Day one back in the Philippines was quite an adventure! After traveling for about 20 hours, we arrived back home at about 8 o-clock in the morning with a full list of to-do’s. We had made a list of all the things we were going to accomplish that day and planned to stay awake as long as possible to help our bodies adjust to the 16 hour time change. Well, that list was quickly cut short when we realized we had arrived on Good Friday! It’s Holy Week here in the Philippines, and boy do they know how to celebrate it! One of the ways they celebrate is by closing EVERYTHING down on Good Friday. Grocery stores, restaurants, banks, and even the shopping malls are closed. Well, there goes our to-do list!

So we decided to go pick up our dirt bike that we stored at a friends house. They were not home when we went to get our motorcycle. The taxi dropped us off and we got on the bike and tried to start it… Nothing. Completely dead. It would not start! I figured the battery must be dead from sitting for a few months, so we thought, we’ll just jump-start it! That should be easy…or not. There were no hills nearby, so we spent about an hour trying to push it up and down a small little driveway across the street. No luck. One of the things on our to-do list includes activating our cell phone so that it would work here. Well, needless to say, that didn’t happen. So we had no cell service. We decided to just start pushing the bike home, hoping that we would find someone with jumper cables along the way. Once we got out of the subdivision, it didn’t take long before a taxi driver, in true Filipino style, stopped to see if we needed help. He parked his taxi and started pushing us, then another motorcyclist came and starting pushing us with his bike…Nothing. After these futile attempts continued for about an hour, we finally decided to give up and just “tow” the bike home.

How exactly does one “tow” a motorcycle you ask… Well, by holding on to the side of the taxi of course! Hahaha! Boy is my left arm tired and sore! Brandie rode in the taxi, while I held on for dear life, being pulled all the way home. I figured I would give it one last try to jump start on a hill close to our house, still nothing. At least we made it home in one piece with our motorcycle and sporting some brand new lovely sun burns! Did I mention it’s 95 degrees with 95% humidity?!?! It’s so hot! We stopped briefly to cool off with a fan. (See Photo)

A few hours later we realized we needed to get some food. After eating way too much American food, I had decided that when we got back, I was going to get back on track eating healthy! Just fruits and veggies for me for a while. Well, I never thought I’d say this, but “Thank God for McDonalds!” That was the ONLY place open to eat! Junk food never tasted so good! How did we get to Mcdonalds, you ask. Well, I thought I would try just ONE more time to see if the bike would cooperate. So I got on, turned the key, and it started right up!!! Turns out there is some sort of short in the electrical system. I really think God has a funny sense of humor sometimes! Shortly after this, we found out our refrigerator has finally given up the ghost! It’s been on it’s last leg for um, probably about 10 years! So now that all the stores are open, we need to get a new refrigerator to put our groceries in! Let’s just laugh about that!!! You know what they say, “It’s more fun in the Philippines!”