It can be a challenge to read the jeepney route details amid all the decoration
PHOTOGRAPH: SEATOPS/ALAMY
To Manilenos and other city-dwellers in the Philippines, they are the cheapest means of travel: hop-on hop-off buses with a minimum fare of nine pesos (15p). To visitors, jeepneys are a colourful symbol of Filipino spirit and ingenuity: custom-welded and painted in eye-catching designs. When sent out into the gridlock of Manila’s streets, jeepneys are a test of another national virtue, ‘bahala na’ (patience in the face of the unchangeable). Their days, however, may be numbered.
1 US forces brought Jeeps to the Philippines in 1944 in their campaign against the Japanese. Many were left behind after WWII, becoming the first jeepneys. The word likely combines ‘Jeep’ and ‘jitney’ (US slang for ‘shared cab’).