Wake me up when September ends

September was a mental and emotional clusterfuck for me (the empty pages in my journal can attest to this) so I was looking forward to October, mostly because I really am a sucker for new beginnings - you fuck up, you pick yourself up, you dust yourself off, and you start anew. A spur-of-the-moment staycation over the weekend was just what I needed to usher in the new month.

We booked a room at Seda Vertis North. Vertis what? Yes, it's that large expanse of land bordered by North Avenue, Agham Road, and EDSA in Quezon City which, once upon a time, was home to thousands of informal settlers. The community was razed a few years back and it's now an oasis in the middle of a busy city, playground of the upper middle class with its hotel and mall (yup, yet another mall across SM North Edsa and Trinoma) and soon-to-open casino. But to be fair to the developers, it was quite peaceful there, perhaps because the immediate surrounding was still relatively car-free. It was the first time we went to Quezon City since the pandemic started and travelling from Taguig to QC was pretty depressing, especially along the Cubao area, as the expanse of EDSA reeked of poverty and corruption (they always go hand-in-hand, don't they?).

An in-room full body massage, a late night room service dinner and an early-morning breakfast buffet, some shopping, and it was a weekend well-spent. Momentarily forgotten were the hundreds of families who lost their homes so the ultra-rich supporters of the current administration can get even richer from working class people like us who badly need these (heavily taxed and hardly inexpensive) breaks from our daily hustle.

But social commentary aside, Seda Vertis North is one of those hotels that caters mostly to business-people but still offers a homey ambiance, with friendly staff who go out of their way to ensure that you have a comfortable stay. Nope, this isn't a paid post (I wish!).