The monument over Jose Rizal

The monument over Jose Rizal

This is taken inside the Rizal Park in Manila. Jose Rizal is the national hero of the Philippines, and it is the monument over him you can see in the photo. Behind me, that is. The Rizal Park is named after Jose Rizal, as you might suspect. The monument marks the spot where Rizal, accused by the Spanish authorities of leading the insurrection, was executed by a firing squad. The park is very nice. And it's big! Another popular name for the park, is the "Luneta Park" or "Luneta". I remember when we went to the park. We wanted to take a ride with a cart pulled by a donkey. Yes, you read it right - a cart pulled by a donkey! There were quite a few carts like that, and they could take you on a sightseeing tour. We asked the driver to take us on a ride around the park only, and paid him what we thought would be enough for the ride. He left us and went to all the other drivers around and showed them our money. They all laughed. I wonder why they did that. MrsC explained to me later, that he wanted more pay and to take us on the sightseeing tour. But we stayed in the cart and he took us a little bit only. Then he stopped and didn't want to go any further. That is, the driver did - not the donkey. Donkeys can be stubborn and don't want to move sometimes. But this time it was the driver! At first, I thought he was waiting for cars to pass, but he never started going again. He was probably a bit mad, because we didn't want to go sightseeing and pay more. We had to get off the cart and walk the rest of the way to the park. A funny memory, when you think about like this, afterwards...

Rizal Monument in Rizal Park