Burnham Park

After the sessions with CPA (Cordillera Peoples’ Alliance), our student guides from the University of Philippines Baguio (UP Baguio): Romel, Maya, and Maureen took us to Burnham Park. This park is known to be the biggest in Baguio and was named after Daniel Burnham, an American architect and urban planner. He was famous for the city planning of Chicago and he helped shaped Baguio City.

The park is located near UP Baguio, right in the middle of the city of Baguio and we took a jeepney to get to Burnham Park from CPA and we each paid 6 pesos each.

There are a lot of street vendor at Burnham Park. They mostly sell food and fruits. We tried soy bean and a famous delicacy in the Philippines, balut. Balut is a nearly developed duck embryo. This dish is known to be a healthy choice as it has a lot of protein. However, the image of swallowing a duckling with a half developed body made a lot of people (even Filipinos) not want to try eating balut.

But, unlike a lot of people, some Monash University Malaysia students dared to try this delicacy. Among them are Erica, Mindy, Max, Aaron, Grace and Susan. They found it hard to open the shell but after eating it, balut has a distinctly tasty flavor. Balut costs 12 pesos each.

This park used to be famous for the green grass, horse riding and boating activities. Now, Burnham Park grass has turned brown, the city council took the horses away because they were becoming an irritant to traffic and the pedal boats are still there but the water has turned murky, dark and smelly.

Most people come to this park in the morning to jog, ride bicycles or simply walk their dogs. In the afternoon, there are a lot of family picnics. Despite Baguio being a fairly safe city, I would not recommend you to come to this park after dark. There are a lot of people who will take advantage especially of women and conduct the sex trade.

Overall, our experience in Burnham Park was enjoyable. Unfortunately, we had to cut it short because Dr. Yeoh aka Daniel was waiting for us at CPA with a delicious Tom Yam dinner that he cooked for all of us. I would like to say thank you to Rommel, Maya, and Maureen who were willing to accompany us despite their own busy schedules and exams.

By Dyah