Jasper Jose: DAY TRIP TO MANAOAG

From south to north and back

Before the dawn even broke, we were already on the road to Manaoag. We left my Grandma's house in Alabang as early as 5:00 am - nobody wants to get stuck in traffic in EDSA, right? By 6:30 am, we reached the 1st gasoline station in NLEX, and everybody knows what comes next — breakfast.

We ate the most important meal of the day at Army Navy. If you have followed me on my social media accounts you know what I order here at times, or most of the times, really – Quesadillas & Churros. Who would get tired of eating them?! Call me weird, but I like the cheese melting on my palettes and the crisp of the churros together.

After finishing our meal, we hit the road again. I fell asleep after a few minutes; woke after an hour entering TPLex. I'd been playing Owl City's "Verge" & Justin Bieber's "Love Yourself" from time to time; please don't hate hahaha. At 9:30 am, we reached the end of the TPLEX and I'm expecting traffic... but there was none. I was so used to turning right after Tarlac exit because we go to Baguio on occasions, but this time we made a left turn to Urdaneta.

It's my 3rd time here, but I don't remember much, my parents told me that my 1st time was when I was still 2, 2nd when I was 7 and I didn't care a lot, and now I'm blogging about it. After a 30 minute drive from the exit we have reached the church. We didn't make it to the 10:00 to 11:00 am mass, but we heard the one that comes right after.

Our family had a small picnic that I forgot to take a photo of — but, just to describe, Adobo, Laing, Tocino & Baked Zitti we're on the table and oh, no Filipino would forget about the rice; it completes every Filipino meal.

At 2:00 in the afternoon, we left Manaoag and by 4:00, we made a stop over and Kobe bought his training shoes at a Nike Park nearby in Pampanga. As the clock tick 5:00 pm, we're back in Manila, the traffic is starting to build up in Balintawak.

One of my Titas asked if we have already witness the live mannequin show in Greenhills. Having not seen it beforehand, we all agreed to see it, after watching the show we decided to eat dinner at Sizzles - a restaurant that serves Filipino cuisine. Christmas Bazaars were already up, and we went for a little shopping.