Araw 54

I was restless this morning, and I kept waking and dozing from around 5am onwards. Manila is noisy, as is Joyland but the noise here is traffic, motorbike engines and horns, which doesn't calm anyone to sleep. When I woke at 7am , due to someone poking my face, I saw Paul staring at me. This roused me from my dozy state, and I rolled over to play with him and Lance, who was clambering onto the bed. I lay in bed till around 9am, (apart from getting up to eat Milo and cheesey loaf) as I was still fairly tired, and then got up to shower. I then headed out to sit with the Watermelon sellers, amusing myself by sweeping, playing with the kids, and helping to arrange plastic bags onto a bottle. During the course of the morning, nearly every time I was gifted a slice of watermelon by Des's Ate, a street boy (or 6) appeared, hands out to me, asking for money or something to eat. At one time, I was actually quite frightened, as I looked up to find myself surrounded by about 10 boys of various sizes and scruffiness, all trying to talk to me in Tagalog. JR ushered them away, but one boy lingered, and I could not very well continue to enjoy my watermelon while he was watching, so I handed over my half-eaten slice, and he slid away smiling.

After lunch, Des and me set about trying to finish her Inventory Report, but she fell asleep mid-sentence, so I played games on my iPod until she woke up, knowing how tired she was. We worked for a few hours, until her Ate went home with the girls and Raymond, Lhiz and Dang showed up to see me. After an hour or so we headed out to dinner, (my treat) as everyone was hungry and I knew Des didn't have much food in the house. Des dressed Paul up in his neat clothes, showered and changed, and we headed off, 6.5 of us in a tricycle to Mang Inasal. Paul was after a balloon that belonged to a girl at the next table so when we got outside I bought him one (only 50php) and we crossed the road to FCM to World of Fun to play basketball, shooting and driving games. We stayed until 9pm, when it shut, and left, laughing and joking back to Des's. 

The Payatas guys don't stay long as they have to get back to Payatas and we (me, Des, JR and Paul) are all tired anyway and want to get to bed. Des settles Paul down, and I notice that the cut on the top of his ear looks deeper than earlier. It looks painful, but Paul doesn't seem bothered. He soon falls asleep and I get ready for bed, but Des wants help  finishing her inventory report, so we slug on, Des getting snottier by the minute (she has a cold) and me struggling to fall asleep. We finish around midnight, and I waste no time falling asleep - I'm shattered!