It was our first time to southeast Asia and we didn’t know what to expect. We’ve been anticipating this part of our journey for months, but neither of us have experience on this side of the planet. Of course we’ve received advice and heard things along the way about SE Asia, but you never know what it’s going to be like until you are actually there. We arrived after our overnight flight from Dubai and the first thing we see as we are transferring flights is a Christian morning service inside the airport. Strange, but we were already intrigued and liked it! Next we noticed everything was in English (another check!). Finally, we make our way outside… they even have Uber. So far, so good on being easy to adapt, but it just didn’t feel right, in terms of what we were anticipating.

The ride to the hotel is where this all changed. We left the airport only to see shacks after shacks lining the road and surrounding areas, all the way until our hotel in Cebu. I would compare it to Mexico, but that would be a BIG improvement on the living conditions we were witnessing. The hotels and nicer buildings seem to be sprinkled throughout the area with local’s homes just about anywhere and everywhere in between. When I say homes, I’m talking 2×4’s of wood and a roof if you’re lucky. This was just the short ride we had from the airport to our hotel, but I was intrigued to see if this trend would continue on our 3 hour drive that we had coming up the following morning… and it was the same, but worse. We were picked up at 5am and headed 3 hours south to go canyoning down a river, and cliff-jumping off waterfalls (Kawasan Falls). We passed countless families and children bathing on the side of the street out of a bucket, getting ready for school. I couldn’t believe how many there were, and I even started to feel guilt and sadness, given that I was in a car and living in luxury compared to everyone else we had seen thus far… but then it also almost brought tears of joy to my eyes when I noticed one thing that every family had in common. It was a smile. I’ve never seen so many people smiling, laughing, and enjoying life, as much I did on the car ride that morning. They didn’t have much, but they were all thankful for what they did have.

We continued on with our canyoning excursion where a local guided us down a river and over numerous rapids for what seemed like hours. We would occasionally see a few people and locals, but it seemed like we had the entire canyon to ourselves until we finally arrived at the famous Kawasan Falls. This is where we started to encounter tourists and some locals working, but again… they all had one thing in common. Every single local we passed smiled at us and typically greeted us with a hello. This was just the start of our Philippine adventure, but we knew right away the smiles would be infinite while visiting their beautiful country.

It wasn’t long before we had another touching experience here. After a few days of doing various other activities, it was time for the dreaded laundry run. We dropped off our clothes at a local laundry mat, and we decided to walk back to the supermarket and hotel. I cant stop eating and Jacke cant stop drinking wine (I guess canyoning counts as a hike), so we grabbed the essentials and made our way back to the hotel. Kids from all over, start running up to us, giving us high fives, and asking us all sorts of questions as if we were celebrities. Eventually, the school children went back their separate ways and we were about to our place. Then another group of children came up to us, but they looked a little rougher around the edges. They weren’t in school uniforms and clean like the others, nor did they speak english. They only knew a few words and smiled at us. We heard one of them say “money,” but kind of shrugged it off. Then as we were continuing to walk, we heard the word “hungry,” and I think both of our stomachs dropped. Jacke instantly had tears running down her face, and I was trying to keep my composure as I turned around and waved them back over to us. They came sprinting with grins from ear to ear, as I had pulled out all of our snacks that we had just bought, and gave it all to them. I’d never seen such happy and thankful kids as I did during this very moment. More kids started to pop up from the same village area as we were giving out what little snacks we had. I immediately told Jacke that we were going back to the store and coming right back. So we walked the rest of the way to our hotel, called a cab, went to the supermarket, and purchased a bunch of snacks and food to make meals with, to give to these children and families, but they were gone 🙁 I had attempted to use hand gestures and talking to tell them to stay put, but they didn’t comprehend what I was trying to say. The next day we were leaving, so I had to try again in the morning.

After breakfast and packing, I wanted to make one last attempt to drop off all of the food. I left by foot and figured I would stumble upon the children again eventually, or just drop it off where I believed they were living. a few of the motorcycle cab drivers were parked outside our hotel and asked “what are you doing with all of those bags of food?” when I replied “giving it to the children.” I continued walking and within 30 seconds I hear one of these old beat up motorcycles fly up behind me beeping his horn… “I’ll drive you for free. hop in,” he said with a smile on his face. We quickly found some of the less fortunate kids and family from yesterday, and I gave all the kids each a couple of snacks and meals for the families. I still had tons of snacks left, so he asked “where to next? school? park?”, when I replied “you take me to wherever needs it most,” and we were off. I had no idea where I was going, what to expect, or if this Filipino man I just met was trustworthy, but I went with my gut and we zoomed off. I was a little nervous, because 1.) I had no idea where I was going 2.) I didn’t want to offend anyone by offering food and 3.) how these kids would react…. but all of those emotions vanished as I arrived to probably the roughest area I had seen yet. The motorcycle man yelled for the kids and before I knew it, about 25 children came out from different areas of what resembled a junkyard like setting. I started handing out snacks one by one as they each jumped and giggled with joy. They all started scarfing the food down immediately and thanking me over and over again. I then looked around and noticed the grins on the families, and gave what remaining food I had to these families as I was hopeful it would help provide for a few meals. They too, were just as thankful and happy as the little ones, but with less jumping around.

The Philippines were filled with fun and adventure as were able to explore Cebu, Badian, El Nido, and Puerta Princesa. We were able to see one of the top islands in the world (Palawan), one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World (Underground River), and see some of the most beautiful beaches in the world… but none of that compared to the seeing the smiles of happiest culture and people in the world. Those moments are what we are going to remember when we think of the Philippines, the memories we cherish for a lifetime.

Takeaways from the Philippines

1. Always smile. They are contagious 🙂 **a smile is the same in every language**
2. Life is too short to be in a bad mood. Be thankful for what you have and make the most of it.
3. What may seem like a little to you, may be the world to someone else. Always support the locals and the surrounding community if possible.