Manila, Arrival Day in Jeepney Town

Travel Day 855 – Makati, Manila, PHILIPPINES

Today was my full Arrival Day in the Manila and in comparison to Hawaii it was a really humid and sweaty one…

Modern Jeepney in Manila, Philippines

When I stepped out on the street, I became aware of the fact that it had been over two years already since I was last in the Philippines and it seemed that some things had changed, while others had not. One thing that was different this time around was my actual location. As I had decided to be closer to my friend here, I went with the option of staying in Makati, a rather posh area, instead of the local neighborhood I was staying at last time. But what had not changed, was a certain smell in the air. I couldn’t really pin it down, but it was a very familiar smell and it was exactly the same Manila smell from two years ago…

Another thing that had not changed was the public transport, namely the Jeepneys. They are an absolute novelty and unique in the world as a means of transportation and just loved them. Last time I was already fascinated by the different color schemes of the Jeepneys and my obsession started to bloom again when I was walking down the street. The tractor like rattling and black exhaust fume leaving Jeepneys were literally everywhere and one seemed to look more interesting than the next…

Intermediate Jeepneys in Makati, Philippines

Since the Philippines used to be a US colony for a while, it seemed the infamous Jeepney has developed from the original US army Jeeps which were imported to the country and probably left over after WW II. Even today they still looked somewhat like those old jeeps, but they had been slightly modified over the years. For once they had developed into a shiny chrome vehicle, but hey also had been elongated to seat more passengers. What was remarkable was the fact that they were all custom designed and every single Jeepney on the road was technically a completely unique vehicle…

Additionally the Jeepney seemed to have evolved slowly over the years, as there were many different stages of this evolution to be seen on the road. The oldest ones looked much more like original jeeps, had an actual paint color and were much shorter. While the newest versions of the Jeepneys were extremely modified, barely jeep like looking creatures that were completely covered in shiny chrome, extremely long and converted with accessories. On top of that there was even a scaled bigger version now I had not seen last time around, but it was a bus like Jeepney with windows, air con and TV inside…

Old version of Jeepney in Manila, Philippines

It was simply incredible to be back in Philippines and besides having lunch with my friends and going out for drinks later, I simply chased down Jeepneys all day long and took as many photos of them as I possibly could. Yeah, it was a proper Jeepney-rich Arrival Day… : )