
If anybody knows why that is, or whether this is even the official traffic law, let me know. I am curious.

More strange patterns are about to follow.

The good and the bad

In this post I would like to list the positive and the negative points that I (being a Swiss citizen) experience in my every day life in the Philippines. I am aware that this list is very much biased and might look totally different for a foreigner originating from a different country than Switzerland.

The good

• The climate. I am coming from a country where the climate is constantly cold or cool. Sometimes the sun is hardly coming out from the clouds/myst for several days or even weeks. Here in the PH the temperatures range between 26 degrees and 34 degrees Celsius.
• The happiness. Filipinos are in a constant state of happiness that nobody can take them away. Even in the most stressful (for me) situations, someone around me suddenly starts singing a song. Just like that.
• There are no youngster groups hanging out here and mocking any person who passes by. Younger people are always respectful towards older people. This contributes quite much to a comfortable feeling when being in the public, as the average Filipino age is around 23 years only. This results in the situation that most Filipinos are younger than me. Voila. Here is the respect.
• As an expat I am in the lucky situation that I can benefit from my European salary but spend it in the PH where many things (not all things though) are cheaper. Particularly restaurants, taxis, personal services (tennis instructor, ball boy, house keeping, ...), traveling.
• I can go diving and playing tennis much more than I could in Switzerland. Diving because there are very nice dive sites just 2-3 hours away, and tennis because it is much cheaper here and the weather allows to play outdoor every day until 22:00.
• Traveling South East Asia Pacific region is very convenient from the PH.
• Proximity to the sea and to nice beaches
• The openness of Filipinos to foreigners and also among themselves. They are not afraid of getting to know anybody new.
• Restaurants and shops always have plenty of staff. As a customer you definitely get the attention you are looking for easily.
• As a foreigner I feel like sometimes I get a particularly good service in the PH. Or if I complain about something my complaint is being taken a touch more seriously.
• For a single man life in the PH (or may be generally in South East Asia) is much more relaxed than in Switzerland in terms of looking for female company. In Switzerland there are 70% males in every bar. Planes can not take off because they are over-weight (see this news article) having so many males compare over so few females aboard. These things would never happen here. Here it could be other way around, I get the impression.
• Virtually everybody speaks English in the PH.
• I can use the swimming pool every day. If I only would...

The bad

• Out of stock: So many times when you pick your dish on the menu of a restaurant, it turns out that this dish is out of stock right now. Or you need to buy some milk very urgently? Out of stock. The service technician who is supposed to install your land line telephone: Out of stock of cable. Needs to come back later. Toilet paper? You don't want to know.... Supply chain management is a problem all over the PH. I have still not found any satisfactory explanation why that occurs so frequently here.
• Out of change: In the Philippines you need to be prepared having the right change to pay for anything. Don't expect to receive change for cash which exceeds 3 times the price (e.g. if the taxi fare is PHP 300, you won't be able to pay using a PHP 1'000 bill). 
• The air in the city and the tap water are not clean.
• The relentless burocracy and the many forms you have to fill even for buying bubble gum. For each service you need to sign five times.
• Many Filipinos litter and are not aware that other people might feel disturbed of the trash lying around. This applies even to parks, beaches and historic islands. I guess the people who litter simply don't appreciate the beauty of the landscape enough, so they don't recognize its value.
• Traffic is very bad in the PH. Not only in Manila. There is hardly any railway or metro system. So all traffic flows though the streets. And the Jeepneys and UV taxis just stop everywhere, blocking the traffic behind. Often cars just stop anyways, for having a breakfast in a Jolly-Cheap, or for having a pee or whatever, and often they don't drive aside but simply stop right in the middle of a traffic lane. Cars always cut the turns. Pedestrians cross at red light. Tricycles (slow!) drive on highspeed roads, leaving no space to overtake. Roads always take traffic right through each city-centre or centre of the village, there is no such a thing like a perimeter road which keeps transit traffic outside of the cities, by-passing them. The cities collapse under the heavy transit traffic, and the transit traffic fights with the slow city traffic like tricycles. A lose-lose situation.
• Travel taxes: Every time I leave the PH I have to pay travel taxes of about 60 dollars. A cheap quick flight to HK, Singapore or Thailand gets easily doubled in price only because of the travel tax.
• Security feeling: I always feel safe around my neighbourhood. And I have never got into any trouble so far and not even whitnessed anything. But especially abroad people keep reminding me how dangerous it can be in the PH. I guess the truth lies somewhere in between.
• Despite the many cinemas around (each mall has one), the selection of movies they display is very narrow (selection is usually around 5 different movies only). Filipinos seem to like the blockbusters with superheroes. But to find cultural movies or movies which are not made by Hollywood or by the PH is very difficult.
• The internet connectivity between the PH and Asia or USA seems to be relatively slow. Despite having the fastest home internet plan available, I still can't watch a Youtube video without letting it pre-cache first.
• Electronic goods (cameras, computers, HIFI systems, TVs, ...) cost more than in European countries. And much more than in Singapore or HK.
• It is difficult for me to find my usual healthy food in restaurants. When I order something with vegetables here, the vegetables are usally only for decoration. Just a spoon full of vegetables. Meat and carbohydrates are clearly prioritized on local menus.
• Despite every body speaking English, sometimes accent-free, it can be surprisingly hard to get your point across to the conversational partner. And the flawless English you hear makes you believe that communication should be child's play. It's not.

This picture shows a taxi stopping in the middle of the street to have a breakfast at the Jolly-Cheap (food stall) at the side of the street. This is normal and nobody seems to care. Even in peak traffic hour.