First Days in Manila

I am getting settled in after a couple of days. Still haven't adjusted to the time change--I only slept about 5 hours last night despite all the walking around AND doing a Jillian Michaels workout in the evening. I woke up at 2:45am and couldn't fall back asleep!

Laura showed me around yesterday and we spent hours and hours walking around. There are a TON of malls here. There are more than 10 malls within walking distance of the hotel. Everything is connected, and the walkways are covered, so even though it rained pretty much all day, we didn't have to carry umbrellas. We also went to the three grocery stores that are nearby and I got some groceries to start out.

Here are a few pics of the hotel...

The view from my window.

 From the living room looking into the dining room/kitchen.

Kitchen!

Living room.

Today we went to lunch over near the office with Aida, the Group Manager here. I had some delicious halibut with avocado & mango salsa. It came with brown rice and couscous (also delicious) and onion rings. It was a pretty amazing pairing, if you ask me. :)

After lunch we went to the office. I am set up in a cube and finally got to meet all the people I have been working with! Everyone is very nice and welcoming. I am excited to be here for the next month. Since I slept so poorly, I left at 4. Unfortunately that meant I had to miss the fashion show at 6...yes, there was a fashion show at the office today. My teammates made me this great sign--look who I get to look at in my cube! I've already informed them that he's my future husband, of course.

The sun was out when I got home so I decided to check out the pool. It was nice--I was actually a little cold sitting outside after I swam. There is a nice breeze by the pool and I sat there watching the clouds roll in and take my sun away. The forecast for the next 10 days looks like this:



Now I'm back at the hotel trying to stay awake until 9 or so. Hoping to sleep longer than 5 hours tonight!