Interesting Dwellings During My Mountain Trip

Here are some pics of interesting dwellings during my mountain trip last Saturday. We went up Baguio City and then farther up to the highest place in Benguet--Tuba and Ampucao. Along the way I saw some interesting dwelling places and took pictures of them. 

The pic above is a model of a typical Igorot dwelling in the Mountain Province--well, actually it's more a leisure hut than a typical Igorot dwelling. You will probably find improvised huts like this in rice fields or on the corners of rustic roads. I'm standing with an Igorot wooden image. We were there during the Pinagbenga Flower Festival for an official business presentation and Session Road in the heart of the city was closed to traffic so that tourists can enjoy walking along it freely. 

Look at the earthen clay pot behind me, which is a real typical earthen jar made manually by a native. Igorots are natives of the Mountain Province, which Baguio City--the summer capital of the Philippines--is a major part of. I enjoyed seeing a lot of manual carvings on hard wood.

Hut roofing material is called "Kugon" which is made of piles of dried rice stalks stitched to the roof. It makes for a cool roofing material that allows for free air circulation and makes a great relief from the sun's heat. You never feel hot under a kugon roof. Well, getting your skinned burned by the hot sun is another story altogether. Most Igorots have rosy chicks and fair skin but those who work in the fields have golden grown complexion. 

I saw lots of beautiful, colorful flower arrangements ideal for indoor house gardens and orchards. Along the road I got glimpses of interesting dwellings during my mountain trip, plus a curious small building with lots of mezzanine floors with low ceilings and extremely narrow stairwells. You won't believe how they forced small spaces to become office spaces. 

The building above has many narrow corridors going to this and that direction. On the second floor, a corridor leads to an alley near the Baguio Cathedral. Amazing how they can connect narrow passages together and create a functional small building. 

Oh, by the way, they say that all buildings and hotels in Baguio have their ghost stories. Haha! This building on the left probably has one. I'd love to go back to Baguio to have more pics taken. We were on official business so there was not enough time for pic taking.

Here on the right are makeshift dwellings of the miners' families. Finally, we reached the top of the Tuba, Benguet area. After seeing no human on the way up, we finally saw people. I did a business presentation for the women's organization in the area and it was a lively one, thank God!