Being really hot during the day, I decided to step out only at around 2pm.
I began my outing by having a KFC lunch. The outlet I sat at had cheddar cheese coated KFC. It was bleh! It’s basically the same artificial coating you find on cheese balls crisps but now on KFC. The meal cost ₱99.I then went to Ayala to withdraw some money from Citibank branch there
After withdrawing some money, I walked around the area (very posh, mind you). Lots of malls and office buildings.
Asian Institute of Management — it’s one of the top-ranked B-schools in AsiaI entered Greenbelt 5 mall, which is just one of many malls under the Greenbelt name in the areaThis is Greenbelt 3, the posh mall with all the really high-end brandsI spent some time at the SM department store picking up some t-shirts for my younger brother. SM has official merchandise from popular anime like Naruto, One Piece and other cartoons. Pretty cheap too, t-shirts can be found ranging from ₱99 all the way up to ₱399.
After that, I went to Carriedo (LRT station) where SM has a clearance mall
I had seen this building from taking the LRT, figured I would check it out
I found some great bargains inside. Besides a bunch of in-store brands by SM, they had a few name brands and foreign brands in short supply (maybe export rejects). None the less, I found H&M cargo shorts for ₱400. Definitely export-reject-worthy Rip Curl swimming shorts for ₱200. And then some bermuda shorts for like ₱100 each. Not everything was cheap, but then again, coming from India, I wasn’t planning on buying many clothes from Philippines anyway.
One thing I found funny was just how many sales persons are there to sell you socks. Like, super-aggressive when it comes to shoving socks in your face. Think perfume sales people offering a spray to get you talking to them — but a lot more of them selling packs of socks! High margin socks I presume? 😀
Outside, Carriedo is home to a rather large street market
I have gone to my friend Santhosh Singh’s farm before, but quite a lot has changed since our visit. First, Santhosh gave it name — Amrutha Dairy Farm. But later decided to not put up signs anywhere. Why? We’ll get to that later.
Amrutha Dairy Farm is located in Haalenahalli, Madhure Hobli, Doddaballapura.
I mean, here’s a map of its location.
Beyond that, all I can say is: good luck finding it on your first try!
The weather seemed nice for this visit
It is a bit of a challenge to find the farm, but if you follow the direction path highlighted on Google Maps, you can get there with relative ease if you use your phone as a GPS device.
We parked inside the farm. This is the farmhouse Santhosh and his brothers built.
The dairy farm was set up nearly 4 years ago. The initial plan was to setup a milk processing center, but when Santhosh realized the heavy investment that was required, he realized it would be better just starting off with just producing milk for the time being, and slowly ramp up.
Santhosh *only* has around 30 cows
Santosh is parallely working on a heifer rearing project (heifer is a young cow before she has had her first calf). This is to contain the operational costs on the business, such as drought in the area for consecutive years. So yeah, like many Indians, even these guys suffer from water and electricity problems. They also have a hydroponics system which can produce very nutritious green fodder (up to 1ton per day) and this was built completely from scratch by them after taking technical help from some guys in Europe and New Zealand.
Hydroponics is a method of growing plants using mineral nutrient solutions, in water, without soil. They have such a facility in the farm.They feed the cows a hybrid napier grass grown at the farm and maize procured from nearby farms along with prescribed nutrientsThis might look like a lot of cows but only 6 cows are ready to produce milkHelloThe farm has some extra land which Santhosh and his brothers are contemplating how to best make use of.
When word spread about Amrutha Dairy Farms, a Netherlands-based group came to India and approached Santhosh to join hands with the farm to set up a milk processing plant to produce products like khova, paneer and cheese. Continue reading “Visit to Amrutha Dairy Farm, a learning experience” »
Today was my last day in Davao. I checked out early from Green Windows Dormitel because instead of heading straight to the airport, I instead decided to carry all my bags, take a taxi and visit the Japanese World War II tunnel in Davao.
The tunnel is now situated inside a resort that goes by the name of D’Japanese Tunnel Family Resort. Like every attraction in Davao, it’s a bit of a drive away from the city.
As the taxi kept on riding for around half an hour, I wondered if I would be late for my flight as the Japanese Tunnel is not in the same direction as the airport.
Once I reached D’Japanese Tunnel Family Resort, the entrance to the tunnel was pretty much visible from the gate. It’s basically a resort built around the tunnel. I went to the resort’s eception desk and bought the entry ticket for the Japanese tunnel. It costs ₱50 for adults, ₱20 for children.
This is the entrance, the reception was to the right.There is a guide that comes along with youThis tunnel was built in 1942, during World War II, when the Japanese had captured Davao and used the island in its fight to capture the remaining Pacific islands.It’s 300 metres longThe tunnel was used by Japanese soldiers during the war as an underground base. This is a mini-shrine, a prayer area of sortsAnd this is how a Japanese soldier used to look like in those daysA mini-prison cell. This is where they would sometimes keep prisoners of war. Yeah, it wasn’t meant to be comfortable.We proceeded further, and it got cooler
