Tim Ho Wan in Baguio City: Warm Bowls, Cold Air, and a Family Meal After a Long Day

There is a particular kind of tiredness that only Baguio City can give.

Not the heavy exhaustion of routine, but the pleasant fatigue that settles into your legs after a full day of walking uphill roads, weaving through crowds, stopping for photos, and insisting you still have enough energy for one more attraction because everyone else seems game for it.

And it's not as if I am complaining. Having a chance to go back in Baguio again to visit relatives is such a blessing, I could only be thankful.

By late afternoon, the cold had sharpened. It slipped quietly through sleeves and settled into the hands first, then the shoulders, until everyone began rubbing their palms together or pulling jackets closer. Even my nephews, who had spent the day racing ahead with the boundless stamina only children seem to possess, had started to slow down. They were no longer asking what we would see next.

They were asking where we would eat.

H Proper Coffee Roasters at The Podium: Coffee, Cake, and an Afternoon That Slowed Time

By the time Saturday arrived, all of us looked as though we had spent the week staring into the same screen updating the same websites. In many ways, we had.

We work remotely, scattered across different homes and different cities, meeting each other more often through video calls. Most days, our conversations revolve around deadlines, web technicalities, campaigns, translations, and the tiny details that only fellow Web Content Developers would understand. When work becomes particularly demanding, our worlds shrink until they are measured by browser tabs, coffee mugs, and the glow of a laptop long after sunset.

That Saturday was different.

We finally traded our laptops for paintbrushes, laughed our way through an afternoon activity that reminded us none of us had promising futures as painters, attempted a little dancing with far more enthusiasm than grace, and lingered over lunch at a Thai restaurant before the afternoon began to dissolve into separate plans. Some of our teammates headed their separate ways, while a few of us wandered into The Podium in search of coffee and a little more conversation.

Lemon and Olives Greek Taverna, Baguio City: Returning to the City of Pines, Finding Greece on Plates, and Remembering Those I Miss The Most

A decade is a long time to stay away from a city that breathes in pine and exhales nostalgia.

The last time I spent any meaningful time in Baguio, life looked different. My mother was still alive, so was my younger sister. The future seemed larger then, unfolding ahead with the confidence that only youth can afford. Ten years passed almost without permission, consumed by work, responsibilities, grief, and the thousand ordinary things that quietly pull us away from places we keep promising to revisit.

So when I finally found myself traveling to Baguio City once again, watching the landscape transform from lowland heat into mist-covered mountains, I wasn't merely returning to a destination. I was returning to a version of myself that had been left waiting somewhere among the pine trees.

Baguio greeted me the way old friends often do. Not with fanfare but with familiarity. The cool air carried the scent of pine needles and damp earth. Fog drifted lazily over hillsides. Familiar landmarks appeared around bends in the road like memories stepping out from hiding.

Yet as comforting as the city felt, I quickly realized that nostalgia alone could not sustain a journey. I wanted something new. Something that would justify the return.

That something turned out to be Lemon and Olives Greek Taverna.