Hi, welcome to our podcast when Next Travel with Kristen and Carol. I am Kristen and I am.
Speaker 2:Carol.
Speaker 1:And we're two long-term friends with a passion for travel and adventure. Each episode, we interview people around the globe to help us decide where to go next. In today's episode, we are meeting with Leah from the Ticket to Anywhere podcast. She is an avid traveler and shares her story of her month in the Philippines, enjoy. And shares her story of her month in the Philippines Enjoy. Hello, hi, leah. Thank you, leah, for joining us today from the Ticket to Anywhere podcast. Yay, I love it.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you, I was just listening to your turkey episode with Brian.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, I'm excited to be here. Thanks for welcoming me. I don't know anything yet and I kind of like to come in like that because it would be our guests as well, and so definitely have lots of questions for you, and I saw your logo. It looks great and.
Speaker 2:I'm curious what is it?
Speaker 1:How long have you been doing it for Ticket to Anywhere?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely so. I am one half of Ticket to Anywhere podcast. We are coming up on our three-year anniversary in January, which is really exciting, and we're actually going to change the format and the content of the show. We're not going to rebrand completely, but we're leaving that a big surprise for 2023 and just becoming more efficient. I feel like Ticket to Anywhere is always evolving. Right now we're pretty much general travel. We come in with destinations, we come in with subject matter experts within the travel space and we interview them, and my co-host and I talk about destinations, how to prepare for them, general travel tips. So we're going to kind of niche down a little bit in the new year. But we love it. We've met so many people through it. We've gone to a bunch of travel conferences this year and it's really just opening up our worldview, as any travel podcast should.
Speaker 1:So yeah, it's been a lot of fun. How did you come up with it? What's your travel background?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so Trizi and I have been friends oh my goodness for 15 years so long. We met like our freshman year of college and we stayed friends throughout all of our many like evolutions in life. And she came to me. She loves working out super early, like she wakes up before the sun comes up, and she's like hey, a one October day. She was like do you want to come running on Friday morning with me at 6am? I said absolutely not.
Speaker 2:Like in Santa Monica but she's like, well, I have a, I have a business proposal, and I'm like, okay, I will come run the stairs with you at 6. On a Friday, and so we went to one of my favorite coffee shops on the west side of LA. She asked if I wanted to start a podcast with her. I had recently told her the past year. I was really getting into listening to them because I had a long work commute at the time and I said, yeah, let's do it. And I never thought I love her for this, because I never thought I could dive into the space and I don't think I would have done it on my own. So we're really good partners in the sense that we definitely we balance each other out. She's more of like the creative brain I usually am working with like guests and a little bit of marketing, and so we've just we've recorded a bunch of episodes, did like a Netflix drop while I was in the Philippines. So there was like a time difference when we were launching and I was like just going to bed or something and she was like launching everything in January 2020.
Speaker 2:Ironically, like a few months before, you know, everyone stopped traveling. It was a wild release, but we never stopped. We never thought to pause the podcast or change it. We added some different topics in during that time. But her and I have so much travel background and we both travel incredibly different, so she has more money than time, I have more time than money, and so she usually travels with a partner. I'm usually traveling alone. We focus on different things when we travel as well, so we're bringing these like two unique and different perspectives to kind of every show that we put out, whether it's destination, whether it's with a guest, and we kind of like that contrast so people can kind of see like, okay, how did Leah do it when she was on a budget on her own and she was there for like two months, versus like how does Trizzy do four countries in two weeks? For real, she did four countries.
Speaker 1:I love that contrast. It's not everyone is identified, and it also depends on what you're doing. Sometimes I want to be a budget traveler, and hey, if that's for the company, it's a tag on, and maybe not so much right Absolutely, and hey, if that's for the company, it's a tag on, and maybe not so much, mm.
Speaker 2:Hmm, absolutely.
Speaker 1:So what does she do professionally? What do you do professionally she?
Speaker 2:is a video editor for a large record label out here in LA, and so she is our editor, our in-house editor, and it's perfect. She just takes her skills and she applies them to our podcast and it's a creative outlet for her, which is really exciting as well. We get to be as creative as we want. And then I am an event manager by trade and at the start of 2020, when events kind of went down, I started helping other people manage their podcast kind of get it launched, help with social media, help with guest outreach, et cetera. So I do that, you know, every once in a while, but mainly I'm an event manager. I work remotely. She works remote too Well for the most part, she has to get hard drive, she has to receive hard drives sometimes, so she has to be at a spot where you can like mail things. But me, I've definitely I've been remote since 2018. So I've traveled a lot.
Speaker 2:Even before the pandemic, I was remote, and before then I was working a big corporate job up until 2015, living between LA and Las Vegas, and that role in Las Vegas they took in-house, and so they got rid of our team and I said, okay, I'm going to go backpack South America for a year. So I backpacked South America for a year. That was wild. I bartended my way through Peru. I was working in marketing, consulting, online, working for or working for some sales companies in Argentina as well.
Speaker 2:And then, after that year in South America, I moved to Australia on the working holiday visa. America I moved to Australia on the working holiday visa. So it was a really cool pipeline and I felt like Australia, like the beginning of South America, was pretty difficult for me, and then it got easier as the year went on. Also, the cultural differences between, like Argentina and Colombia are pretty heavy as well. By the end of that year, I felt so challenged. You know, I was really confident in my Spanish and going to Australia it was a lot easier. But, man, there's still massive cultural differences, even when you speak the same language huge cultural differences between, you know, being in America and being in Australia. But it was so fun. And then yeah, in May 2018, I came back to LA.
Speaker 1:I am like just in awe. That is so cool. I mean what you just said so many questions. So what was your life like? Did you travel a lot? Like that takes a lot of guts to be able to just go for a year. What was the catalyst of that?
Speaker 2:And I would have gone for more years too, if I, you know, I was always thinking, oh, maybe next year I'll do Southeast Asia and, um, you know, I came back in 2018 because I had a few weddings that I was in and life events and I wasn't like, when I was in Australia, I was actually working for a company there which I loved and that that's where I pivoted my career from advertising into events officially. So I was actually working for a company there which I loved in that that's where I pivoted my career from advertising into events officially. So I was always working like pro bono events on the side when I lived in LA and Australia and I was scared to make the leap into getting paid for them Because I'm like, what if I start to like not like event planning and event management? So Australia gave me that opportunity to like, test it out at, maybe like an entry level, and I absolutely loved it. So that worked out.
Speaker 2:But before all of that, yeah, I was traveling, you know, on my two week vacations every year and growing up, my family always took us to. I mean, I'm in LA now. I grew up in LA. We'd go to Disneyland, vegas, hawaii, that's like the where in LA, did you grow?
Speaker 2:up. I grew up in Torrance and we're down oh wow, like South Bay. Yeah, I grew up in Santa Clarita, valencia, or Six Flags is yeah, yeah, yeah, it's pretty far North, uh-huh, no.
Speaker 1:So you had the shakeup at the, the big earthquake then, cause that's where my uncle yes, yes, his toilet ended up so close in the hallway like they were on vacation. He came back and the whole thing was everywhere. It was so scary.
Speaker 2:I was so young and my sisters were even younger and I was like this is weird. I'm like what's happening? My parent, my mom, was so scared. My dad wasn't even home because he works graveyard shift. He still works graveyard shift to this day.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:For so long yeah. But oh wow we traveled a lot is oh post office yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay, oh, very cool.
Speaker 2:And so, yeah, we grew up traveling. We even have an episode on it like how much we traveled when we were younger, Like I didn't realize. Looking back on it, I don't know, maybe the nineties were a great time to travel because we went on vacation into Disneyland all the time and my dad and my mom were like providing for four of us to be able to do this and I'm like that is so. It's so expensive for one person to go these days.
Speaker 1:So yeah, we always siblings or just.
Speaker 2:I'm one of four siblings or just you, I'm one of four, one of four, oh wow, I'm I'm one of four as well. Oh yeah, yeah, it was big families traveling all the time but we did travel a lot and, like, of course, when you're younger you don't appreciate it, you don't recognize what you're doing, like I've been.
Speaker 2:I went to the Grand Canyon three times before I was 18 went to Alaska twice, went to Hawaii four times and like none of it mattered when you're younger. And then you, you know, now we're in the travel space, we love it and it's like, wow, we did so much and our parents did all that for us. So very lucky yeah.
Speaker 1:That is so cool, so fast forward. You're in Vegas and there's a layoff. And then you what was the catalyst to say I'm just taking off for a year?
Speaker 2:It was all of 2015. Actually, it was feeling like I didn't want to yeah, oh gosh, it was so long ago at this point, but it was like my last corporate year, if you will like, sitting at a desk, being in one place, right, and the whole year I I was just like I don't really want to stay in Vegas forever. I definitely don't want to stay in advertising forever. So what can I do? So, concurrently with my day job, I started getting a teaching English as a foreign language certification. I did that online just as a backup.
Speaker 2:I know a lot of people are like you have to be in love with teaching to do it, and I definitely found my niche. Like I don't think I could teach little kids. I was actually teaching. I only taught for a little bit after they got the certification. You're certified for life. But I taught business English to adults who had an intermediate level of English. So I was like, if I ever go back to teaching, that's the level I want to do. So they were already professionals. They were just translating their like business Spanish.
Speaker 2:I was teaching, you know, students from all over South America and they already had a decent understanding of English. So at the very a nice like padding of cash to help me float through the year. Because I was like what if I don't want to work the entire year which is funny, because I ended up working like half the year. So I ended up working quite a bit. But then I look back at it I was like I didn't do that year as cheaply as I could have, because I was like flying to different countries at the drop of a pin when friends wanted to go. I was like going out to certain fancy like cocktail dinners and whatnot.
Speaker 2:You know, I wasn't really in Argentina. In particular, I wasn't really budgeting and I got an apartment there. I was sharing, of course, but I wasn't saying no to anything and that was what I wanted for that entire year. I was like I actually don't want to say no to anything, so I'm glad I went with a comfortable amount of cash and that I was working intermittently in order to, like you know, I didn't want to miss out on any experiences while I was there.
Speaker 2:So after six months in Buenos Aires, I moved to Colombia for three months, traveled around Colombia, which was much cheaper. The Spanish was much easier, I felt like more in tune with the people there and the culture. It was a lot easier to like. The trade agreements are a lot different, so we had a lot of like Mexican and American products available in Colombia, whereas, like Argentina, back in that day in 2016, their trade agreements like weren't very open, so you really couldn't get a lot of products from from back home, like when my family came to visit me, I'd have them bring me like mascara and bottles of sriracha and different things, um, but Colombia was a little bit easier to get those things, which was nice, and then that's.
Speaker 1:I went to yeah, a lot of that.
Speaker 2:That's so interesting that the trade agreements dictate that, yeah, I mean, I think, like Apple products were, you know, hard, they were a lot more expensive in Argentina. Not a ton of people have. I mean, like in general, the rest of the world, like most of the world, I feel like, doesn't have an Apple product but iPhones. You know, they say in Argentina like don't be flashy with your iPhones. There's like a high risk of robbery, unfortunately so, because Apple products are hard to get in Argentina and when you can don't be flashy with your iPhones, there's like a high risk of robbery, unfortunately so, because Apple products are hard to get in Argentina and when you can get them they're expensive, like if there are any Apple stores down there, which I don't believe there are but anyways this was also six.
Speaker 2:Yeah, six years ago, yeah, oh that's fantastic.
Speaker 1:So you did that. So you did Argentina, columbia went to places as well.
Speaker 2:Where else did you go, yeah?
Speaker 1:So when I was in Argentina, colombia went to places as well.
Speaker 2:Where else did you go? Yeah, so, when I was in Argentina, from Buenos Aires port, uruguay is only an hour away by ferry. So a, lot, of, a lot of us expats were doing visa runs, because you can only stay in Argentina for 90 days before you have to leave. In order to get around that, people would run to Uruguay for like the day, get their passport stamped and then come back. I'm not sure how much it's changed and if that's still, you know, allowed, but that's what we were doing. But I didn't have any problems. I went to Uruguay within like the first month I was there, came back, went to Uruguay again when family visited and then I left Argentina while I was there. Also, I went to Chile to celebrate a friend's birthday. I went to Iguazu Falls in Brazil, went to Rio for like 10 days. Wow, and yeah, a lot of fun.
Speaker 1:So when were you in the Philippines then, and how long did you go there for?
Speaker 2:Yeah, philippines didn't come until later, didn't come until 2020. I'm Filipino American. My parents immigrated here from there about 40, almost 40. Wow, almost 45 years ago. It's been a long time yeah.
Speaker 2:And my parents are actually both Filipino but they met here in the US which I didn't know, that they didn't know each other in the Philippines. So my mom and dad came over. My dad was in the Philippine Navy, my mom came over separately. They met at like a club in Marina Del Rey, which I don't even think there are clubs in Marina Del Rey anymore.
Speaker 2:But so I grew up in a Filipino household but raised in the US first generation, all my siblings and I went to college. Um so, like first generation college students and I had never been to the Philippines before like my entire life our parents didn't care to really take us back. You know, it's expensive to take a lot of kids. My mom's and dad's family all of them were actually in the U? S. They all came over within like a span of 10 years. So it was almost like, well, we don't really have any family to go back and visit. You know, they don't really care to like take us, which I thought was unfortunate. I actually don't really care much going growing up. It wasn't until college, until I started. That was when I started caring and I was like, well, I want to know more about my culture, my heritage. You guys don't seem to care.
Speaker 2:So, finally, 2020 was like waiting my whole life for to go back with my mom and dad, and I realized they always kept coming with an excuse work, money, time, blah, blah, blah. I was like you know what? I'm just going to go on my own and then, dad, if you want to meet me there, you can, because he goes back more often than my mom and yeah, I was like you know, I'm going January 2020. So he's like, okay, we'll come to this wedding while you're out there, you know I'll fly you out like inter island in the Philippines. I was like that's awesome. So I had this like month in the Philippines, where two weeks of it was on my own, traveling, meeting friends, staying in hostels, and then I spent two weeks with family, which I recently did a Bali trip. That was split between family and friends and like solo and I loved it.
Speaker 2:It's like my favorite way to travel now. So, yeah, philippines was like a month, from January 2020 to February 2020, but I I was so eager to go. I felt like I'd be waiting for this trip my whole life. I was just soaking up everything I could. I can't speak the language, though, which is it didn't make it hard. However, I think it would have put me at an even bigger advantage. So they're already like oh, you look like us, but they're like oh wait, you don't understand what we're saying. They do speak a lot of English, like every national language in the Philippines is English. It's one of them. It's not even the national language of the US, but in the Philippines, english is a national language, so everyone speaks it.
Speaker 2:So, you were there for one month.
Speaker 1:And then so, and I have it up on a map and there's quite a few islands and things.
Speaker 2:So I'm assuming- you were in Manila, manila. I didn't even fly into Manila. Actually, I flew into Cebu City, which is the second biggest city, and it was crazy because I literally left January 11th and I, I left January 9th, I landed January 11th, something like that, but on January 12th there was a big volcano near Manila, really close to Manila, within 45 minutes. That exploded.
Speaker 2:It went off, it erupted and I was literally like in the air as it was erupting. And then I was landing and everyone knew I was landing in the Philippines and they thought I was going to land at the Manila airport but I was like halfway across the country landing in the other airport. So I was fine, but I didn't know what was happening. I turned on my phone and I'm like, oh my gosh, everyone's asking if I'm okay, why are they asking that? So I started in Cebu city and then went to a lot of the that region's called the Visayas and then so I started traveling around the Visayas mostly.
Speaker 1:Visayas, mostly Visayas.
Speaker 2:Is that just the term of like all the different little islands or something. Yeah, it's kind of like it's a region. There's three like regions of the islands. It's like there's three different regions in the islands. The Visayas is the middle portion, arguably the best portion. I loved it so much to do. The water is amazing, but and how do you? Spell that uh, v-i-s-a-y-a-s visayas yeah, okay, very nice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I see, uh, manila, and then I see deval. I don't know there's a big island down, wait cebu you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's C-E-B-U.
Speaker 1:I was just bringing it up and so that's the site. Yeah, I'm just looking at the pictures. It looks very big. How would you say compared to like Los Angeles, like a third of the size or as big as Los Angeles?
Speaker 2:Oh, the city. Yeah, cebu, that I'm not actually sure Seem pretty spread out, or not really? Yes, definitely. And the traffic? I mean I think manila, not sabu where I was, but manila has notoriously one of the worst traffic patterns on the planet and it's, it really is bad. I sat in a taxi in manila and I never want to do it again I just paid the guy and got he drove me, took us 30 minutes to maybe move like 20 feet. It was so bad.
Speaker 1:I'm not even kidding. Or is it like a mix of cars and scooters and bicycles? Yeah, definitely a mix.
Speaker 2:I was in a taxi because I was carrying like large bottles of liqueur that I was going to take home with me and I didn't want to carry them. And then I ended up jumping out of the taxi and carrying them all the way back to the hostel anyway, because we weren't going anywhere. So I gave him 300 pesos, which is like $6 at the time.
Speaker 1:And I was in my head, I was like, well, it wasn't his fault.
Speaker 2:But I was like thanks for nothing. We moved like not even. We moved like not even a 100 feet and I'm like, oh, this is so bad. So it was like farmers carrying the liquor bottles back to my hostels Like this is so heavy and painful.
Speaker 1:But you stayed in hostels, so you flew in. I was just curious. There's so many islands, how much did you get a? Chance to see in the month that you were there. How do people navigate around the Philippines where, where they, should they go?
Speaker 2:yeah. So I am a little wild. So I actually did 11 different cities in a month, which is too much, it was too wild, and I didn't even go in like a circular pattern like most people do. I went, like I was like this, all over the country because my my dad kind of threw a wrench and said, hey, come do a wedding on January 20th, and I was like, ok. So I was all the way across the country and then I like flew back to where I was, you know, the previous week to go to this wedding and to spend a couple of weeks with my family.
Speaker 2:But inter-island flights for you know, like maybe someone whose dollar, whose cash goes a lot further, are relatively inexpensive. So for me, hopping on a flight like I could find a flight same day for like $60 to a completely different island if I wanted to. To a Filipino, that may be a lot of money, depending on you know what your daily salary is. You know our dollar goes much further there. So it was, um, it was pretty fun and pretty easy to just know that, like there are some two main airlines Cebu Pacific, philippine airlines they had flights going like every hour to like any destination you can imagine. So a lot of times I didn't pre-book my flights. I was just like, oh, I'll just grab it, like tomorrow, the day before or whatnot.
Speaker 1:Kind of like a taxi. Then it sounds like just kind of grab and go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and so um. I was carrying at the time a large luggage bigger backpack, like an 80 liter backpack, so I always had to check that in but, you know I budget wise.
Speaker 2:I prepared for that, knowing that I would have to pay extra for my backpack. Now I'm two years later, I'm a bit more experienced traveler and I know to go with like a carry on backpack Um, I can fit more in that way. But but yeah, I went all over and um, there really was and I can give you a list of all the cities and regions I went to but it was great because when I was with family and friends, they took me to more less touristy places which I was curious about that.
Speaker 1:How long were the flights in between? So like was it?
Speaker 2:you know, just like 20 minutes an hour, two hours oh yeah, they're anywhere between, I would say an average of like 40 minutes to two hours. In between that time.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But I stayed mostly, mostly central, actually within the Visayas.
Speaker 1:The. Visayas is like the central region, yeah, so would you say that that's the most like tropical or beautiful or uh where? Where are the the spots that I guess from your travels in 11 places? What were your top three?
Speaker 2:oh, top three. I know that, let's see, because I did go to a lot of um touristy places as well, but it was my first time. I was like I really want to, you know, experience it and. I know, carol, you had this as a question, like kind of what a hidden gem is, so I wrote down some recommendations.
Speaker 2:I would say the. The city I went to the wedding in is called Bacolod and it's on the island of Negros, N-E-G-R-O-S, and I think Negros in general is an island that's completely skipped over by tourists even though it's in between, really, two touristy islands and it's just stunning, like at the top.
Speaker 2:there's Bacolod, which is an up and coming foodie city, and I love that you can go a short drive an hour up into the mountains in of the jungle, which is like looking down at Jurassic Park. It was just so stunning. You know we're eating from fruit stands and lunches off the side of the road and everything was so inexpensive and so fresh was it safe?
Speaker 1:like I know, mexico is not safe, but is it, yeah, safe to eat there?
Speaker 2:or is it? Yeah, well, I will say, the entire time I was at a big advantage because, like, because I'm Filipino, I looked like all the Filipinos I was traveling with. I didn't really stick out as far as like features, like hair, facial features, but when they learned that I, like, couldn't speak any Tagalog, that was when I felt that not necessarily treated differently, but they were like, oh, like she can't even really understand what we were saying. So there were a lot of times, especially down in Mindanao, when I went with my family, they would say Leah, don't say anything, because they'll hear your accent, and they're like we'll just do all the talking. And I'm like, oh okay, mindanao historically has a bit of like a rough history, but I was there with like 20 of my family members and they were the ones driving me around, so I felt completely safe there. So I do feel like I was at an advantage, just purely like no one gave me a second look because I look like everyone else.
Speaker 1:But in terms of like eating the produce or eating the food from the fruit stands and things like that.
Speaker 2:It was pretty safe.
Speaker 1:It wasn't like Mexico, where you have to, like you know, make sure that you're going to get sick, or Montezuma's revenge, or something like that. Right, right.
Speaker 2:I think it all like depends too on you know, I wasn't eating really like anything raw.
Speaker 2:And then a lot of the vegetables in some countries they like tell you because of the water systems. They'll say maybe like don't eat like the lettuce or tomatoes unless they're like cooked, that type of thing. So I was just careful about, you know, making sure everything was cooked. And I actually don't eat um, I'm pescatarian, so we don't eat a lot of the meat, so I feel like I was also carbo loading, which is it's. It's heavier, but it's also safer, because then you know, like the rice and the noodles are like cooked.
Speaker 1:Yeah exactly, absolutely so. Then you said to the island, said, buckle out. And I have questions about that. The two larger islands, you said is cebu. And then what's this? Is it penne?
Speaker 2:the one next to it.
Speaker 1:I'm actually not sure what it's called, but I know, oh yeah, elo, elo, elo city. That's what.
Speaker 2:Okay'm actually not sure what it's called, but I know, oh yeah, ilo Ilo Ilo City, that's what.
Speaker 2:Ok, got it, that's yeah, it's popular amongst the, amongst the locals, but as a tourist I don't know how traveling around Ilo Ilo City is, but I would say Negros that island where Bacolod is. And then there's a small island in the south of that called Siquijor. It's S-I-Q-U-I-J-O-R that I loved. They redid all the roads on it, so all the roads are like smooth. So if you want to learn how to ride a motorbike, I felt like this was a good place to do it. It's a small enough island. You can drive around it in like a couple of hours and I felt like there were some food stalls and restaurants that were open 24 7. The beaches are beautiful. You can do a lot of snorkeling there. It's really close to a lot of the other popular islands, but not a lot of tourists go to this one, so I had a really great time there. I thought it was very relaxing.
Speaker 1:I don't even see it on this map, at least it wasn't easy to get around, Since it was so small. Did you have like mopeds or buses?
Speaker 2:or yeah like scooters.
Speaker 2:Mostly everyone rides on scooters. I don't ride a scooter myself, so I usually try to jump on the back of someone else's, but if there's bikes available, I'll ride on a bike. Um, and in smaller islands like that, the taxis are usually unmarked, but if they're a driver, you know, and that's what I always recommend, I travel through south america, latin america, a lot like if the taxi doesn't have a meter in it, like state your destination and ask them how much it is beforehand and get a price and hold them to it. Uh, so you don't try to get ripped off. Ripped off or you're not surprised by like oh my gosh, this two second ride cost me thirty dollars, you know. So that's always my advice for taxis or drivers around there. Yeah, where?
Speaker 1:where would you say? Um, so these two islands, uh, secure? How did you pronounce it?
Speaker 2:oh, I, I dropped it in the chat. Uh Sikior, oh Sikior and then um Bukulad.
Speaker 1:Those were two like if someone were to come down, it sounds like just to stay in the West Side that's okay, that's okay the central yeah, the central area, yeah, I was gonna suggest even in Mindanao there's some great places.
Speaker 2:However, mindanao, like I said, it, has kind of like a colorful history. There used to be, used to be a lot more dangerous. I don't believe that's the case anymore. However, I think it is still on the US embassy website as like. Proceed with caution when traveling there, when traveling there.
Speaker 2:So, um, I visited family out on the east of east side of the island of mindanao and this is where I was, like with 20 other filipinos, so I felt very safe because they were all locals. But let me drop the name of this beautiful region that has a ton of like islands right off the coast that are pretty untouched. You can go snorkeling, boating there. It's pronounced Hina Tuan and there's like an enchanted river there. There's like lots of lagoons and cold springs and very untouched by tourists as well. Quite a bit of a trek to get there, because how we got there was we flew to Davao, which is on the south of that island, and then we took like a six hour van ride up the coast. So it's a little hard to get there, but there's ways. It's a lot of the Philippines is like a lot of flying to another country and then sitting in a van or a bus for hours to get to where you actually want to go.
Speaker 2:I was like there's 7,000 plus islands, yeah, and is the weather?
Speaker 1:pretty much the same all year round, just because where it is? Or was it slightly cooler at the time of year that you went?
Speaker 2:and you know when it was a big monsoon season. Yeah, really the weather in the Philippines. It's always nice and warm. It's really just divided into rainy and non-rainy season which is most?
Speaker 2:tropical countries. Right, I would say December, january, february are probably the best non-rainy months to go. It's also holiday season during that time, but it's also very popular for tourists, so a lot more expensive. And that's exactly when I went. I went January through for tourists, so a lot more expensive, and that's exactly when I went. I went january through february. But a lot of my friends I've found, who are also filipino, american, are going back to weddings that are in the months of like april, july, august, which I'm like isn't that like when we're told not to go because it's monsoon season and they were like, yeah, but our friends that are getting married there are like that's when they're having their wedding and I kind of piece it together. I'm like it's probably not filled with tourists at the time and it's probably so much cheaper for a local to have their wedding during those months.
Speaker 1:I wonder if climate change has changed the weather at all. Well, it's still quite. It's still quite rainy during those times.
Speaker 2:But I think even during rainy season it's hit or miss. You could have one day where it's pouring and one day where it's still quite rainy during those times but I think even during rainy season it's hit or miss. You could have one day where it's pouring and one day where it's cloudy, but there's actually no rain, you know how do you spell that you know to one place, because I was trying. Oh yeah, oh, I dropped that in the chat too. Yeah, I can send over a list.
Speaker 1:I was gonna say also out loud because the the um, whoever listens to this won't have the chat, so I I'm wondering if you can spell it and I'm trying to bring it up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for sure, it's H I N A T U A N.
Speaker 1:Oh, got it. Okay, Everything's kind of said.
Speaker 2:Oh, everything is um. You know the Philippines were, um, colonized by the Spaniards for almost 400 years, so everything is, most things are Spanish word or Spanish pronunciation, got it? Yeah, A lot of mixed in with. A lot of the words are the same. It's really interesting when I hear my mom talk. I'm like all the fruits and vegetables are the same word count, like how you count letters, like a lot of them are the same exact word in Spanish.
Speaker 1:It's really cool yeah, yeah, I see the um in a twine uh river, so it's a.
Speaker 2:It's very pretty the colors and things oh yeah, it's stunning yeah, it's really, and I will say, um, because I know, carol, you had asked in your email about how it is to work in the Philippines. I would say if you need to be on Zoom calls every day and downloading and uploading big files, the Philippines is probably not your best bet. However, if you're slow traveling and you can kind of make your own schedule, you don't need to really be on like heavy video calls all the time. It's probably easier for someone who works that way, unless you're in a bigger city where you can, like Manila or Cebu City will have co-working spaces and will have availability of internet.
Speaker 2:But Philippines is infamous for you know some of the brownouts that happen where too much, especially like in the beautiful remote islands where a lot of people like don't want to be working on a computer. I mean, they do want to be working on a computer.
Speaker 1:but I was like, well, I'd hope you'd go like snorkeling or hiking, but Is there AC in a lot Cause I just think about it, as in Florida, it's like I can't work here. It's too. It's too sticky I have to inside, so is there a lot of places that have air conditioning, or is that pretty?
Speaker 2:rare. I think a lot of the places that cater to tourists now definitely have air conditioning. I would say, when I was traveling with my family, a lot of their homes didn't, a lot of the stores we walked into didn't. One of the cities near Hinatuan? It's called Barobo, where my stepmom grew up. They didn't even have what's it called. They didn't have like 5G or 4G throughout. They didn't have Wi-Fi throughout the city.
Speaker 2:And so my uncle was like oh, they're installing like the fiber optics to like get really fast Wi-Fi here. So I was using my like data all the time. I always switch to a local SIM card if I'm staying anywhere for over two weeks. So I had a Filipino SIM card and at the time paying to top up your data is really inexpensive. You literally can go to like any convenience store, including 7-Eleven, and just top up, so I was paying like $5 a week to get five to 10 gigs of data.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it worked really well. But Barobo, this little town, for instance, like they were just getting their first 7-Eleven, they were just getting Wi-Fi available, but they had beautiful natural like cold springs. They had a beautiful natural lagoon, so you know.
Speaker 1:So 7-Eleven, that's kind of interesting. I know that is that. Do you see that in other places you travel?
Speaker 2:Is places you travel. Is it a pretty global company?
Speaker 1:yeah, so it's actually, um, it's a Japanese company. It started in Japan. Yeah, no idea. There was like a half a block of my house growing up. I thought it was.
Speaker 2:I thought it was my neighborhood store right, right it's, it's massive in Southeast Asia massive um really big in the Philippines. It's really big, really big in thailand as well.
Speaker 1:I loved it in thailand I want to say south korea. We were there and they were everywhere too. Yeah, but they're like so much nicer I feel like they are very much, so much nicer, nicer and what they had, yeah, I was really surprised in the airport 7-eleven actually. Yeah, definitely, and I love it.
Speaker 2:It differs between every country. I always love getting like bags of chips from the 7-Eleven. It's just. It just feels like a true neighborhood store where you can go and get anything and even have like a quick snack, you know.
Speaker 1:So no, we got Doritos actually there and they were tasted totally different. They were very different, which we were very surprised about.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love that. I love trying chips from other. I think that's a good indicator of like the flavors that they like.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I had a question too, a couple of things. So it sounds like for wifi purposes, and if there was someone who wanted to travel and stay there, if you stayed there a couple of weeks a month, a couple of months or something, you'd stay at like Cebu or Manila and then just kind of take a jumper plane to for a weekend or something like that to go check out different places that you're interested in. And it sounds very tropical, very warm. I was curious in terms of what the locals, you know, what do they go and do?
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, if they're lucky enough to live in close to a water source, whether that's like a river or a beach, a lot of the locals, will you know, pack up the whole family, pack up huge picnics and go when there's like a holiday or a weekend or a day off during the week. What are typical holidays there? Ooh, christmas season is a big, big season. I don't really know like the exact holiday calendar. I know they have random days off here and there for different like saints, different observances etc. Massively catholic country as they were colonized by the spaniards. Um, but christmas like basically starts, it's, it happens in any month that ends with a ber. So september, october, november, december, it really starts after summer is over, and then christmas in the philippines is massive, it's just christmas season is just four months long is it similar to here, where there's christmas trees and um kind of lights on the houses, or is it totally different?
Speaker 2:yep, they have their own like special decor which I see at some filipino houses in in the us like they have this beautiful shape, it's called a parole and they hang that everywhere you know. It's very symbolic and they just have their own kind of decor. Like the Philippines is also interesting because there's a ton of Western influence there due to, you know, military occupation, the fact that we speak English, the fact that there's a huge there. In the 60s there was a huge exchange of like Filipino nurses to the US in turn for education and cash, so a lot of Filipinos like come and work in the US and money back home to their families. Like California alone, I think 20% of the nurse population is Filipino.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, there's a lot that. That pipeline between, like, the Philippines and California is also very strong, but there's also you can get nonstop flights between the two.
Speaker 1:So it's really easy. Yeah, but there's a lot of.
Speaker 2:Western influence in the Philippines.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I was going to also think food wise. What's their traditional foods, holiday foods or what? What kind of I?
Speaker 2:always think of. Lumpia right oh lumpia, lumpia, lumpia, I don't know. No, lumpia is great. There's a lot of. I think it's a meat heavy culture, to be honest, and I'm pescatarian, so I don't eat a lot of the meat dishes, or if I do, I'll like. I'll like eat around it.
Speaker 1:So I eat a lot.
Speaker 2:Like I said, I carbo load a lot. I love eating, like the noodles, the rice dishes. There's very few vegetarian dishes, but I'll eat the fish, I'll eat the shrimp. One of their more famous dishes is the lechon L-E-C-H-O-N, which is like the roasted pig and that's just like a custom thing that is pretty much had at every celebration. But they do take the whole pig and they roast it over the fire and they serve it on a huge platter and it's usually the centerpiece of the table and then people just like pick whatever parts they want to eat I don't eat yeah, I don't eat the lechon.
Speaker 2:People love it. I just, I don't eat it. It's just the centerpiece, you know, but it's usually there for big celebrations, big birthdays, weddings um christmas, etc. And then lots of amazing different desserts. In the philippines, halo halo is a really famous one. It's spelled like halo but it's pronounced hollow okay, what is it? A dessert. It's a mix of like shaved ice with ice cream and different like gelatin and boba and fruits on top.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's really really 10 desserts in one, oh yeah it's like it's a cold treat, but it's really, really yummy and you can make it your own. You know, you can add or subtract things as you wish, and you can put different kinds of ice creams in there.
Speaker 1:What's there Is boba tea big out there.
Speaker 2:I think it's becoming a little bit bigger, but I think I don't know. I'm not a huge boba fan, so I think for me I don't really go looking for it, but I think others love it very much.
Speaker 1:I was going to go back to your question about the or the. My question to you is the top three places and I don't know if you said the top three. I know we talked about one, you know, tuan, but I wasn't sure if there's anything else. If someone goes, uh, that there's, they should seek out if they want to. Um, you know, if they're, I don't know, activities and things.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I'll give you, I'll just give you, I'll reiterate oh no, I'll add a fourth one on there. I didn't go to it, but I've heard a lot about it. Yeah. So I would say Bacolod, big foodie city, access to the jungle really up and coming. You could fly directly into it for an inexpensive flight. They have an airport there. So that's in Negros.
Speaker 2:Highly recommend Sikihore, which is at the bottom of Cebu Island and right next to Negros as well. I think it's underrated. You can snorkel there. The roads are repaved. It's a small island. There are food shops and restaurants that are open 24-7. And it's just a much chiller vibe. Hinatuan. It's like the east side of Mindanao, a little bit harder to get to, but definitely worth it. Probably not the best for Wi-Fi, but lots of beaches, islands, enchanted rivers there. I think you get a really good taste of local life there and like integrating with local families. But, with that being said, I don't know that there's a lot of hotels there either. I obviously stayed with family when I was there. I don't think it's really built up for tourism yet, but if you can get there, highly recommend it.
Speaker 2:And then the last one I would say some people have reservations about the ethics of seeing the whale sharks in the Philippines. There are places in Cebu where you can go visit the whale sharks, but it's done via tour companies, that kind of feed them out of turn, potentially, and they use motor boats. So it's kind of like polluting the water and you're feeding them, maybe a cuisine they probably wouldn't get out in the wild. So then they become what's it called? Accustomed to receiving food that only humans can get for them. So I've heard that if you want to go diving to see whale sharks on your own, like in the wild, malupasqua is a great place to go.
Speaker 2:How do you spell that? Let me check that. I know how to spell it. It's called um M a L a P a S C U a. This would be in divers paradise. I'm not a diver. I tried it in the Philippines. I failed my diving course. But like I would say that if you want to go slightly off the beaten path and dive and you're at least an intermediate level, malapascua is the way to go.
Speaker 1:Nice, that's a good one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, these are all outside of also, cause I went to all the touristy spots. I went to Palawan, which is the best island in the world for like five years running. I went to um Shargao, which is a really popular like surfing spot. I went to Manila. I went to Sabu City. I went to all the touristy places, but the four that I just gave you probably would be a little bit more off the beaten path and, um, a bit more undiscovered. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So you said Palawan. And then what was the surf spot? You said, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Shargao. It's pronounced Shargao, but it's spelled S-I-A-R-G-A-O, so like Siargao, but they pronounce it with an H. Okay, sounds really fun. I know it's a little bit of an information overload, no, no it's great, it's totally good.
Speaker 1:I really I know, carolol, you always have your rapid fire questions as well. Yes, yeah, oh yes, um, so well, we covered some already. It's always popular religion, um, I think he said catholic because of the spanish Catholicism yep, um, your favorite food. So what was the favorite dish that you've had there? I know you said rice noodles, but it was there. Is there something unique to the Philippines that, as a pescatarian, you enjoyed?
Speaker 2:yeah, I really loved. Oh, my gosh, this is so hard. I'm gonna do three answers in one sentence. Okay, a fried, a fried fish made with like their soy sauce and vinaigrette. It's called bangus but it's spelled B-A-N-G-U-S. Okay, but it's pronounced a little funny, like pronounced differently. So the fried fish a really great specialty in the mornings where they have people kind of calling out to have people buy it. It's called taho T-A-H-O and it's like kind of like a dessert, like drink with like brown sugar, tapioca balls and like this pudding. That's really popular in the morning as well. And anything with ube which is like a sweet purple yam, sweet purple potato, um, and it's becoming really, really popular in the us, but it's spelled ube I think I see it in some of the hollow hollows.
Speaker 1:Would that make sense? I see?
Speaker 2:a lot of purple in the hollow hollows okay, yep definitely, and it's made from sweet potatoes yeah, it basically they just mash up the sweet potatoes, cook them and then they dump a bunch of sugar in it. But a lot of like Filipino Americans are becoming really creative about how we cook it and what we put it in in here in the US. So it's actually a lot more like creative and popular than it is in the Philippines and the Philippines kind of found everywhere.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and is that what's the popular music there?
Speaker 2:honestly, every time I walked into anywhere, all I heard was pop music from the us. Okay, so they have a couple pop singers in the philippines that sing in like tagalog, which is a national language in english. But I heard so much us pop music that I'm like this is the music they like.
Speaker 1:Yes, Okay. And then you mentioned a little bit about surfing. Is, is, is, is there a big surf culture there, or what's like the closest place to you know, like if you stayed in Cebu city, like how far would you need to go to have, like some you know good, like basic Hawaii type surfing?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think a lot of people surf in um Shargall. It's like the new Bali. So, a lot of surfing. Yeah, happens at cloud nine out there. Um, they do get ravaged by hurricanes a lot, unfortunately, so, um, the Island does take a hit every couple of years, which is really sad. So when it's safe, I always try to encourage tourism there. And then, not far from Manila, a popular surf town I've heard of is called La Union. That's how it's pronounced, but it's spelled La Union.
Speaker 1:U-N-I-O-N.
Speaker 2:That's a popular little getaway, very much loved by the locals. I don't think there's a lot of tourists there. I do not surf at all. I don't even care to learn, so this is just what I've heard from word of mouth.
Speaker 1:Okay, and um what is the money there? Um peso P E S O.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so it's like what a lot of the. I mean, it's the same word as if you would go to many of the Spanish speaking countries like a Mexican peso or whatever, but it's a Philippine peso and when I was there it was about 50 Philippine pesos to one US dollar. That probably has changed in the past two and a half years.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and was it easy to use, just like your, your credit cards that have like the foreign exchange, and was that a better way to do it? Is it better to like swap money?
Speaker 2:So I only grab bank accounts and credit cards that have zero foreign exchange fees and I only grab debit cards that do not. That reimburse me all of my ATM fees.
Speaker 2:So I make sure I'm covered back front left and right. As far as ATM fees, I never have to pay for any of them. Foreign transaction fees I won't get a card if it has foreign transaction fees. And if I do have one, I maybe had one in the past. But if it does, I don't use it while I'm there. So I use Charles Schwab mainly for my debit, yep, and then I have Novo, which is also reimbursed ATM fees and for credit cards. I use my Amex Gold and I have the capital one venture x as well. You have like system down, huh capital yeah, I have a big system capital one venture x x.
Speaker 1:Okay, got it. So tell me, noro, you said what's that one?
Speaker 2:oh, no vote and ovo sorry, I spelled it wrong oh, that's okay, I didn't make it?
Speaker 1:yeah, because I went to South Korea and Bali this summer and ATM fees, holy cow, and I just I couldn't. I just had to like keep paying them and I'm like oh, oh, no, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 2:I don't pay ATM fees, I refuse to. But in the Philippines, like I would say a lot of places, don't let you withdraw more than a thousand pesos at a time, a lot of.
Speaker 2:ATMs unless you go directly to a bank and like, wait in line to see a teller. So my advice is to always and it's still a heavy cash economy yes, so use your card where you can, that's all. Use your credit card where you can. That's always my first suggestion. Any country I go to, even in the in the us, that's what I do. Use my card where I can, because you're more protected on a credit card than a debit card, obviously. And then um, if you have to use cash, which is still most places in the Philippines have the cash ready. Take out enough for the next few days, because sometimes ATMs can also run out of cash. The Philippines in Bali, me too, I've had it happen in the US at a music festival. They're like all our.
Speaker 2:ATMs are running out of cash. I'm like this is lame, this should not be happening. But in other countries like that's normal and no one no one throws a fit about it.
Speaker 2:Like they're just like well, just you know, get cash another time or keep enough cash on hand on you. Yeah, I always recommend using credit card, but having enough cash when you can, pulling out enough cash in time so that you don't run into a holiday or that the ATM doesn't run out of money. I also try not to carry like a ton of cash on me, so finding that delicate balance every time is a little hard, but you'd always rather be prepared, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Very good, Great. Well, thank you very much for joining us today and thanks and so good to hear about the Philippines overall, on a scale of one to 10, if you know people are, you know, decent travelers. Do you say this is a good destination to like a must see or?
Speaker 2:I think it is so incredibly underrated I would give it a 15. I've heard other travelers complain that it's hard to get around, but the beaches and the views and the hikes and the waterfalls are worth every train, bus and ferry overnight that you have to take. Oh yeah, they're absolutely worth it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, my stepmom's been there for 30 years and she loves. She was in the Navy and there for a little while, so she goes back almost every year. Um, yeah, she's a big, big fan. Well, and I also. Before we wrap up too, I wanted to, um, let our listeners know about you and if they're interested in your podcast and how would they listen and you know where should they find you?
Speaker 2:yeah, thank you so much. So I'm known as la in flight online, so you can find me anywhere, any social media platform. Tiktok, instagram are my main ones. Twitter, facebook, la in flight, la like los angeles, but it's also my initials um. I'm also dropping episodes with my co-host, trizzy of Ticket to Anywhere Podcast, so it's Ticket number to Anywhere Podcast. We are mainly on YouTube, but we're also anywhere you can listen to podcasts, so we'd love to connect with you there. Yeah, Thank you so much yeah absolutely, it was very amazing.
Speaker 1:'ve definitely wanted to go there for many years, so thank you for sharing.
Speaker 2:I hope I've inspired you to take a trip then.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, absolutely. Thank you, Leah.
Speaker 2:Thank you both so much. It was so great chatting with you.
Speaker 1:Bye. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed the podcast, can you please take a second and do a quick follow of the show and rate us in your podcast app, and, if you have a minute, we would really appreciate a review. Following and rating is the best way to support us. If you're on Instagram, let's connect. We're at where next podcast. Thanks again, thank you.