The Holy Week just ended, and I fully expected to spend it as I spent the last 5 Holy Weeks - staying at home. You see, in this great country of ours (for the foreign folks who read my blog), Holy Week is also known as the Great Traffic Jam Outside of Manila. Almost everyone travels to visit relatives or to just take a vacation.
Not me - I always treated Holy Week as a break from the world, so I usually just spent it at home with the parentals. We would just go do the traditional visita iglesia OR do the Stations of the Cross on Maundy Thursday and stay at home on Good Friday.
This year, however, my dad requested that we all go to Baguio, as it's his last year before he officially retires from his office. So I said "why the hell not?" and decided to go with them - then they told me that we would be leaving on Maundy Thursday.
Good Lord. That's the equivalent of taking a nice quiet stroll at the Korean DMZ.
To make a loooooong trip short, the trip to Baguio took us 9 bloody hours. Yes, 9 hours to travel 300 kilometers (which included an hour's worth of lunch). To give you perspective on how bad it was, during my last trip to Pagudpod (~600 kilometers from Manila), it took me 8 hours to get there.
Plus I forgot to fully charge my iPod. Argh.
The trouble spots were NLEX because of a) numerous stalled vehicles, especially one that involved an 8 car pileup, b) the long line at the Dau tollway (5 kilometers!), and c) the SCTEX toll entry from NLEX (25 minutes!). To be fair to the NLEX management, they did an excellent job of managing the traffic during Holy Week - all stalled vehicles had at least one patrol car along with the proper orange cones for safety, AND at the Dau tollway, they were physically managing the traffic by coordinating the merging of cars as one approaches the tollway itself. PLUS they had numerous employees ranging ahead to collect toll fees. PLUS they all had a positive cheery demeanor that you really didn't feel the urge to lash out at them. The NLEX problem was really brought about by the volume of cars - which, given that it was the middle of Holy Week, should've been expected.
SCTEX was another matter. For some insane reason, it took us 25 minutes to get our toll card - we were debating why it was taking so long (my mom was saying that maybe they were collecting the payment already) but as we arrived at the toll, the lady did *something* to the card (either swiped it OR printed something, since I heard a dot matrix printer) then handed it to me. It took her about 7 seconds to do that - which, in my opinion, was idiotic. Why do you need to do something to a card that comes from just ONE location and the payment system was based on where you entered?! The SLEX system uses the same payment system - but when you get up to the toll, they just hand you a magnetic card that's pre-encoded with the entry point where it was handed out. No fuss, no delay. SCTEX should fix that system - it was the one fault that they had.
Anyhow, after spending just 41 hours in Baguio (yeheesss, let's talk about payout, shall we?), we zoom zoomed to Manila, which took us just 6.5 hours. Not bad at all.
It would've been great if I was able to bring Gail along - but as my mother said, "since Chad and Gail aren't official yet, no one can bring their respective significant others as well." *lol* Now if that isn't an endorsement, I don't know what is. :P
Allow me one rant though, about motorcycles.
Everyone knows how motorcycles behave in this country - no need to go into that much detail about their generally despicable driving ethics. But take note of this pic:
Pardon the lousy shot, I had to shoot it through the tinted windshield of my dad's car.
Not me - I always treated Holy Week as a break from the world, so I usually just spent it at home with the parentals. We would just go do the traditional visita iglesia OR do the Stations of the Cross on Maundy Thursday and stay at home on Good Friday.
This year, however, my dad requested that we all go to Baguio, as it's his last year before he officially retires from his office. So I said "why the hell not?" and decided to go with them - then they told me that we would be leaving on Maundy Thursday.
Good Lord. That's the equivalent of taking a nice quiet stroll at the Korean DMZ.
To make a loooooong trip short, the trip to Baguio took us 9 bloody hours. Yes, 9 hours to travel 300 kilometers (which included an hour's worth of lunch). To give you perspective on how bad it was, during my last trip to Pagudpod (~600 kilometers from Manila), it took me 8 hours to get there.
Plus I forgot to fully charge my iPod. Argh.
The trouble spots were NLEX because of a) numerous stalled vehicles, especially one that involved an 8 car pileup, b) the long line at the Dau tollway (5 kilometers!), and c) the SCTEX toll entry from NLEX (25 minutes!). To be fair to the NLEX management, they did an excellent job of managing the traffic during Holy Week - all stalled vehicles had at least one patrol car along with the proper orange cones for safety, AND at the Dau tollway, they were physically managing the traffic by coordinating the merging of cars as one approaches the tollway itself. PLUS they had numerous employees ranging ahead to collect toll fees. PLUS they all had a positive cheery demeanor that you really didn't feel the urge to lash out at them. The NLEX problem was really brought about by the volume of cars - which, given that it was the middle of Holy Week, should've been expected.
SCTEX was another matter. For some insane reason, it took us 25 minutes to get our toll card - we were debating why it was taking so long (my mom was saying that maybe they were collecting the payment already) but as we arrived at the toll, the lady did *something* to the card (either swiped it OR printed something, since I heard a dot matrix printer) then handed it to me. It took her about 7 seconds to do that - which, in my opinion, was idiotic. Why do you need to do something to a card that comes from just ONE location and the payment system was based on where you entered?! The SLEX system uses the same payment system - but when you get up to the toll, they just hand you a magnetic card that's pre-encoded with the entry point where it was handed out. No fuss, no delay. SCTEX should fix that system - it was the one fault that they had.
Anyhow, after spending just 41 hours in Baguio (yeheesss, let's talk about payout, shall we?), we zoom zoomed to Manila, which took us just 6.5 hours. Not bad at all.
It would've been great if I was able to bring Gail along - but as my mother said, "since Chad and Gail aren't official yet, no one can bring their respective significant others as well." *lol* Now if that isn't an endorsement, I don't know what is. :P
Allow me one rant though, about motorcycles.
Everyone knows how motorcycles behave in this country - no need to go into that much detail about their generally despicable driving ethics. But take note of this pic:
Pardon the lousy shot, I had to shoot it through the tinted windshield of my dad's car.Now if you're going to drive like a moron without any regard for manners or the proper and safe way of driving a motorcycle, at least have the effin' decency to wear a HELMET. Now, if you like living on the edge, that's fine - hey, it's your moronic life, not mine. But for the love of all that's holy - if you're going to compound your idiocy by making your CHILDREN ride a motorcycle with you, at least have THEM wear a bloody helmet!
*growl*
Ok, rant over.
It's been a while since I've purposely gone out for a photo shoot - hmmmm. Must schedule one soon. My DSLR's glaring at me already for ignoring it.
*growl*
Ok, rant over.
It's been a while since I've purposely gone out for a photo shoot - hmmmm. Must schedule one soon. My DSLR's glaring at me already for ignoring it.
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