10 Amazing Things We No Longer See In Pasig River 3. Public baths. In India, bathing in the Ganges River is a holy ritual practiced by the Hindus. Although the river today is threatened by pollution, the water is tolerable enough for people to take a dip in it Our very own Pasig River used to be like this–a place where people could clean themselves and escape Manila’s sweltering heat. Some Manileños even brought with them their four-legged companions. In the 1899 book A History and Description of Our Philippine Wonderland, Adjutant E. Hannaford paints a picture of Pasig River that was once teeming with life: “Toward the evening parties of bathers, people of all ages and both sexes, multiply along the bank, or are already splashing about in the water with light-hearted glee. Great water-buffaloes with wide-spreading horns come singly or several together for the bath that rewards their afternoon toil in the fields or on the road.” But as with other beautiful things that disappeared from Pasig River, public baths became extinct. By the 1950s, people stopped bathing in the polluted water. Today, you can still see humans swimming in the biologically-dead river, but they’re either floating corpses or kids who have no idea what they’re getting into.