|
|
|
 |
|
DAVID PAUL MORRIS FOR TIME
|
Bibliophiles Beware: This is not your normal library
|
Manila nightclubs offer lively, if absurd, diversion—just leave your sense of propriety in your room
By Phil Zabriskie
MAP: Manila
The Philippines doesn't have a Taj Mahal, Borobodur or Angkor Wat. What it has that other Asian countries lack is a genius for fun. Travelers running low on laughter are well advised to seek out monuments to that Philippine talent.
Remedios Circle in the Malate district is a good starting point. Among the area's nightclubs and restaurants is the Hobbit House, a live-music bar owned and staffed by a cooperative of midgets and dwarves. The interior is supposed to be a tribute to The Shire—the owner is a J.R.R. Tolkien fan—complete with plank tables and a large mural of hobbits on the wall behind the stage. If you drive there, a little person will wave you into your parking space. (Back up very, very slowly.) A charming little waitress takes your order, which is disconcertingly delivered by staffers shorter than the tabletop. Beers, attached to what look like disembodied hands, mysteriously appear on the table.
Despite the unusual staff, the main draw is the stellar music scene. Live acts—regular sized—perform nightly, ranging from down-and-dirty blues to funk, folk and well-done Dylan covers. And if you try very hard you might catch a whiff of sedition: during the final years of the Ferdinand Marcos era, oppositionists gathered here to drink and listen to anti-Marcos folk songs.
The Hobbit House is only a short distance from the Library, a former gay bar that lost its identity—and gained fame—when the straight masses demanded to be included in the nightly festivities. The highlight is a 10 p.m. revue that combines variety-show entertainment with unexcelled ribaldry and karaoke of a sort found nowhere else in Asia. The drag queen M.C.s are talented comedians—when they clown and sing you wish they'd go on forever. (And they work hard: the Library is small enough that you can literally see them sweating.)
Then the audience participation begins. A limited number of guests are invited to get up on the tiny stage to compete in a singing contest. The M.C.s interview them extensively, make merciless fun of their dress, their cities of origin, their friends. Just when you wonder why anyone would subject himself to such punishment, the music starts and the mousy secretary from Iloilo belts out a Whitney Houston-quality performance.
The costumes are elaborate, the divas appropriately bitchy—and expert at self-deprecating jokes and hometown quips about landslides and kidnappings—and the performances make it difficult to leave. Priscilla, Queen of Manila, in all her—and his—wondrous forms.
It's an extraordinary blend of what the Philippines has in spades: talent, humor, and good-natured camaraderie.
Click here for more TIME travel stories, city guides and info
|
|
|
