A Tale of My Misfortunate Misadventures Part 1
Last Friday, amidst all my misadventures due to the super typhoon that struck the metro the previous day, I promised to myself that I would write a blog. So here it is…
Day 1: Thursday, September 28, 2006
I filed for a vacation leave for that afternoon because the Game 2 of the UAAP Finals between Ateneo and UST was happening then. Getting a ticket to watch the match live was not an issue. Catching the whole thing on TV was ok so long as I don’t get interrupted. But due to my very lazy nature, I decided to skip work in the morning thinking that I could use some quality time with Halo. I wake up at 5 a.m. on weekdays. At that time last Thursday, the typhoon was yet to arrive. But as the morning went by and the storm was really intent on destroying everything that stood on its path, I thanked the lazy me for being lazy; otherwise, I might have gotten stranded somewhere with that kind of wind. I had my breakfast at around 830 a.m. and the lights were already going on and off. At around 1030-1100 a.m., the lights finally went out for good without my knowing that it would take days before they would be restored. By the way, the game was postponed for Saturday. It’s ok, at least there’s a storm. My VL wouldn’t be wasted.
Day 2: Friday, September 29, 2006
I didn’t go to work as usual. The previous night went on all right in spite of the heat, the darkness and the mosquitoes. I thought lights would be back at any time before today’s daybreak but no. Add to that the fact that there is no more water coming out of the faucets. Patience, patience (even if my daughter, who is always hyperactive, was naliligo na sa pawis)… I am a very impatient person. I hate waiting. But iss there anything that I can do? Nothing really. The least I could do is to open the telephone directory and look for hotel phone numbers. It’s time to evacuate. So the whole morning, I was calling hotels and asking for their rates— but not really reserving a room (stupid me!). So I packed our bags (Halo’s bag was the heaviest) and headed straight to Greenbelt to have lunch. Since it was lunch time when we got there, the restos were jam-packed. My hubby made a comment that later would be known to us as a premonition: “I feel like Jesus,” he said, referring to that fateful night when Mama Mary and Joseph had no place to go to but the manger. So we had lunch at Blue Ginger then started our trek to Makati Shangri-La where we planned to check-in. We left the car in the Greenbelt carpark and walked to Makati Shang. My hubby approached the reception and inquired. Unfortunately, they were fully-booked so they wouldn’t accept walk-in guests. Our bath-tub-and-aircon dreams vanished but there’s still hope. So off we went to The Manila Peninsula just to get the same answer: “Sorry, we’re fully-booked.” But not giving up all hopes, we proceeded to the Mandarin hotel without any luck.
Our feet were tired but we had to get to somewhere for Halo’s sake. We took a break by going to Citibank Makati coz my hubby had to get money and pay for credit card bills. While waiting for Wacks to settle his transactions, I texted our college blockmate Zarah, who works in Citibank together with our other college blockmates, so she could see Halo. She replied excitedly. After a while, we saw her coming with Camille, her bestfriend and also our blockmate in college who was celebrating her birthday on that day. We chatted a little and took pictures before we said our goodbyes to continue with our “journey.” After trying even the cheap hotels with no luck at all, we decided to quit Makati and head to Pasay and Manila.
It was already 4 or 500 p.m. when we reached Pasay. It’s fully-booked in Heritage hotel. In Hyatt, the one beside San Juan de Dios Hospital, there are rooms available but there’s a catch… there’s also no electricity! Hahahaha! That was funny! I mean does the hotel staff honestly think they can attract customers even if they offer discounted rates? Yup, they said there are rooms but there’s no electricity so room rates have a 500 peso discount. 500 pesos! Hahahaha! That explains the empty parking lot. For a while there we thought we could finally check-in. With that, off we went to a number of other hotels, most of which I can barely remember the names, but still without any luck. By the time we decided to call it quits, my patience as well as my hubby’s had run out. Halo, our inspiration, was ever so jolly even if she was all sweaty and smelly (coz she hadn’t taken a bath) not knowing that what was happening to us was bad, real bad. Our nice-comfy-bed-and-buffet-breakfast-for-two dreams have totally, totally gone away… Now, we’re truly the Holy Family looking for a place to stay but were rejected. Poor us! So instead we spent the night at my mom’s place where there is water even if there is no electricity too.
