Philweb Memories

In a not-so-distant past, I was one ambitious monkey trying to dive into cyberspace at the dawn of the Web. By the time I was officially enrolled in the industry, the dot‑com bust had already unraveled a dozen time zones away. In a strange way, I was glad it happened that way. Had I entered earlier, I might have been swept up in a completely different career, riding a wave that crashed before I even learned how to swim.

After finishing Computer Engineering at the University of the Immaculate Conception (UIC), working there wasn’t exactly my dream plan. But it felt like the safest route — a familiar runway before attempting a longer flight. I decided to further my learning by doing both teaching and programming, splitting my days between classrooms and the Computer Center.

I was eager to “recoup” the educational investment I had made with my alma mater. Yes, I actually thought in those terms: if UIC helped shape me, then maybe starting my career there was my way of paying it forward while quietly paying myself back. The environment was familiar, the people were kind, and the risks were low. For a fresh graduate, that combination is very hard to resist.

Leaving the nest: the decision to move on

After three years, I felt I had reached the limits of what staying in the same place could teach me. By June 2000, as a new school year was starting in the Philippine academic calendar, I decided mine was ending. I remember talking to the school president, Sr. Ma. Assumpta David, trying to be firm as I explained my decision. She listened, and to her credit, did not push me to stay. That quiet respect made the goodbye less painful.

Then came two weeks of staying at home with no salary, which is a fast way to learn that “freedom” and “income” should ideally travel together. Just as the silence was getting heavy, I received confirmation of a job in Cagayan de Oro City — about six hours by bus from Davao, on a route that, without me knowing at the time, passed by the house of my future wife. I also had relatives in Cagayan de Oro, which turned the unknown into something slightly less intimidating. It felt like the first real step in a longer journey, even if it was more than just a single stride.

Landing in Cagayan de Oro: the White House chapter

Thanks to Rizza Rizada — a childhood friend and neighbor — I got in. She referred me the job after a colleague resigned, and a seat opened. Only later did I realize that this was another milestone in our long, overlapping timeline. We went to the same grade school in Mintal, shared classrooms in high school, took the same course at UIC, and now here we were again: colleagues in the same company. Life has a way of quietly weaving people back into your story.

In the office, I met more names that would stick with me: Candice Joan Cruz, Shelley Santiago, Roy Yap, Meg Viado, Kent Dabatian, Chui Odulio, Edward Neri, and Jimmar Ripolido. Our workplace sat along Fr. Masterson Avenue, on the third floor of a building everyone simply called the White House. It stood out with its bright white paint and felt like a small island of technology in a neighborhood of suburban homes and commercial shops.

There were only about ten of us in the office, which meant we knew each other’s moods, habits, and lunch preferences very well. My Mama Flora prepared packed lunches for me, so I didn’t have to wake up early to cook. But sometimes, curiosity (and the smell of other people’s food) won. I remember walking to a nearby house to buy mongo, joining whatever the group was eating that day.

At work, music played from a desktop PC running Winamp — back when skins and equalizer bars were considered high-tech decoration. We took turns choosing songs, and downloading MP3s through Napster was still almost a sport. The office sounded like a strange mix of keyboards, chats, and whatever was in the playlist that week. Thankfully our musical choices blended well; it was a time far removed from today’s earpod-powered workforce.

Weekend commute: chasing home and time

Determined to see my family regularly, I took the Rural Transit bus from Cagayan de Oro to Davao on Friday nights. I would arrive around 7 a.m., stumble into the house, and fall straight into bed. By late morning I’d wake up, have lunch, and already feel the clock ticking. The weekend always felt too short — just long enough to remind me of what I missed, but not long enough to fully enjoy it.

By Sunday afternoon, I’d already be at Ecoland terminal, waiting for the bus that would take me back to Cagayan de Oro. Those rides were a mix of gratitude and ache: grateful that I could go home at all, but painfully aware that my time there was always borrowed.

After work, we sometimes gathered at someone’s house, shared dinner, or launched LAN battles of StarCraft that stretched late into the night. We talked about plans — beach trips, out-of-town adventures, all the classic things young professionals imagine they’ll do “soon.” Most of those plans never left the conversation stage. Just when routines were beginning to settle and friendships were deepening, an email arrived.

I was being summoned to the Manila office. At first, it felt like a sudden interruption, a killjoy that cut short a chapter I still wanted to explore. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized: this was probably the reason I left UIC in the first place — to go wherever the path led next, even if it led to the big, messy capital city.

Cagayan de Oro had already been a favorite city of mine long before that job. As a child, we passed through it on the way to Bohol for summer vacations. I remember once asking my mother if I could study high school there — a request that now feels both bold and a little ridiculous. She said no, and in hindsight, I’m thankful she did.

Working there allowed me not only to reconnect with relatives on my mother’s side, but also to spend time with my aunt Sylvia a few years before she passed away from breast cancer. Those small family moments, squeezed between work days and commutes, are things I only learned to appreciate fully much later.

In the office, we worked on a payment suite called e‑Padala, one of Philweb’s flagship projects. On paper, it looked promising product touted to rival PayPal: an Oracle database, a capable DBA in Meg, and a concept that fit the times. In practice, it struggled. Procedures were lax, coding standards were weak, and documentation — if it existed — did not make the system easy to take over. Scalability was more hope than reality.

Eventually, I was asked to move to Manila to help finish things up. It was partly a promotion in responsibility, partly a rescue mission.

First impressions of Manila and Enterprise Tower

It wasn’t my first time in Manila, but seeing it as a place of work instead of just a stopover was different. I traveled with Meg, and we were reassigned under PhilWeb, based in the Enterprise Tower in Makati. The building, with its sleek lobby and high-speed lifts, felt like another planet compared to the modest White House back in Cagayan de Oro.

Looking up at the tall buildings, I felt small — just another dot in a huge, humming machine. The pace was faster. Even though our office was only a jeepney ride away (or a tricycle ride if you overslept), there was always a sense of urgency. Manila has a way of making you feel as if you are five minutes late, even when you are on time.

Our staff house sat along Estrella Avenue, near Rockwell. It wasn’t big; in fact, we were crowding the rooms. The air-conditioning unit was loud enough to double as an alarm clock, and many housemates snored with the commitment of seasoned performers. If you were one of the last to fall asleep, good luck finding silence.

Living there also revealed Metro Manila’s less glamorous side. Isang, one of the year’s strongest typhoons flooded the streetsand, paralyzed Makati’s flooded roads, and kept us indoors. Ironically, while water was everywhere outside, our taps ran dry. We had to rely on bottled water because what little came out of the faucet was unreliable. It made me miss Davao, where tap water was safe to drink and the idea of buying bottled water was an unnecessary expense.

Routines that made me miss home

Mornings at the staff house were exercises in patience and timing. Colleagues rushed to the bathroom before work, negotiating mirror space and shower schedules. Many of us grabbed breakfast on the go or at the fast-food counters of the Enterprise Tower. Evenings were often spent at food courts in nearby Landmark shopping mall. It was, for me, became a regular dinner spot. But sitting alone with a tray of fast food made me miss my mother’s home-cooked meals more than I expected.

People often say that in Manila, every move you make costs money. I learned how true that was. What used to be an ordinary meal at home became a budget line item; what used to be family conversation over dinner became background chatter from strangers. My predictable life at the UIC campus in May turned into a new layer of freedom in CDO by July. By September, I found myself adjusting to the chaos and opportunity of Makati. It felt like the break I had been looking for — just not in the shape I imagined.

If I accomplished something in that period, it wasn’t seeing the e‑Padala become a polished product. Instead, it was successfully landing a new job as a web developer at Zurich Insurance, based at the nearby Citibank Tower in Paseo de Roxas. When I told my manager, Ronald Chavez, through SMS that I had something important to share when I returned to Cagayan de Oro in October, he already understood. In the world of IT and projects, “I have something to tell you when I get back” usually has only one meaning.

Leaving meant saying goodbye to colleagues I had only worked with for two and a half months — a short time, but intense enough to form bonds. It also meant another farewell to my aunt Flora and uncle Lito, as I packed my clothes and caught the evening bus to Davao once again. My life in those years felt like a series of bus rides: between cities, between roles, between versions of myself trying to keep up.