Tagaytay Overview : )

Tagaytay is a mountain town south of Manila famous for its cool climate, specialty restaurants, fresh fruits, and soup made of a cow's bone marrow (and I shit you not, good sirs). Located in the province of Cavite, its population consists of mostly Filipino Locals and rich uppity bastards that seek to invade the countryside with their posh sprawling manions large enough to accomodate up to 5 Sharon Cunetas* on any day. 

*(An endemic species of large, song-belting creatures often featured in late night television) 

The main languages of Tagaytay are Tagalog, English, and Coñospeak. In the recent years, the subdialects of Jejemon (backwards retarded tagalog) and Bekimon (homolust tagalog) have slowly crept in, brought in by visitors from the corrupted lowlands of Metro Manila. 

The main currency of Tagaytay is corn and Collette's bukopie, both of which are readily available for exchange in shops located along the roadside, with one bukopie shop sometimes barely 5 meters apart from another shop of the same franchise. I don't know why, but apparently the locals love their bukopie. Don't ask. I know I didn't. Peso is also accepted by most major establishments, but as peso is not in pie form, edible, and filled with sweet buko inside, usage is frowned upon. 

Don't even get me started with credit cards. Seriously.  Last time somebody brought that up, it took three years for the body to surface. Don't court trouble, go with buko pie.


(Disclosure: Collette's paid 3 bukopies for this placement)

Another big feature of Tagaytay is the spectacular view of Lake Taal, which contains the Taal Volcano, dubbed as the smallest volcano in the world. It's well worth noting that it is not small at all, would not fit your pocket, or your luggage. And thankfully so, otherwise it would have long since been stolen by the neighboring province of Laguna. As a minor trivia, Taal Volcano is actually not part of Tagaytay. As any Batangueño will gladly tell you at knifepoint, it is part of Batangas. Recently there has been a proposal to put a signboard that says "Batangas" on the goddamn volcano. It did not push through, thankfully, otherwise we'd have to update our National trait from "Hospitable" to "Horribly Tacky". But I digress. Every now and then, it is worth noting that the view of the entire Taal Lake vanishes into a white screensaver, presumably during the extended maintenance period when the Taaleños clean the projectors that are used to create the world's largest hologram of the world's smallest volcano. [Citation Needed] 

Tagaytay is also a famous place for weddings, presumably becuase it's far from Manila, so fewer guests tend to attend weddings there. Since it's traditional for Filipinos to feel entitled to attend the wedding of anybody they barely know (i.e. bumped into on the way to work etc), and no sane individual will finance a banquet that can satisfy an entire refugee camp,  setting the event in a mountain is an effective way wither down the headcount pretty quickly, or failing that, a short controlled landslide does the trick with the low overhead of using explosives. 

Tagaytay also features horseback riding tracks where both pros and novices from all walks of life can relive what it feels like being a rich haciendero riding an aging horse in a shit-infested track, which the locals fondly call "El Turista Trapp".  But seriously though, who DOESNT want to ride horses? When I was a kid I thought I could ride one, give it a few kicks and hightail it out of the shitty track, going back to Manila with a horse that I can show my friends. Of course later on, I learned that if I kick the poor aging horse more than once, it'd die of rib fracture or something, and I'd get no further than about five meters away from the road before the horse goes belly up and I hit the pavement with my face. 


Aaaanyway, Tagaytay is an awesome getaway that is about as close to Manila as you can get. With the cool climate, fresh fruits, sweet-tasting beef from mountain cows, and lots of restaurants to choose from, Tagaytay is a nobrainer when deciding where to take your rich foreigner buddies for a tour of the local scene (hint: if you're not local, ignore this statement)

 Tagaytay, it's like Baguio, but helluva closer.