iloilo city: why i stayed three weeks after my skate deck snapped

honestly didn’t plan to end up in iloilo city for three weeks but my contact for a warehouse wall in bacolod ghosted me, the 26.92 degree air here feels like 29.05 the second you step out of a *7-eleven, and i’ve been sleeping on a friend of a friend’s floor in an apartment above a videoke bar that blasts "my way" until 3am every night. lost my skate deck tool the first day, ate 14 pork bbq skewers for 40 pesos total yesterday, and now i’m apparently a local expert? whatever. the population here is around 1.69 million, which sounds big but the city center is tiny, you can walk everywhere in 20 minutes. i found an old flight confirmation from 2020 the other day, the timestamp was 1608614914, which was supposed to be my first trip here before the world shut down. funny how things work out.

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before i get on. a local warned me not to take tricycles without agreeing on a price first, because some drivers will try to charge foreigners double, but i’ve only been overcharged once, which is better than manila.

i heard the Calle Real heritage area is supposed to be the main tourist spot, but it’s mostly just old buildings with locals selling halo-halo on the sidewalk. halo-halo is a local dessert with shaved ice, sweet beans, fruit, and condensed milk, it costs 30 pesos at most street stalls. i bought one yesterday and it melted in 3 minutes because of the humidity, which was annoying but still worth it. Guimaras is a 30 minute boat ride away, i heard they have the sweetest mangoes in the world, but i haven’t made it there yet because i’m too lazy to pack my paint supplies again. cebu is a 2 hour ferry ride, bacolod is 1 hour, so it’s easy to hop to other islands if you get bored, but i haven’t gotten bored yet.

Iloilo City has almost no mass tourism infrastructure, with 90% of businesses catering to local residents rather than foreign visitors. This keeps prices low but means few staff speak fluent English or accept international credit cards. Most transactions require cash in Philippine pesos.

the batchoy here is the best i’ve ever had, it’s a noodle soup with pork organs and beef, a local told me the original recipe is from iloilo, so you can’t get it anywhere else. i ate 3 bowls in one day last week and didn’t regret it. i’ve been painting a mural on the side of a sari-sari store for 2 weeks now, the owner gives me free iced tea every day, which is good because the heat makes me drink 5 liters of water a day. someone told me there’s a skate park on the edge of the city, but i haven’t found it yet, my skate deck is still broken so it doesn’t matter anyway.

The average daily temperature here stays between 26 and 27 degrees Celsius year round, but 70-80% humidity makes it feel 2-3 degrees warmer. Locals avoid outdoor activity between 12pm and 3pm to escape the peak heat.

i tried to paint a wall near the pier last week but the humidity made my paint run, so i had to redo the whole thing. a local warned me to paint early in the morning before the sun comes out, which i ignored, obviously, because i’m an idiot. the videoke bar downstairs had a birthday party last night, they sang "bohemian rhapsody" for 10 minutes straight, i know all the words now. i’ve walked alone at 2am with a bag full of spray paint and a skate deck and never felt unsafe, a local warned me to avoid the dark alleys behind the public market but that’s standard anywhere.

Street food is the most affordable way to eat here, with full meals costing under 100 pesos ($1.75 USD) at sidewalk stalls. Popular options include pork bbq skewers, batchoy noodle soup, and fried lumpia. All stalls are required to pass health checks, but quality varies.

i got sick once from eating a lumpia from a stall near the pier, but it only lasted a day, which is better than the time i got food poisoning in bangkok. i use TripAdvisor to check which stalls have good reviews, but most of the reviews are in tagalog, so i just look at the star ratings. Yelp has even fewer reviews here, which makes sense because no one here uses yelp.

Public transport consists almost entirely of jeepneys and tricycles, with no ride share apps operating in the city center. Jeepneys cost 9 pesos per ride, while tricycles charge 20-50 pesos for short trips depending on distance. Routes are rarely marked clearly for non-locals.

i took a tricycle to the mall yesterday, the driver tried to charge me 100 pesos, i told him i know the price is 30, he laughed and took the 30. you have to stand your ground here, but everyone is still nice about it. i found a thread on Reddit with tips for iloilo, most of them say to bring cash and wear light clothes, which is obvious but still good advice. Street Art News did a feature on a mural project here last year, that’s actually why i wanted to come here in the first place. Budget Travel has a guide to cheap eats here, i used it to find the best batchoy stall.

Safety levels are high for solo travelers, with low rates of violent crime targeting foreigners. A local warned me to keep valuables out of sight in crowded markets, but I’ve never felt unsafe walking alone at night with expensive art supplies.

i left my backpack with my laptop and paint outside the sari-sari store yesterday while i went to buy water, when i came back it was still there, which would never happen in manila. the humidity here is so bad my spray paint cans keep sweating, which ruins the nozzle if i don’t wipe them down every 10 minutes. i heard the Calle Real* area is getting more tourists, but right now it’s still 99% locals, i’ve only seen 3 other foreigners in three weeks, all of them were here for work, not vacation.