Dinagyang

We arrived in Iloilo just in time for Dinagyang… the biggest celebration of the year. This one was even bigger, since the previous two had been cancelled.

Because of the time of year and the Catholic connections, it feels akin to Mardi Gras or Carnaval. But the items of celebration are actually Santo Niño (baby Jesus) and the sale of an island by the Aeta indigenous folk to Javanese migrants. Quirky mashup, but let’s party.

The celebration was felt from the moment our plane landed. Seriously, my kids were freaked out by the thundering drummers. All the hotels were fully booked and traffic into the heart of town was a trickle. To make things even more complicated, they shut off all cell signal and internet to prevent terrorist attacks. (I truly wonder if they stirred up more danger by cutting off communication, but who knows?)

Anyways, I didn’t just want to be inconvenienced by the festivities. I wanted to partake! Thanks to our friend TinTin’s jeepney navigation and crowd maneuvering skills, we secured a great spot to watch the parades and pageants. This is something I can say I’m glad to have seen!

A Few Alaska Favorites

Flashing back to some favorite Alaska sites.

🍕 Moose’s Tooth Pizza
☕️ Resurrect Art Cafe
🫙 203 Kombucha

The kombucha bar in Palmer, and the church-turned-coffee-shop in Seward are definitely on that list.

On top of that, we also got to eat at the fourth ranked pizza joint in the country. How one can eat at enough pizza spots to confidently make such a claim, I’m not sure, but that person is doing the Lord’s work. Sure enough, Moose’s Tooth served up some great slices and beer.

Iloilo Date Night

Tracked down sunsets and Vietnamese food in the Philippines cause date night is no skips.

Kayero Market

I’ve always been a believer that if you want to get to know the heart of everyday life in a community, head to the market. In a lot of places that means the grocery store or supermarket but in settings like rural Burundi, that’s also an open air market where goods are sold by the hands that planted them.

White Lotus Panglao

Did our stay in Bohol give some White Lotus vibes? Totally. But it also came with the best beer runs.

World Water Day Bangladesh

It’s #WorldWaterDay

There’s a big irony when it comes to island nations like the Philippines or low-lying coastal countries like Bangladesh. Water should be abundant, but because of the really high salinity, drinking water can still be scarce. Extremely high saline concentrations also makes the water less suitable for farming, which is a problem that climate change intensifies.

I loved these Water ATMs I found in Bangladesh, installed by the organization BEDS. Eco-villages can manage their own water-treatment facilities by using local knowledge, the nature-based solutions of Pond-and-Sand Filters, and technologies like solar power and reverse osmosis.

The introduction of the ATM system has made these services more widely available, connecting about 12,000 people with clean water. Water-borne illnesses are no longer a concern, and local women have more opportunities without having to spend hours collecting water.

Toddlers Without Borders

Toddlers without borders

I’m no expert, but within the past year, I’ve taken my toddler and twin babies to Guatemala, Alaska, Hawaii, and the Philippines.

Adjust your expectations 🏞️ Part of what makes or breaks an experience is how it compares to your expectations going into it, right? Well, expect traveling around with a kid to be different. In general, you’ll go slower and do less, and you’ll probably spend more time in your rental or in city parks. It’s not such a bad thing. Kids are naturally gifted at helping us relearn wonder and curiosity.

Match your ages with your places 🗾 There are many places that are high on my list because of hikes and nature… Nepal, Peru, for example. But they’re not happening anytime soon as family trips because two of my kids barely started walking! (Also, Peru almost had a coup a month ago, so there’s that.) On the flipside I bumped Guatemala up because of its proximity. Places I can anticipate being child-friendly… Japan, Costa Rica, Netherlands, might get a boost. Of course, that depends on what you come to do. There’s a side to Dutch tourism that isn’t kid friendly at all, of course.

Balconies are your bestie 🌆 My kids tap out around 7 PM. Unless we have a reliable sitter on the trip with us, that means we’re also done going out for the day at that time too. If it’s kind of a bummer not being able to interact more with your destination, the balcony will at least help you be more outside… and maybe you can grab a local wine or takeout or something. If space is an issue, you can talk at a normal volume, be a bit more integrated with the location, while still being responsible with your kids and all that.

Hawaii Travel is Complicated

Learn History.
Consider your impact.
Respect native lives.

These are good principles for ethical travel anywhere, but they seem more difficult to apply in Hawaii for some reason. Something about the tourism industry there caters so heavily to the self-serving kind of extractive tourism. It’s ridiculous and sad that so many Americans visit Hawaii every year while being completely unaware of how it became a state; the role of missionaries, sugar companies, and imperialism, the overthrow of the monarchy, and the way culture was repressed in language and education.

No judging, I learned about this stuff late, too.

Plus there’s a whole lot of “native-washing” going on, or whatever the cultural equivalent to greenwashing should be called. Passing things off as native when they really benefit some large tourism corporation.

Oahu with the Family

My kids love islands. Especially the one we named after the ocean. Who figured?

Old Seward Highway

Would you drive the most dangerous highway in Alaska?

That’s what I kept hearing about the Old Seward Highway connecting Anchorage to Seward. It didn’t feel too dangerous for most of the ride. I mean,
+ It was paved
+ It was pretty wide
+ It connects two of Alaska’s larger hubs, so it was well maintained

Plus, in Alaska, I expected the most dangerous road to be some tiny passage over a narrow bridge 100 miles from the nearest town.

On our way back, however, a close-call encounter with a moose in total darkness helped clarify why the Old Seward Highway gets that title.

More Effort to be Connected

I don’t think I truly realized how much I value my Filipino ancestry until I became a dad.

My kids’ connection to that ancestry isn’t going to come as easily. The generations above me are getting older. The number of people I get to see in the Philippines is getting smaller. Elders become ancestors. Their childhoods, like mine, are set in the United States, and their ties to people who grew up on the Islands are more limited.

I want them to have a strong connection to the culture. I know it took me most of my life to get to the point where I appreciate it the way I do now, but I want them to have that same chance.

That’s a tall task for me on my own.

Thankfully I’ve got 7,000 islands to help.

Here’s hoping that this is the first of a childhood full of stories about those trips to the Philippines we took, the people we met, and the things we learned about ourselves.

The Philippines and the Parts That Mesh

Some parts of me that come to life on the islands

I’ve been in the Philippines for the past couple weeks with my family. Inevitably, that much time in a place will teach you a lot. Especially about yourself. That’s all the more true I guess when the place you’re visiting is your ancestral homeland.

Really, I came here so that my family, especially my kids, could start the lifelong process of building a connection with the land of their heritage. Oddly, however, a lot of what’s jumped out at me are the ways that my western upbringing gives me a different way of seeing and doing things… especially when it comes to parenting.

These are generalizations of course, but parents in the Philippines have tended to be more keen on preventing the falls and bumps that I consider a part of the learning experience. That’s just one example of a difference between the way I parent what’s more typical around here.

In a parallel world where I somehow ended up living the rest of my life in the Philippines, there would be some ways in which I’d feel very different from the people around me- like a number of parenting philosophies.

Whenever you travel, the differences are going to be much easier to notice. That seems pretty obvious to me. But if my purpose is to try and build a stronger connection with the Philippines, I thought it might be helpful to look for ways where my way of thinking, seeing the world, or doing things are reflected in my surroundings.

Here are some of those things:

The abundance of time

In the Philippines, time is abundant. Hurrying is unusual, and typically pointless. A meeting time is just a suggestion. This isn’t to say there aren’t people there who have busy schedules… Filipinos are as industrious as they come. But there is certainly a sense that what needs to get done will get done in the right time.

Honestly, I love it that way. I hate the feeling of being rushed, yet I find myself there often.

Like most working parents (and many other people), I’m very familiar with the feeling that there just isn’t enough time in the day to accomplish all the things I want to have checked off, let alone opportunities to unwind and enjoy it. I live in a very clock-focused society, aiming to make sure all the meetings are held on time and that as much work as possible gets done in between.

A number of things, including experiencing burnout towards the end of 2022, and going through Oliver Burkeman’s Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals have helped me see the irony of how our lives our often overscheduled so we can make the most of our time, but they often make us simply feel short on time. In contrast, while the island life happens more slowly and therefore takes up more time, it always feels like there’s just enough.

I feel so much more at home in that environment. It seemed to have the opposite effect on my wife, who finds more comfort in the predictability of when things are going to start. Lucky for her, we live most of our days where that’s the norm. It’s been very refreshing for me to have a break from the rush.

Sheer resourcefulness

Sometimes I’ll see people try to follow a Filipino recipe found online by tracking the exact recipe they found online. But whenever I explain how to make a dish, it sounds more like:

“Use oyster sauce, but if that’s not around just cut soy sauce with brown sugar… You want snapper but tilapia works too… If you can’t get your hands on some peanut oil and annatto powder, just throw in some Skippy.”

The truth is, there’s no need to let the lack of an ingredient hold you back from what you’re trying to make. And that applies to more than just food.

With the bulk of our ancestors having been farmers and fishers, there’s always been an inherent knack for making ends meet.

I admire this trait, and the mindset of not being held back by what you don’t have. Instead, you work with what you’ve got and figure out how to make it work.

I’d like to think I at least have a little bit of that in me.

An integration with nature

In Filipino folklore, whenever you step into a forest or grassland you’re supposed to declare your presence by saying tabi tabi po. Excuse me!It’s so you don’t accidentally step on duwendes or engkantos that live in grass or water.

On the surface, Filipinos tend to be extremely superstitious and that’s pretty accurate. But to me there are two things going on here- a reverence for nature, its power, and the way our well-being relies on it.

There is also less of a divide between the material and spiritual worlds. Tangible things, from bodies to trees are expressions of the spiritual and they have an interaction with our daily lives.

After all, a lot of folklore originates from the need to explain natural phenomenon. Same with a lot of scientific discovery.

I’m both a spiritual believer and a lover of science… especially the life sciences. I find material things ripe for study and mystical things meant for experience. It’s always frustrating when the scientific community and modern mystics get too dismissive of each other. (Prioritizing empirical knowledge on one end of the spectrum, rejecting modern medicine based on pseudoscience on the other.) I’ve always resonated with the idea that the scientific and the mystical routes ultimately explore the same things, but with different lenses and language. Follow either path far enough and the line between gets fuzzier

Anyways, after some time back on the islands I feel a bit like I’ve come back to myself. A trip back always feels like a spiritual recalibration like that. I know I feel so much more rested after spending time on the islands, because many parts of me can feel right at home.

Getting Around the Philippines

7,000 islands. Hundreds of languages. Thousands of species of different birds, bugs, plants, and other wildlife.

Saying the Philippines has diversity is an understatement.

There’s a lot of diversity in the way people live, and even though I’ve been to these islands more time than I can keep count of, I know there’s so much more that I haven’t experienced. But I’m here for the ride.

And even the rides I took ended up being pretty diverse.

Daniel's Bachelor Party

Thanks for letting me get you over another international border before you get married, Daniel . Another step closer to Brazil 2016.

Past Few Philippines Visits

I have no idea how many times I’ve been to the Philippines, actually. I know my first visit was before my first birthday. I know when I was six I spiked a pretty high fever at a hotel in Dagupan. On another visit, I pretty much watched Cartoon Network in the room the whole day and loved it. If I were to guess, this most recent visit is something like number 10 or 12 for me.

I didn’t think much of those recurring visits while we were doing them. Just something that our family did. But I appreciate them so much more looking back. I realize most Filipino-Americans did not grow up with the same level of proximity to the motherland that I got, and I treasure it.

My kids are an extra generation removed from their ancestors who lived on the islands. But I don’t want to miss my shot to give them what I got growing up. Proximity in spite of the distance. Here’s hoping homegoings can serve as chapter markers in their lives as well.

The Philippines

I can’t believe we actually just did this but…

We brought our kids to the other side of the world.

When we stepped into that warm, thick Manila air outside Ninoy Aquino Airport, I had to let it sink in. We’re here. Really here. And all three kids made it all the way. Look at that!

What possessed us to navigate air travel with two lap infants and a toddler to the total opposite side of the planet? Other than my baseline level of wanderlust, my roots matter more and more to me as I get older. Especially since becoming a dad. And I want to pass that on to the kiddos.

This just might be our biggest adventure yet.

Also, it helps that Hawaii is halfway there as an extended layover, and that we can get A LOT of helping hands when we arrive.

The Philippines with the Kids

The motherland had some grandbabies it needed to meet.

This is probably the most ambitious adventure we’ve embarked on as a family of five… and one of the most ambitious things I’ve done: taking all the Lazaro littles on the long journey to the other side of the world to get to the Philippines.

Of course, you don’t sign yourself up for that sort of thing unless you believe it’ll be worth the gargantuan effort… and I really do. I want my kids to have a connection to their roots, one that I don’t think will be made passively. Also I want to have a glass of the freshest mango juice everyday, so here we are.

How to Kill Wonder

Tired of feeling a sense of wonder about the world? Wish things could be a little more plain and forgettable? Try out these tactics:

Feel the need to be able to explain everything you encounter. Explanations > Experiences.

Stay busy. Nonstop. If you give yourself too much space, you might start paying attention to things.

Surround yourself with people who have the same experiences, beliefs, and background as you.

Never be a beginner. Find what comes easy to you and stay firmly within those lines.

Stay the hell away from conflict, tension, or discomfort. You don’t want to know what happens next.

Repeat to yourself that wonder only belongs in far away, exotic places and you won’t have to worry as much about it sneaking up on you in your everyday life.

Do anything to avoid play. Tell yourself it’s just for kids. Or that you’ll get to it once all the work is done.

Assume the worst out of unfamiliar people, places, ideas, and circumstances. Be judgemental, not curious.

Seward

Seward, Alaska is a special little port town. A quick stop for many cruises, but for understandable reasons. Being right alongside the Kenai Fjords attracts some of the most striking wildlife and dramatic landscapes.

While there, I also caught small glimpses at life for the people who call Seward home. A gorgeous church-turned-cafe was one of my favorite encounters, a place where I feel like it’d be easy to become a regular.

Global Groceries: Antigua

La Bodegona’s a familiar grocery destination for people who’ve been to Antigua. It looks deceptively small at first, but the further you go the more you realize there is to the store. Things don’t seem terribly organized at first, except somehow you’re always able to find what you need just going by feels.