Getting away from the office

On my fifth day we had a meeting in the morning to see how I can best help them improve their service. We created a good collaborative plan which parallels many of the ideas the funders in Ottawa had but is now much more specific. We celebrated by going out for lunch at a restaurant near Manila Bay which is about a half hour from the office. The traffic was not too bad in this city of anywhere from 10 to 13 million (everyone gives me a different figure but it is a lot of people). The restaurant is one of their favorite spots. You pick whatever you want to have and how you want it cooked. I chose a tuna which was grilled but the portion was about 4 times the amount you would get if you asked for a tuna steak in a Canadian restaurant. We all shared the squid, prawns, scallops on a half shell, green mangos (which are tart not like the sweet yellow mangoes I am eating all the time here) and a vegetable dish with green bean, onion, squash, and some other vegetables with a cocoanut sauce which was delicious. I also drank cocoanut juice from the nut which i have done in Hawaii and elsewhere. We also had a delicious clam soup, not a chowder, which had a nice ginger taste to it. Very clean tasting. We spent a lot of time eating and having a good time. As you can see from the pictures this is not a high end restaurant but the food was excellent and the staff very friendly. The staff of the office were there. Jimmy A. who is opposite me is the Project Director who has lived in Canada and the U.S. He is trained as a labour economist and has been involved in Development projects throughout Asia but he is originally from the Philippines. Next to me is Kit, Jeri next to her, and Ting opposite to Jeri. They are the counsellors in the office. Tosca and Joel are the support staff. I have been eating a lot of fish here even for breakfast because there other favorite food is pork which I do not eat. Anyways afterwards we all went back to work later until 5. They are talking about a typhoon coming through, essentially a rainy, windy storm but it is Saturday and it rained some and now the sun is out. If it is nice tomorrow I will either go to the old historical section of Manila or take a trip out of the city. Either way I should have a few more pictures.