Back To The Philippines - Manila Is Ugly

Ah, the Philippines. It has replaced New Zealand as my favorite country in the world last year. It has so much to offer and so many places to explore that I decided to come back. My first stop was Manila, Philippines' capital.

Now, I haven't really heard many good things about Manila, but since I was landing there anyway, I thought I would take a day to explore the city and see what all the hatred is about.

Luckily, once I checked into my hostel, they offered a free walking tour throughout the Makati neighbourhood (the supposedly nice and affluent part of Manila), which I gladly joined. The plan was to walk through the area, visit the riverside, an old church, a modern museum, and finish the tour at a little street food market and with a few drinks back at the hostel.

Now, we did all of these things, but my feedback about Manila is quite negative. While the Philippines is one of the most beautiful countries with absolutely stunning beaches, amazing people and unreal sunsets, Manila must have been one of the ugliest cities I have ever seen in my entire life. Like really. If you ever think about going to Manila, don't. Grey, it is smelly in parts, dirty, no vibe, no real beauty or anything very interesting. I was shocked to be honest.

Maybe it has some beautiful or hidden parts that I didn’t see or visit, but I would assume a walking tour takes you to the nicer places to showcase the best of a city. Yeah, no, not the case or there simply is nothing really beautiful there. Maybe I do the city unjustly, but if I ever return to the Philippines (most likely), I will use Manila just to change flights, nothing more.

What you can see in the pictures is my best attempt to make the city look halfway pretty or interesting, but, yeah, I will keep this post short, as I was genuinely shocked how ugly a city can be. Especially when I compare it with my adventure to Oman or the interesting things I saw in Oman's capital, Muscat.

But Manila: Apparently nothing to see that was interesting or beautiful, so after one night I was getting out of here and heading to some more interesting (and hopefully a lot more beautiful) parts of the Philippines - not a tall order to be honest.Read more