Philippine life?

[Admin]

Having been to Davao and thought the place needs knocking down and starting again, where in the Philippines do you come from, and what's the area like?

[ginapeterb]

Sadly our Fourm Administrator Keith started this topic last year, and didnt get any takers, ok I am a Brit but I will talk about Philippine life a little as we didnt get anyone from the Philippines who was prepared to submit a contribution, I have spent 3 months in 2004 living in the Philippines in batches of 3 weeks at a time, having lived there for a while, I started to get a feel for what life is really like.

I found the following:

The Philippines and in fact the Filipino people are and can be a strange phenomena at first sight, many have commented in the past about social issues in the Philippines, the country and its people can and often is very frustrating for Foreign Nationals, the first thing I noticed most of all, is their obsession with the label "Foreighner".

For one thing we may use it here in UK also, but as we are a much more cosmopolitan and multi national country, with many natiionalities both living and commuting between Europe and other countries, we tend not to use this word, the Filipinos sadly do still live in a culture that they are Filipino and everyone else is a foreigener.

I have tried to explain this to them, in conversations that they will never become truly international, or that Manila NAIA will never become an international Hub for travel if they truly persist in treating everyone as a foreighener, the other word which tends to come from the U.S.A. is the word "Alien", in my own view the word Alien is offensive, Aliens to me come from Mars and Venus and from many lights years away, the use of this word does not endear me to the authorities in that country, a fact which may cause some mirth with Filipinos, who does agree with this, sadly it is still perperuated by official orgnaizations such as banks.

What also tends to shock many Westerners, is the total lack of internal infrastructure in the Philippines, albeit the country is poor, and is classified as a third world member, the internal road system in the provinces, is appalling.

Although around the major cities such as Metro Manila, the roads are acceptable, the complete lack of travel links between islands is dissapointing, making connections between the Islands difficult.

Philippine Social life is also something which intrigues me whenever I go, on the one hand some of the social life exists on a 2nd level, that is the Barangay social life, this life seems to exist in a sub culture within a mainstream culture, the mainstream culture, being the intelligentsia of the country, that is professionals, Doctors, Surgeons, politicians, the rich, and other professional people, these ones I refer to as the Cosmopinoys, you may note that thse patricular ones, tend to be the people who run the country, and provide the specialist services that enbale the majority to exist and survive, although this is true in many countries, they go to parties, have nice houses, and to my surprise, they actually smoke cigarettes, something that surprises me even more in the Philippines.

It is not uncommon to see cosmo Filipinas hanging around and lighting up, whilst in the many Bobs cafe's and bars in the cities, when you start to really look at the Philippines you start to find that it is not much different to any other developing country trying to find its own place in world affairs, sadly the country is dogged by lack of Foreign Direct Investment, due to the obsession in the Philippines of political discontent with its elected representatives, unstable democratic institutions, and the ever increasing threat of military coups.

Although the Philippines appears to be a stable Republic with strong democratic credentials, a President and senate, with a congress of representatives, the constant backstabbing frustrates the President and present Government on achieving any sense of development or stability, as they are too often spending so much time on securing their positions.

The Economy itself which filters into social life, is a low wage, low price, market economy, where labour is plentiful and cheap, but still has a unemployment of some 9 per cent which is fairly high by any standards, the Philippine population is growing at a phenomenal rate, and should reach 130 Millions by 2040, this means that increasingly, the barangay structure of social life will ever increase, the gap between rich and poor will ever more widen, and the race for its inhabitants to leave the Philippines in search of better life chances will grow even more, even today, Filipinos are the worlds largest trans migrational work force in the world.

To be continued.

Next Barangay Life.

[Admin]

I do come Mars ;D

[peterdavid]

I first got a little rankled at the blanket use of 'foreigner' to describe anyone who is 'different' (ie non filipino) - it smacked a little of Britain in the 70s, when it was rather ignorant about racism and multi-culturalism.

But then I very quickly found it a quite convenient way of describing a multitude of sins - filipinos knew exactly what it meant, and most of them are so ignorant of world geography/history/politics (due to the appalling and worsening education system) that making any further distinction was rather meaningless anyway - they barely understand the difference between europe and australia, let alone understanding the differences between all the countries that comprise europe.

Having spent so long there and gotten used to using the word foreigner, not maliciously, but as a convenient noun whose meaning everyone party to the conversation would understand without the need for further extrapolation, I return to the UK having forgotten it's rather a politically incorrect way of describing people not born here and start making myself sound like some relic from an alf garnett show.

Political correctness hasn't really reached most asian countries - which ironically makes it feel far more liberated there than it is here in the 'free world'. :)

Having said that, if anyone were to describe my wife as a "foreigner", I'd be none too pleased - although she would probably take no offence to it whatsoever, because over there it's simply a descriptive noun, just like "boy", "girl" or "lazy, idle scrounger who expects handouts from foreigners without having to do a day of work in his life". :)

[peterdavid]

They take the word 'alien' from the USA, but then they take a lot of things from the USA, possibly because they never existed as a cohesive country before being conquered by the spanish, and then the americans, before being given independence. Unlike most other countries when given independence, the Philippines wasn't returning to being an independent Philippines, it was, for the first time, existing as an independent country, and trying to force together a whole load of disparate tribes who had previously had no reason to 'live together' other than the fact they had been conquered by the same outside country. Thus, there are very few, if any, common traditions, cultures or norms which apply across the philippines as a whole (as it is still very much a tribal country) and so they are susceptible to a greater than usual influence of americanisms. The country and supermarkets are full of american food, the philippines (or manila, certainly) has more american fast food chains than even the UK and philippine food is seen as the "poor people's" food, and if you want to treat yourself, you eat 'foreign food'.

Of course, that could just be because philippine food is sh1te.... :)

[ginapeterb]

Barangay Life.

When I talk of Barangay life, I speak from my own personal experience, so if any readers wish to disagree they may do so in reply, such is the freedom of expression on our Forum.

The first thing I often noticed about Barangay life is the social cohesion that exists that appears to me is lacking in Townships and conurbations that dot around so many of the UK’s largest cities, if you take the differences in the 2 cultures, you will note that there is a tendency to be more insular, and less dependant, in other words, UK Societal structures are self dependant and Philippine societal structure is more inter-dependant.

Barangays I have said previously are really districts within small cities, each Barangay has a string of representatives, such as a Brgy President, Vice President, Treasurer, and other committee members, it’s the smallest form of local government in the Philippines, these are separate to sub divisions, which are generally privately owned land areas, which are their for the purposes of private housing development.

Its no surprise that low and middle income earners and those in poverty, that tend to be congregated in barangays, which are characterized by social housing, by Western standards of course some of the houses seen would not be characterized as appropriate dwellings for householders to reside in, however there are little or no standards enforced in these areas, with regard to building regulations, and overcrowding, which leads me onto the structure of barangays and their close proximity to each other.

If you were to drive down a street in a Barangay at night, typically you will find that there is anyone and everyone sitting around outside the dwellings, doing nothing more than staring into the night, having a drink, chatting and commenting on life in general, and of course, for want of nothing better to do, enjoying the past time of Tsismosa, (gossiping about others).

Again due to the close proximity of dwellings, it is not uncommon for lots of relatives be it more distant than we are used to, to be hanging around each others homes, chatting about the days events, it is difficult of course for anyone to have any reasonable amount of privacy, as I have often said, people will talk about just anything that makes up for a good story.

Whenever people are living in close proximity such as the Barangay’s people will always have a subject of discussion, sadly very often it is at the expense of a neighbour, their relatives or friends, Barangay life can be mundane and boring as in most areas of the world, lack of employment, and business opportunities often lead to long periods of enforced idleness, however having said that, Filipino’s can often have some of the most amazing ideas for starting businesses, so local economies are flourishing in ways that Westerners would never have thought possible.

Sometimes on driving around these self contained communities, one does find that the areas have a smell that is recognizable, this is often brought to your attention before you actually go, remembering of course, that Filipinos are extremely clean and hygienic, this is not a reflection of them as a people.

Barangay life is about inter dependency, and closeness of family, it has its benefits, it has its disadvantages, it’s the old saying “Its not a fantastic system, but it’s the best we have got”.

[Admin]

Sounds like Bradford ;D

Seems strange that it is safer to walk around a shanty town than it is a UK inner city.

Crime were I live is zero, but I'm one of very few in this country that have that luxury.

Anyone want to start a thread on Philippine crime?

[peterdavid]

Crime where you live is zero?

Where do you live, an abandoned oil rig in the north sea or something?? ;D

Bradford - eeww. I think I'd rather live in a dirt poor barangay than Bradford, any day.

[Admin]

I live up in the Welsh hills in a very small village. My front door opens onto miles of open fields and hills ;D

The only city I could live in is Singapore, but I'd prefer open space by my house, like the sea if I lived in the Philippines, as they can't develop that way :)

[walesrob]

I live up in the Welsh hills in a very small village. M
I too live in a very very rural part of Wales, where the sheep are many, buses are few and all decent places are 4 hours away. As much as I love this place, I always look forward to going to Hong Kong. Its like going from empty to full, from quiet to busy, from a few people to many thousands. Bit of a contrast!

I stayed at Elsas place in Tacloban last year, and the difference in living standards to Uk and Philippines is massive. I could compare it to going from luxury to going to absolute poverty. Its a real eye-opener.

[Admin]

Singapore city is the only clean & crime zero one I know of on the planet and it's a pleasure to be there.

If your just taking a holiday, you can do the complete island in a week.

I'll do a few threads on it some time.