They say Guimaras Mangoes are the sweetest in the world. Well, I only bought 1 mango since I didn’t want to bring along a whole kilo with me during the trip and I really don’t know how to pick my mangoes so … I’m sorry to say but it wasn’t the sweetest I’ve tasted It was delicious though and I enjoyed eating it while we were in the multicab

Balay Negrense

Ledesma Mansion

RCBC

El Ideal Bakeshop

Castillian House

Dome

To date, many old buildings still remain intact including a grand church, several commercial, and residential buildings.

El Ideal Bakeshop


Old Buildings still very much in use

Commercial Buildings in the City Proper of Silay

Jalandoni Museum

San Diego Cathedral in Silay City

Silay City Hall

Old House

Balay Negrense

After a few hours of our arrival, we had lunch in a Chinese restaurant beside L’ Fisher Hotel and had dessert in Calea.

Calea is known for their tasteful and sinfully sweet cakes. It’s an institution in Bacolod that every visitor should not fail to visit. I got myself a slice of their oreo cheesecake. YUM!

Next Destination: Silay City, the Paris of Negros

I’ve got to get a job sometime and pay the bills. Blogging is a great way to earn money but I’m a much too inexperienced human and I don’t have that much confidence yet to be what you would call a pro blogger. I’ve got to be able to engage myself in real life situations and put my skills to the test in the real (adult) world. I’ve got to interact with other people in the same field to be able to understand the industry that I’m diving myself into.

I’ve already sent a job application for a “link building” position at one of the SEO companies here in Iloilo. They are quite apprehensive in hiring me though after finding out I’m a nursing student. Their concern is that I might leave their company after a few month to concentrate on passing my exams (NLE, NCLEX, CGFNS, IELTS) because they’ve had the same experience with the nursing graduates that they hired before. Their company policy isn’t really favorable for me, is it?

I haven’t got a definite reply about their decision with my application yet. I hope they realize that I’m different from those nursing graduates who left. My challenge is convincing them that SEO is really something that I find worthwhile doing. It’s a stepping stone to even greater plans that I have in pursuing an IT-related career.

I’ll be taking the Nursing Licensure exam in Nov/Dec this year. Hopefully, it will be the last I’ll ever deal with nursing. If there are good opportunities in IT then I’d have no reason to have to pursue nursing.

My graduation picture - March 28, 2008
Whenever bloggers start to make considerable money online, they would usually make a post with the title “The -insert item here- that blogging bought me.” Some high income bloggers would post about their new car, plasma/LCD TV, or house. I’m not a high income blogger but I have bought something from blogging that is equally worthwhile.

It was during the summer of 2007 that I started to fully pay for my tuition with the money that I got from blogging. I was able to pay for a lot of expenses in school thereafter including my tuition for the first and second semester, daily expenses, expenses for make-up and completion duty (this part is quite expensive), and my board exam review. It’s a good thing that I study in a state university because studying in one is cheaper than private schools here. In total, I was able to save my parents more than P85,000 in school expenses because of blogging.

It’s quite an achievement for me but I couldn’t be more proud than being able to survive the BSN program of WVSU, one of top the top performing nursing schools in the country. I couldn’t have done it alone, and I give most of the credit to my friends, who gave me a reason to go to school and on duty, and especially to my teachers, who put up with me for four long years.

So what’s next for me? An option would be to continue my nursing profession and work abroad but right now, I feel that there are a lot more things that I am able to contribute before eventually giving in to being a nurse.

Last time I was in Negros was on September 2007 for an organizational study of Riverside Hospital with side-trip to Patag in Silay. I knew of some new developments in Bacolod and had the chance to see them myself.

Sanparq Square, home of Bacolod Branch of Convergy’s, the largest call center company in the world.

Planta Hotel

Also visited a recreational center in Talisay called Nature’s Village

Planta Hotel

There’s a new mall in Bacolod called 888 Chinatown Square, which is a divisoria-type development. I went inside and saw a lot of shops selling cheap RTW and ukay-ukay clothes, shoes, and electronic products like cellphones and MP3 platers but I noticed most of the spaces are still unoccupied. There was this one shop, which intrigued me because of the Iphone, N95 they had on sale for less than P10,000. I later realized they were just China phones and the same models could be bought in The Atrium Mall back home for a cheaper price.

888 Chinatown Squar

One of my close friends, whom I was with in Bucari, had just returned to her home in Kabankalan City. I told her that I wanted to visit her place and that she would look for a place for me to stay. She agreed and found a boarding house for me to stay near the City Plaza for only P100/night ^_^

Kabankalan City is two hours away from Bacolod and on the way, I got to take pictures of the other towns and cities in Negros Occidental.

Bago City

Bago Gym

Colonial House beside the Plaza (hadn’t had the chance to see the house of Tan Juan)

Gothic-style Roman Catholic Chuch of Bago, loving it!

Bago City Hall

Villadolid

View of Guimaras from Villadolid

Hinigaran

Roman Catholic Church of Hinigaran

In Kabankalan, I was able to tour interesting sights within the City Proper.

Fountain in the City Plaza

“green” highways

Roman Catholic Church

Public Highscool

Public Elementary School

Football field

Public Comfort Room in the City Plaza

Gaisano City Kabankalan

Unitop Kabankalan

Kabankalan is the second largest city in terms of economic-size in Neros Occidental next to Bacolod. It is strategically located in the center of Negros Island and is the transit point of travellers/commuters crossing from Northwestern Negros (Bacolod City area) to Southern Negros (Sipalay area all the way to Dumaguete City) and vice-versa. The city has a sizeable commercial economy and the only City outside Bacolod (that I have been to) that looks like what a city should look like.

I am quite surprised of the grandiose public buildings in Kabankalan but not quite impressed. Kabankalan is a city, which had a total income of P444M in 2006 (No figure for 2007 yet). P386M is from the allocation of the national government called IRA (Internal Revenue Allotment) and that means that Kabankalan is 87% dependent on the National Government for its funds. Meanwhile, Kabankalan also generated a local income of P58.0M, which is considerably large but only ranks 11th when compared among other cities in the region despite it having the 3rd largest total income next to the cities of Bacolod and Iloilo. During the same year, Kabankalan only spent 67% of its income or P140M in savings.

This is the breakdown of how the IRA of Kabankalan is computed
Population - P115,209,373.93 (for its pop of 149,769)
Land Area - P221,682,895.01 (for its land area of 726.40 km²)
Equal Sharing of all cities in the Country - P49,745,511.06
——————————
Total - P386,637,780.00

You can see in the information above that Kabankalan gets almost half of its income from the IRA it gets from its expansive land area computed with a predefined formula for all cities. If Kabankalan was a mere municipality the amount of IRA that it would have received would just be decreased to a third. These data only goes to show the disparity of the distribution of IRA to municipalities and small cities because cities get more IRA per square kilometer and per capita, which is theoretically correct because land and people in cities have more economic value that their counterparts in towns but when you have a city with a very large land area like Kabankalan, where only a fraction of its land area is urban/developed and most of it is just farmlands/sugarcane plantations and mountains, a large disparity happens. And this disparity is responsible for Kabankalan to be able to finance such grandiose public infrastructures including a locally-funded airport that gotten the nod of President GMA.

Don’t get me wrong though. I have nothing against Kabankalan, in fact I find it a suitable place to live, with clean, wide roads, well lighted city proper at night, convenient shopping centers nearby, and a peaceful and fun-loving citizenry. I merely want to present my thoughts.

After I was able to contemplate on what was mentioned above while I was touring Kabankalan’s city proper, I took a refreshing break from the deep thinking by visiting Mag-aso Falls. The place was very nice, I would definitely love to come back to Mag-aso and Kabankalan!

After returning from my Bacolod-Kabankalan trip, I decided to take a break from traveling overload I’ve been getting myself into for the past week. I’ll just stay home and try to get my skin to its original color while I share my adventures through my blogs.

Mt. Agua Colognia and the rice terraces seen in Bucari, Leon

Our first destination was Sitio Camandag to swim in the springs and watch the waterfalls. We left at around 3pm for Sitio Tabionan because we were supposed to spent the night in the campsite there. Going to Sitio Tabionan is a grueling 5km trek upland along a muddy road. When we arrived at Tabionan, it was already dark … too dark to be setting up tents in the campsite. Instead, we stayed in a nearby house and set-up our tents there instead.

Natural pools in Sitio Camandag

Imoy Falls

Rough road to Sitio Tabionan

Great view of the Bucari Landscape

Dusk at Tabionan

There were locals there who assisted us during our stay and cooked our food for us. Earlier in the town proper, I had already mentioned that I was curious about this delicacy they call “Linagpang.” I had heard of it during the Jessica Soho episide when they featured Bucari on National TV. I was head over heels when I found out that they were cooking Linagpang for us for dinner. I especially like that they pour fresh chickens blood in the soup to add a special taste, when its served you can eat the blood because it has already coagulated into one jello-looking mass. Leon’s Linagpang is delicious, a must taste when in Leon.

Grilled Native Chicken

Yummy Linagpang!

The next day, we set out to be among the pinetrees. There, we lounged around the picnic tables and made a shooting for the second installment of Connor Cunnings. Meanwhile, I had the chance to take self-portraits in between shootings.

Ferns and Pinetrees

Dozing off at the picnic tables in Tabionan

Picnic Tables

Cabbage Patches

I always ride on the roof of the jeep because it offers a great view of Bucari

Road-building equiptment neglected and overrun by grass

We had lunch at my friend’s house in Leon Town Proper, where another serving of Linagpang was prepared for us. Talk about Linagpang overload! I was already in a hurry to catch my ferry boat ride bound for Bacolod, Negros Occidental waiting for me at the riverwharf in Iloilo City.

Self-portraits in the Pines:

Urban in the Jungle

Flickr | DeviartArt

I have my eyes on you

Flickr | DeviartArt

Thinking of You

Flickr | DeviartArt

Forest fashion

Flickr | DeviartArt

A Verdant Death

Flickr | DeviartArt

During the first night, we already planned to sleep at my friends’ house and spend some time swimming in Junbee Garilva Resort, just like what we did last time. I introduced myself to the owners who happened to be the one who welcomed us to their resort, I was surprised to find out that they already knew me and my website, Explore Iloilo, because of a post I did about their resort. Neat! After a bit of inquiring about their prices, they presented us a good deal - P150/person per night in an aircon room and inclusive of swimming pool priviledges. Each of us slept in our own beds, which is very different from the limited-budget situations that we usually have when during our outings.

Rock formations in Pilar, Capiz

The next day, we visited Pilar town in nearby Capiz province since my other friends wanted to make a petition to the Shrine of Mother Mary for guidance during the Nursing Licensure Exam on June. I was shocked to find out that Pilar was just barely 30 minues by tricycle from Balasan.

During the way back, we made it a point to buy bibinka in Balasan. I was told that RCJ bibinka was the best in town. Indeed it was, the bibinka in Balasan is really more delicious than those sold in the city.

We were back in Concepcion in the afternoon and rode a pumpboat to Bulubadianan Island at around 4:00pm. The sunset was in full bloom shortly after we arrived. It was a very surreal experience, the sky was just full of pastel colors, the soft color of the sea, and the white sand beach made the most perfect of scenes.

We spent the night in the only resort in the island, the Sandbar Island Beach Resort. They had cottages for rent for P1,000 per night but we opted to sleep in the tents we brought instead because they only charged us P300 for setting up the two tents. We had to cook our own by “uling” (charcoal) and the electricity went off at around 10:00pm. During that time we had a bonfire set-up for P300.

The next day, we circumnavigated the island. It took us about an hour and when we came back, breakfast was ready.

After breakfast, there was a little rest. I talked to the resort attendant about “boating” around the nearby islands. He charged us P500 for a trip to Malangabang Island then to Agho Island and Back.

The road is excellent up until the border of San Joaquin Iloilo and Antique where it gets a bit rough. You’ll know when you’re entering Antique because of the zig-zagging road. It can get scary because some parts of the highway are beside steep cliffs and the bus usually runs really fast during the turns.

We arrived at around 5pm and went to my friend’s house to unload our things. Our first destination was to see the sunset along the beautiful coast of San Jose. We went to this place called Danilo’s since it was one of the more popular resorts there but when we arrived the beach was full of people, which could probably be because it was holy week. Seeking a more peaceful place to enjoy the sunset, we had a very long walk to a resort called Camea/Kamea, which my friend recommended. There, we had a little snack and sat along the beach as the sun set gracefully into the horizon.We then went back to our friends house.

We had our completion duty at around 8pm. After the night was over, and I mean 8 in the morning, there was enough deliveries for me to complete my scrubs! Yey! I was one step closer to completing my requirements for graduation.

We then tagged along with my friend and her family to lunch with their other relatives living in Brgy. San Pedro Antique. My friend told me that Brgy. San Pedro is the largest in San Jose. It used to be a seperate town and had its own Spanish-colonial church. After taking our lunch, we visited the old church of Brgy. San Pedro. What was left of it is the ruins of the facade and walls of the church. The interiors of the church was turned into a garden/grotto and a new brightly-colored church was built nearby.

After lunch, we decided to hangout in a cool resto that I previously visited. It was called Bondoc’s located in Binirayan Hills (sounds like Beverly Hills). We ordered some food and they were delish and very affordable.

Before the afternoon was over I headed back to Iloilo and had a long rest from my sleepless trip/completion duty in San Jose, Antique.