Flight chronicles of the backpacker Tutubi, with travelogues, pictures/photos/videos, travel guides, independent and honest reviews, affordable, recommended resorts and hotels (including inns, guesthouses, pension houses, lodges, hostels, condotels, bed and breakfast and other cheap accommodations), commuting guides, routes (sometimes street maps and GPS coordinates/waypoints) and driving directions to answer "how to get there" questions, information and tips on tourism, budget travel and living in Philippines, Exotic Asia and beyond!
Backpacking, independent travel, and flashpacking are cheaper than the "cheapest package tours" and promotional offers around but you can also use travel information for family vacations, even romantic honeymoon destinations.
More than the usual tourist spots and "places to see," this blog advocates heritage conservation, environmental protection, and history awareness for Filipinos, foreigners, and ex-pats wishing to explore Paradise Philippines and Exotic Asia!
About two weeks ago, Tutubi visited his brother-in-law (husband of his elder sister) confined at Manila Doctors Hospital on United Nations Avenue in Manila, where his parents and sister also dropped by to deliver to Tutubi his annual supply of sweet lanzones Paete.
After the brief visit and a tiklis of lanzones in tow, they headed off to Malabon to deliver again lanzones to another brother living there. The driver decided to traverse Roxas Blvd up to Bonifacio Drive and Delpan bridge and came face-to-face with a familiar, once infamous site known as Smokey Mountain that currently has a new face and offer a ray of hope to Manila's poorest of the poor...
About 8 yearsa go, Tutubi always passed by Smokey Mountain when it was still a mountain of burnt garbage. He never saw the notorious mountain in its heyday.
This video from YouTube, shot by Romeo Candido, is a timely one to remind us of the struggle of the poor to escape the tight embrace of poverty.
How to go to Smokey Mountain, Tondo, Manila:
By car from Roxas Blvd, traverse Bonifacio drive passing through Delpan Bridge until you reach the site.
I clicked your alternative blog but it opens in a small window, the size of the comment page. do you have a url i can open in the normal full window?
That's interesting, what you posted about smokey mountain. (actually what snagged me was your lanzones lead... ahhh, lanzones. sweet translucent heaven.) you know, after watching shows like wowowee and wish ko long and other nonesuch, sometimes i imagine that the poor have taken to having it as their identity.
Bless the people of Smokey Mountain and their strength. Experiencing this place and it's people taught me incredible things. I will never cry again visiting Smokey Mountain for they are people fighting to survive and they will be always cherished. They do not need my pity. They do not need my money. It is left only to the ingenuity of those that bother to make this more than a reminiscent thought. What can I do? From someone who WILL NOT just become a stupid tourist and visitor.
the amateur ear said...
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