Baguio Insider

Baguio and Me

Long have I postponed the creation of this page, not for fear of taking credit — or blame — for the contents of this blog but because I felt it should be all about Baguio, where I live, which I live and breathe, whom I love so desperately, and not so much about myself.

I still have not developed a rambling blog where I can simply post anything I please about my thoughts and my life, believing that no one would really care and knowing that I do not really care to entertain those who would use my life as a pill for their boredom.

I felt the word Insider was enough to indicate that the writer was a resident of the city, who could provide readers with the latest news and events, who could provide insights in ‘defense’ of Baguio at every turn. Of course I started doing this with my first website Go Baguio!, which aims to be the compleat resource for all information about what I call my ‘virtual heaven on earth.’

Baguio Insider is a very personal blog, sometimes treading on ‘dangerous ground’ by calling local officials to task. But for a person who, during the dark days of Martial Law and even shortly after, had 16 armalites pointed at her at one point, nothing fazes me now. I make sure any and all business I enter into in Baguio serve and enhance the city (which means they are not my primary sources of income), and that my dealings with the residents here are always fair and honorable.

When I started doing business in Baguio, it was after the 1990 earthquake. My family felt it important to have a respected Metro Manila business like ours show investor confidence in Baguio and help rebuild the city. My father had relocated to Baguio in the late 1970s and was going to help us in the business. Actually we bid and won to run Halfway House (1991-1997) for him.

When the directive was handed down, by those interested to make money off its privatization, to make Camp John Hay fail in the hands of the Filipinos, the other concessionaires and I vowed to make the facilities earn despite all the corruption under the first Filipino administration, despite 3-month contracts that did not allow for planning and renovations. I courted many large companies and organizations to decide in favor of Baguio for their events and conferences. When Camp John Hay was shut down for a few years starting 1997, the year of the Asian economic crisis, it was then that I decided to reside here permanently and invest in Baguio some more via the food and beverage sector of the hospitality and tourism industry.

My love affair with Baguio began on my first trip up when I was 4 or 5 years old in 1969, when my dad, Freddie, insisted on camping out in the cold at a friend’s yard (was it Ernie Yabut?). It was sealed by my first pony ride when I was about 5 or 6.

There were many trips after that, sometimes on the spur of the moment when my dad would rouse me from bed in the middle of the night and I would find myself in freezing my nightgown at dawn as we were suddenly up in the mountains of beautiful Baguio. Then we would eat, and head back down again. These were occasions when he would break-in his cars — and believe me, Freddie Araneta had many, many cars.

My father was the kind of man who would not allow distance to get in the way of his taste buds (so we would travel long distances from Manila to, say, have lunch at the fish pond restaurant that was Josephine’s in Cavite when Cavite was a really rural province). He made many friends in Baguio when he moved here in 1978, especially restaurant owners who all claimed him as a regular — and voracious — customer.

As I was growing up, Baguio was everything bucolic chic! It had a wonderful small town feel with very well-dressed, friendly, English-speaking residents. The weather and surroundings always called for hats, coats, scarves and boots, with Manila tourists wearing shorts just to show that the cold did not faze them. It was like traveling to America. It was Little America. Safe, clean and simply wonderful. At the same time, it had the sweetest people on earth called the Igorots who contributed so much color and depth to the city, and made the public market the best souvenir place in the land.

My grandfather Vicente, owned the first condo at Europa where he served as an officer so we always had a home in Baguio even in the 1970s. I remember that before he saw to the water cisterns, my cousins and I would do bucket brigades all the way from the 5th floor of Building 3 to the lowest level. We are also a family of riders who would go on trail to Marlboro Country when you could still ride like the wind across ‘dem dar hills.’ I remember also once passing a ‘lake’ on Kennon road, temporarily created by a landslide that stopped the water from flowing down Bued River.

I remember that my mom, Mitos, who dated a few PMAers during her single days, and was asked to guest edit their publication (which name I cannot recall and which was deemed such an honor then), always saying that the real lion’s head welcoming one to Baguio was the naturally-shaped rock that is now dwarfed by the (in my opinion, ugly and scary) Lion’s Head commissioned by the Lion’s Club in the early 1970s.

I have written a snippet about my love affair with Camp John Hay in the 1980s in Go Baguio! so I will not get into that here, except that, when the Americans finally allowed the Filipinos to enter the recreational facility, boy, did my cousins and I recreate! You see, in 1975, my favorite cousins, the McCanns, had moved up to Baguio, converting their vacation home (which was handed down from our great grandparents Gregorio and Carmen, to their grandmother, Margaritina, to their mother Carmir) into Mountain Lodge on Leonard Wood. They lived on Wagner Road, off Military Cut-off. As the old timers know, their house near Heald Lumber was located just a few hundred meters from the old John Hay Main Gate on Loakan. During those our student days, we could not, of course, afford the base taxis so we walked to Mile-Hi, 19th Tee and all the way to Scout Hill.

Diane was a year younger and we were fast friends, writing to each other via what is now known as snail mail, and riding, riding, riding as much as we could, scrimping on meals to get extra hours on horseback, living on boiled peanuts at Wright Park, befriending the pony boys (they were really men) to allow us to “Manong, pa-round!” late in the day.

I would take Pantranco buses on weekends just to be with her, and of course, as those were our disco days, to dance at Crystal Cave (later, Gold Mine) at Hyatt Terraces Baguio or Sadiwan at Pines Hotel. Sometimes one of my high school best friends, Osay, would be hired to spin at a party at Woodshed, or we would go all the way to Green Valley for a Top Spin (TS) Party.

The Baguio boys then used to dress in blazers a la Miami Vice as that was, of course, in the 1980s, when Harlequin was such a cool dive, as was Basement, and when The Blank played at Rock Session with my classmate in Francais 12, Grace as lead singer. Then there was the ultra romantic Cafe Amapola where one would invariably fall in love with the boy of the moment for all the romance that dripped from the place.

All the boys my age are gone from Baguio now, having moved out after graduating from college as here were no real jobs to be had here even then, and especially then when we graduated from college in the mid-80s. Those were the dark days of the economy before the fall of Marcos.

I have many Baguio stories growing up and all of them are beautiful and warm, enough fuel for me to go on living here and loving Baguio despite the many present day concerns that I write about in my posts. Of all the places in the world that I could have chosen to move to when I was cross-stitching beside my mom at 32 on a Saturday night waiting for my younger siblings to come home, I chose Baguio. And whenever I climb up Kennon Road, the excitement of my youth comes back every time.

And I know I am home.

More About Lisa at Go Baguio!

Email Me at: creativenative@gmail.com