This is a heads up to travelers and backpackers on their way to Manila, or even residents who don’t know jackshit about the city. Mapa Manila doesn’t just give you your location, it will also tell you how best to enjoy where you are: the City of Manila.
The map is designed by Team Manila and curated by “highly reliable people who care about the city. There is an advocacy to promote our country,” says photographer Miguel “Mignac” Nacianceno, one of the fellas behind Mapa Manila publishers 5 Ports.
Mapa Manila is smartly divided into areas or districts with recommendations for each one. Consider it not just a map, but a city guide. Coconuts Manila speaks to Mignac about his latest project.
What’s up with 5 Ports?
My friends and I, we put up 5Ports in late 2012. It was put together because we still believe in print as a medium. Digital is great but when you want something, you want to hold it in your hands. A lot of our projects are collaborations with other people. Mapa Manila here is a collab with Team Manila.
Tell us more about Mapa Manila.
When we go to other places and countries, you know they are traveler-savvy because they have all these information available to you on how to experience their city: how to get around, what to do. When you land here in Manila, you have none of that. You probably have access to EZmap, and that’s great. It scales things. But if you’re here for the weekend, and you don’t know what to do. We’d love for you to check out our map. The name is apt too because “mapa” means map. But at the same time, it’s colloquialism. Kung mapa-dito ka, diba? It connotes something na hindi sinasadya. So, mga lugar na pwede mong puntahan, diba?
Ah, clever.
We wanna provide for travelers, and with tourism in an all-time high. We want them informed. It’s printed in other languages, and it’s free!
Are you planning on replicating this for other cities?
Within the year, we’ll have Mapa Makati-Taguig. We’ll show you that Makati isn’t just a business district — there’s Little Tokyo, for example. Taguig isn’t just BGC — SM Aura will be there, but we’ll balance it out with, say, Sarsa. I’m a big fan of that restaurant. Basically, places that we want travelers to be aware of. We’ll eventually go out of Metro Manila, have a Mapa Tagaytay, Mapa Cebu, Boracay.
In Manila, you recommend Dong Bei Dumplings, Aristocrat’s barbeque, a Filipino handicrafts bargain underneath the Quiapo bridge….
It is a curated guide, designed by Team Manila. We work with highly reliable people who care about the city. There’s an advocacy to promote our country.
Apart from the #MapaManila hashtag on Instagram, where else can we find you?
We’re at the airport — terminal 2 tourism information kiosk. Some hotels like Sofitel, Raffles, Fairmony, Century Plaza. We’re also at stores like Powerbooks and select Team Manila lifestyle stores.
