After the tour on our first day, Jayson dropped us off at the hotel: Ease Cloud Hotel. When the agency (Royal Kites Tours and Travels) announced that we would be staying at Ease Cloud, instinctively, I googled it and read some reviews. Relatively, Ease Cloud Hotel is a new hotel. This means, there are only…
Four UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Four Days: Day 1 in Beijing
On 21 December 2018, my colleagues, my friends and my partner traveled to Beijing, China on a tour package. Our flight back to Manila was on the 24th of December, with high hopes of making it for the noche buena or the midnight Christmas meal on our respective homes. The original expected time of arrival…
Le Grand-Place, Brussels: Place Making is Community Making
When my book Performing Catholicism (UP Press, 2016) was chosen by the National Book Development Board to be part of the official book launch event of the Philippine Pavilion at the Frankfurt International Book Fair in 2016, I made sure to do a side trip to Brussels. Besides, the transportation system in this European region (i.e….
The Legacy of the Nguyen Dynasty: Hué Imperial City and Thien Mu Pagoda
Earlier, I wrote two posts about our wonderful experience in Hue! The focus of the earlier posts was the Royal Tombs of the Emperors of the Nguyen Dynasty. In the first post, I talked about Minh Mang’s and Khai Dinh’s. In particular, Minh Mang’s was impressive due to the man-made lake fringed with pine trees….
“Forced Migration” of British Convicts in Australia
Once upon a time, the concept of an Australian nation was nonsensical until 1 January 1901 when the Commonwealth of Australia was born. For a long time, Australia was a British colony. But its genesis as a colony was not intended for the British colonizers to explore raw materials for the benefit of the British…
The Royal Tombs: The Legacy of the Nguyen Dynasty (Tu Duc)
Earlier, I wrote about the Royal Tombs of Minh Mang and Khai Dinh. You may read the post here. In this post, I highlight our journey to Tu Duc’s Tomb. Nonetheless, the visit to Tu Duc’s was not really an intended one. After visiting Minh Mang and Khai Dinh tombs, we wanted to see next Gia…
The Royal Tombs: The Legacy of the Nguyen Dynasty (Minh Mang and Khai Dinh)
In November 2017, my partner and I decided to travel to Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam to celebrate our 12th anniversary. The only thing planned was to tour the sites of interest around the city (such as the opera house, the cathedral, independence hall, and the market area). A few weeks before the trip,…
It’s Edin-brah, and not Edin-behrg! This is Edinburgh, Scotland
My first and so far, my only experience of Edinburgh, the capital city of Scotland was in 2012. This encounter was memorable because first, the travel was a gift from my “foster family,” who took me as their “eldest” when I was still studying dramaturgy, curatorship and cosmopolitan cultures at the University of Manchester. Second,…
Baroque Churches in the Philippines: 500 Years of Christianity (Part 3 of 3)
This is the final narrative (Part 3) about the UNESCO World Heritage Sites in the Philippines collectively known as Baroque Churches of the Philippines. In the previous two posts, I have presented three magnificent Baroque churches, all of which are located in the Philippine largest island, Luzon: San Agustin Church in Intramuros in the National Capital…
Amsterdam: An Urban Center Dependent on the Waters
Many European cities such as Venice, Brugge, Gent, Paris, and Amsterdam are entwined with water. A lot of these magnificent cities are twinned with man-made canals, leading to rivers and onto the sea. Of these European cities, Amsterdam is exemplary, in such a way that its canals are significant to the city’s economic development. At…
