Dubai Fountains
Night lights at the bottom of the Burj Khalifa ~ surreal to think I’ll be back at my office desk this time next week and all of this will be but a distant, happy memory 💫🌍✨

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@emmavictoriaf
Dubai Fountains
Night lights at the bottom of the Burj Khalifa ~ surreal to think I’ll be back at my office desk this time next week and all of this will be but a distant, happy memory 💫🌍✨
Stairway
Sunset with Stairway Foundation ~ one of the most inspiring NGOs I’ve ever had the pleasure to encounter ~ if you’re considering volunteering, look up this organisation, the work they do is nothing short of incredible ✨🌴
Filipino farewell
Wow. Where to start. These wonderful people have been my colleagues over the last three months, and I have learnt so much from them. It is so true that those with the very least give the most; their kindness is truly humbling. They have taught me the real meaning of hope and that human touch we can so easily forget in the busy whirlwind of the western capitalist world. I hope to impart some of their magic when I return home. In the meantime, I am so full of gratitude for this incredible opportunity. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Salamat Po 🙏🏼✨
Filipino spirit
Over the last couple of days I have felt quite overwhelmed by the sheer scale of the poverty around me; emaciated street children running barefoot and partially clothed through the filthy streets with nowhere to call home, serving as a constant reminder of life’s inequality. It is so hard to gauge how much impact my volunteering here has had ~ it seems so minimal when there’s always another problem to fix ~ but then as I left the office I was met with this glimmer of hope... an outdoor Zumba class on the street outside showcasing exactly what I admire about the poorest Filipinos: they might not have much, but boy do they have spirit in their soul and a fire for life ✨💃🏻🎵🎺
Exploring Intramuros
It was about time I saw some of the city I’ve been living in for almost two months, so taking advantage of a ‘cooler’ day ~ 32 degrees + warm breeze ~ here are some snaps of Old Manila (Intramuros) feat. Emmy 🇵🇭 ✌🏼 🌏
All Saints Day
All Saints Day is a public holiday in the Philippines to honour the dead. Filipinos return to their home provinces and pay respects to relatives that have passed away. As the sun was setting on a stifling hot 35 degree day, masses of families turned out in their best clothes ~ some children still sporting Halloween costume ~ and gathered in huge crowds in the cemetery where their family lays to rest. Instead of green grass and grave stones, picture a busy maze of multi-coloured one storey mausoleums, with ornate tombstones, bright flowers and family names emblazoned across each little ‘house’ for identification. Golden sunlit hues hung around the dusty light as the aroma of burning candles filled the air. Each family occupies their patch, saying prayers and sharing stories, while fanning themselves from the extreme humidity. It is an occasion for families to get together and some make a picnic over the tombstones, as noisy street sellers take advantage of the hordes and offer Filipino delicacies to eat and drink. Families stay for nightfall, as the light of the fading day is exchanged for the fluttering, bright candles, creating a still, vigil-like atmosphere. More and more people arrive as night sets in and the colours drift away to flame and stone 🎨⚰️🍭🕯💒
Mini Minstrels
Back to Manila, the Filipino furnace, where I am volunteering at Minstrels of Hope, a performing arts NGO. The ‘House of Music’ gives children a space to express themselves through music, theatre and art as extra-curricular activities. They are a joy to teach; I was so impressed by their intelligence, dedication and motivation to learn. This photo was taken after an ice-cream break during a public speaking seminar I taught 😎🍦📚
Brilliant Bangkok
One week ago I was standing, rooted and mesmerised in the hubbub of this colourful shrine, located on the corner of a busy transport intersection, surrounded by an assault to the senses from the passing buzz of Bangkok. Flowers and burning incense filled the air with sweet fragrance and a break from vehicle fumes. Prayers and Buddhist music swarmed around combined with rattling trains rushing past and impatient drivers hooting at the junction. Colours of gold, pink and blue painted onto live dancers and the hues of votive offerings brightened the dull concrete of the elevated train tracks above, as people went about their daily lives 🇹🇭🙏🏼✨⚱️📿🌸
Karen Hilltribes Trust
This week I’ve been volunteering with the Karen Hilltribes Trust exploring the beautiful border region in Mae Hong Son and Tak provinces, assisting with content management and learning more about the charity’s water infrastructure projects. It’s been fascinating to discover the extremely remote off-track mountain villages where many of my Karen students came from, and to understand better the simple conditions in which they live. By supporting these small communities with better access to cleaner water, KHT succeeds also in improving conditions for health, sanitation, agriculture and education🚰🌿🌏
Saying Goodbye
As I move on to my next volunteering project, goodbye seems to be the hardest word. My lovely Karen pupils presented me with the most beautiful handmade gifts and artistic thank you cards on my departure. I’m so incredibly grateful, touched and overwhelmed. It made my heart sing and was hard to hold back the tears. I hope, in my time here - if anything - I have inspired them to believe that with hard work and dedication they can be anything they want to be, and that they can achieve their life dreams regardless of the circumstances they were born into 💫🙏🏼🌏🇹🇭
Tablu Miss Emmy
This is my youngest class. Two weeks ago they hardly spoke a word of English. Now they can understand, read freely and communicate clearly. This is their third language after Karen and Thai. While at times they drove me to the brink of frustration, the end result is hugely rewarding and I’m so very proud of them.
❤️🧡💛💚💙💜
🙏🏼🇹🇭🎈
Jungle living 🌴🐒🎋
This week marks one month for me in South East Asia, crowned by the gift of new life 👑💖 early this morning one of the young ladies from the orphanage gave birth to a beautiful baby girl 🙏🏼🇹🇭
Picnic time
“Miss Emmy, we are very poor but we have everything we need so we are happy” a seven-year-old boy told me with a heartwarming smile. Some of these children are orphans, some have been abandoned and some come from impoverished families. Their parents are often opium addicts that have committed suicide with poison or by hanging. House of Blessing gives them ‘a children’s home’ and earlier in the week we gave them a treat of a picnic in the evening sun. They were so happy 🥛🍳🍚
Raven
This is Raven [not his real name] and he turned four years old last Friday. Not only was he born into abject poverty and indescribable living conditions, but he is also disabled with a limp, partial eyesight and an inability to swallow. His prospects in life are limited. Yet he is the happiest little boy I know and his smile lights up the room. I think we can all take some inspiration from little Raven, he has certainly stolen my heart 💛💚💙
17.09.18 ~ Typhoon Mangkhut/Ompong disaster relief in Baseco, Manila’s largest slum of c. 74,000 people ~ it’s hard to put today into words so here are some pictures ~
First (re)impressions // Waiting for Typhoon Ompong
Hello there world! This is coming to you live from Muntinlupa City, Metro Manila, Philippines.
It is currently hovering around 30 degrees at 90% humidity with a 90% chance of rain.
Indeed, my arrival here in South East Asia was just in time to witness Typhoon Ompong, a ‘super typhoon’, which is looming imminently.
Schools and government buildings have closed down and residents are advised to stay indoors due to risk of flying roofs, falling trees and landslides. It will rain for several days, and my first few days volunteering at Kaibigan Foundation have been postponed as a result, making it the perfect time to report back some initial impressions.
I last visited the Philippines in April 2000, and much has developed since then, while the people are just as friendly as I remember. Here I will record my observations over the last few days in categories as I wrote in my diary:
Sunsets
While Heathrow gave me a pretty, fluffy, candy floss pink sunset on departure, I have to say (arguably) nothing quite compares to South East Asian sunsets. The hues vary from red to purple to orange, lighting up the heavens and a camera lens cannot begin to do it justice.
Smells
On the plane from London to Dubai - a brand new and half empty Airbus A380 - there was an overpowering smell of Oud from my Arabian neighbours, mixed together with a distinct smell of body odour, making for a rather pungent few hours rest. Changing planes in Dubai, already in the departure lounge, I noticed a familiar and rather comforting smell; the whiff of fresh laundry and something I had associated with the Philippines during my last visit 18 years prior. These clean companions made for very amenable company on the flight to Manila, which was jam-packed with Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs - the Middle East is a particularly attractive place of work to send money home to relatives).
Thunderstorms
As we descended into Manila, the sprawling night lights of the metropolis laid out below, ominous clouds cluttered the horizon, lit up by silent flashes of pink and white light, illuminating the heavens like a muted, filmic, dream sequence. It was quite a spectacular welcome to the sweltering tropical temperatures on touchdown. Indeed storms here are loud and not for the faint-hearted, the rains are almost deafening, and not like anything we are accustomed to in Europe. It’s an experience. Wait until I tell you about Typhoon Ompong.
Malls
Mall culture here is big. Manila seems to be a vast expanse of malls and makeshift housing. Every area of the city has a mall, juxtaposing western materialism and stark commercialism with the impoverished communities of the slums just next door. It’s extraordinary to see, but apparently normal to life here, and a way to escape the heat and pollution outside. Uniformed and armed guards man the entrances which have airport tight security - firearms are legal and commonly owned, as in the US. Indeed the mall culture stems largely from the Philippines’ ties with America, and visitors will be greeted by uniformed staff uttering ‘Good morning Ma’am’ with an American twang wherever they go. Much to my dismay, Christmas music was playing already and some stores are already decorated for the festive season. These dizzying blocks of shops are intended to serve all needs, from the freshest fruit and local produce to Johnson’s baby cologne or ice cream sandwiches, you can find it all at the mall. Meanwhile the slums are a buzz of activity, toothless elderly men with wide smiles sitting and spectating outside their dwellings, greeting passers by; corrugated iron roofs achieving incredible balancing acts, punctuated by blasts of colour from towering advertising billboards.
Transport
Manila is well known to be a city with traffic. Public transport is infrequent and unreliable, and its infrastructure cannot cope with the city’s ever expanding population. Therefore people rely on four wheels, and this is regulated with government issued number plates that only allow cars to drive into the city on certain days. Rich people get around this by owning multiple cars, so it’s not necessarily the answer. There are chunky silver jeepneys - originally made from leftover US military jeeps in WWII - which serve as hop-on/hop-off buses in all colours of the rainbow, and there are also bright pink tricycles (bicycles with a sidecar). These hoot and swerve their way through the heavy traffic, their raucous drivers shouting at the top of their voices, peso notes weaved between their fingers like frilly gloves. Moments later animal transport dissects the traffic with pigs being taken to slaughter, and a van emblazoned with ‘Perishable goods, do not delay’ whizzes past.
Gold
Visiting Ayala museum in Makati, I learnt about the importance of gold in Filipino history. As the original resource for trade, it made the country very appealing to its colonisers (the Spanish settled here in the 16th century). Gold was often traded with Islamic merchants in the south, and there are clear Balinese influences in the designs. The 10th - 13th century jewellery and ornaments recovered and exhibited are truly beautiful and intricate - ear and neck ornaments, diadems, ceremonial masks, cord weights, cuffs, belts, studs and sword hilts.
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Images: Blue Jeepney - Rubi St - Vegas style Mall - Ayala Museum, Greenbelt - Manila sunset - Typhoon weather map