I thought I'm going to enjoy weekend in bed, but I thought wrong, very wrong. In fact, I still feel sore from the two-day non-stop walk around Binondo, first, to do business and second, to do some holiday shopping. Whatever the reasons may be, Chinatown always spells fun, fun, fun!

Here goes another adventure of the great couple who would brave the scorching sun, the toxic pollution and muggers just to score authentic dimsum and fabulous finds.

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Saturday, we had a business meeting with a Chinese guy selling cameras at the President's Tea House. We had our usual fare of dimsum(ha kao and sharksfin sio mai) and two servings of chicken feet which I ate with gusto after a three-day long diet. The Chinese guy recommended some place where we can go if we decided to go shopping. He also suggested that there are a lot of Chinese restos around that we should try serving equally delicious fare and stop eating at Presidents. We concluded after some thinking that maybe the Chinese guy is co-owner of one of the restos he mentioned..hmmm..the Nido soup thickens..

He was kind enough to sketch the place called 168 mall (kinda weird for a mall's name) and after several twists and turns we found the hidden destination of Uncle Scrooge's kins. We got really huge discounts minus the harassment that is Divisoria. I'm soo happy coz everyone's going to have a gift no matter how small it is. We got toys, bags, Christmas lights for our giant tree, shirts, jerseys, and a lot of knick knacks.

Within a few hours, we didn't notice that we've spent all our hard-earned money save for our fare. Okay, that's it, we're going home. So we started walking to some unknown street and finally reached an intersection. Gad, may rally! Wait, no, those are throngs of tired and eager-to- get-home pedestrian awaiting for the brave, lone MMDA lady's signal to cross the street! I've never seen such a huge number of people in one place except for the habitual rallies Filipinos stage at EDSA whenever they get discontented with a president. A line from Mike Hanopol's song came to mind...divisoria masaya, divisoria mag-ingat ka...

As the light turned red, I suddenly felt nauseated, getting a ride would be another hell of an mis/adventure.

to be continued...