The traffic in Quezon City — blaring, belching, scarcely moving — seems to be in a permanent state of rush-hour gridlock. Quezon, population 2.2 million, is the largest of the seventeen municipalities that form the megalopolis of greater Manila. Chrome-clad Jeepneys, the chopped and airbrushed descendants of WWII army jeeps pressed into public service, engage in a slow-motion chariot race with motorized tricycles, oxcarts laden with scrap metal, and passengerless bicycle rickshaws. A knot of metal and rubber binds every intersection. Ragged children dart between vehicles at lights, selling cigarettes with one hand and huffing gasoline-soaked rags with the other. The…