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People
Strangely enough, it’s the people that either endear
or repulse you. Here, as in the physical landscape contrasts,
you have contrasting personalities. The poor are
hardcore poor, ranging from the homeless (they sleep in the park like
it’s a huge camping trip but without the tents somewhere near the expressway in
Manila itself or sometimes just on
pavements. Not even makeshift cardboards like the ones in North America. They just plonk themselves on the pavement -mother, father and kids. I have seen mothers and babies sleeping on
pavements which stink of stale urine and this is in the afternoon
abt 3pm in Ermate which is the commercial area
just next to Malate.

When you exit Hyatt Hotel, a 5-star hotel, you come face to face with the gritty and grim life outside. It tugs at your heartstrings, but I see all the Filipinos (universal term that includes the females as well) immune to the stark contrast. Life goes on. Maybe the church should help? Or, maybe they believe it’s in their karmic destiny (unlikely because most are Catholics). I find it hard to swallow that such extreme contrasts exist side by side. Same in Indonesia especially in Jakarta.

Perhaps, it’s the Malay/Polynesian race added with some Chinese and Spanish blood that make Filipinos such an enigmatic lot. You never know what you get when you mix things up. Add Roman Catholicism to the melting pot and you have, well, a very unique people not found elsewhere. It’s the only Asian nation that has adopted Christianity. The fervour with which some take the religion is rather notable. Take for example, a devout taxi-driver who only listens to Catholic sermons on the radio. Yes, there is a dedicated radio channel bringing sermons to the people. Same with television. His taxi is filled with all these Catholic paraphenalia and Christian words of encouragement. When the priest was praying on the radio, the ernest chap would clasp his hands together and pray along. I was also praying too - that he only does it when he stops at the traffic lights and when there’s a traffic jam. God answered my prayers, hopefully his too, whatever he’s praying for.

You have the beggar children
and older people on the streets. You have agressive taxidrivers who
will fight you for an extra 10 pesos (that’s less than RM1). One time, I wanted to try the street food that common Filipinos eat, and so, I dropped in at a small food shop (in Indonesia, they call it warong, In Malaysia, gerai). The workers were a little perplexed to see me there (it’s in a tourist district after all), but are quite happy serving me. The food was far tastier than restaurant food and at 1/3 of the price. It was about 11am then, and most Filipinos order just one dish (usually meat) to go with the rice. There were also two men drinking the cheap Miguel beer (which is the beer of choice in the Philippines- nothing great. Compared to Beer Lao from Laos, Miguel might even rate at the bottom of the heap, with Beer Lao at the top). Another time, I dropped by another stall, and the same scenario greeted me. People do not order too many dishes and there would always be one or 2 tables of people drinking beer at that time of day. To be honest, I see that sometimes in Malaysia too at some dingy coffee-shops.

At the other end of the scale, Makati looks more like spanking clean Singapore CBD. Wide roads with enough shopping malls to satiate all your shopping cravings. Expensive cars are being paraded inside the malls. They have every kind of shops that you can find anywhere from KL, Bkk to HK. Franchises like Starbucks, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Crocs shoes, Baleno, G2000 and even the really upscale brands like Prada, DKNY, Hugo Boss, Armani Exchange can be found in spanking clean luxurious surroundings. Being such devout Catholics, a church service was even being held right inside a shopping mall when I dropped by on a Sunday.

I was told entertainers earn a lot in the Philippines. Models and singers earn a lot but the competition is fierce. Very hard to find jobs there as there are too many applicants chasing after too few jobs. One needs to know some influential people in order to land a good job. Which explains why thousands of Filipinos leave the country every year to find greener pastures in America, Europe, the Middle East, and some come to Singapore, HK and Malaysia to work as maids or entertainers. Some of these are highly educated but have no connections and are thus confined to menial jobs like waitressing and nannying - a sad state of affairs indeed.

The rich are so rich they stay away from the masses of poverty which I perceive is an eyesore to them. One can get so psychologically immune about it. They employ their own security guards and stay at the outskirts of Manila, cocooned in their own luxurious splendour. Security guard business is big business in the Philippines. Even 7-Eleven shops employ them. While only banks and other big companies employ security guards in Malaysia, over there, even the travel companies employ security guards. And the cashier is stationed inside a locked room with windows around for any transactions involving money.

There is an expectation of robberies and snatch thefts in Manila. Do as the Filipinos do. Lock the door after you enter the taxi, otherwise you might find a stranger on the street opening it and demanding something. Bombings have even occurred previously. I have been fortunate not to witness any, almost. Well, there was one time, a friend and I went up the horse-drawn carriage (kalesa) after they promised the fare to be about 20 pesos each for a short distance. However, halfway through the journey, another man leapt up the horses and said the horses were his and we have to pay 100 pesos each to him! To me that was daylight robbery. We had a little war of words and in the end, I told them to take us to the tourist police. However, my friend was afraid they would take us somewhere else and paid up. For some reason, I was not afraid and was trying to see where they would take us. The adventurer in me forgot that this country is essentially lawless, yet surrounds itself with legalese as if it’s a law-abiding country.

Later, when I related this story to a Filipina, she told me that the kalesa should cost only 10 pesos per person for the short distance covered. And we paid 100 pesos each - a whopping 10 times more.

Sex and Love

Filipinos are generally romantic people. Valentines’ Day is celebrated on a bigger scale than Chinese New Year. Not surprisingly since they revere all the Christian saints and St Valentines’s is one of them. Chinese New Year is like any other day with no public holiday.

They are passionate about love songs and take the chance to sing anytime they can. Karaokes are very popular there. So are massage centres which cater mainly to tourists, at least in the tourist areas. Filipinos have their own style of massage but it’s not well-known. One can get that near the Black Nazarene Church in Quaipo. AT the tourist districts however, they have adopted Thai and Chinese massage styles. Only the Chinese massage at an upscale massage therapy centre located in a hotel in Malate is worth the price. Same price in Malaysia. RM50 per hour. Two others I went to weren’t up to the mark. I also tried the Ritz, a popular spa with the Koreans. Very nice ambience. It was so cozy that I dozed off while the masseuse gave me a leg massage. When she woke me up, I couldn’t remember the entire session!

Staff inside the spa could be a little over-attentive - kept looking at you even though you are trying to change!!! Tips are expected of course for little things like bringing you the towels or drinks. Speaking of which, the Filipinos have adopted the American way of life when it comes to tipping. The tipping culture is so entrenched that if you forget or do not tip, it’s like losing face. Coming from a non-tipping culture, I felt like money draining off me all the time! Of course, I tried to balance it with the thought that these people earn very little.

It seesms like a common thing for Filipino men to impregnate a few women and not be
responsible for the babies. And women continue to fall
for them because of their good Caucasion looks (some of the lucky ones have that prized caucasian mixed looks). It seems that every other woman I met is a single mother.
This is another hard fact to stomach. The population
is more than 70 plus million and growing at an
alarming rate. Why? Because Filipinos (incl Filipinas)
are such romantic people that they fall in love
easily. Love hotels abound and are advertised quite openly. You also find the same concept in Thailand. Hotels with covered car parks where curtains are pulled across to hide the cars from any suspicious spouses or business rivals can be found in many places.

The population explosion would have been contained except for the fact
that the Philippines is a staunch Roman Catholic
country which prohibits the use of contraceptives. So, you can
imagine what happens.. Women get pregnant by the
thousands on a regular basis. And babies are born out
of wedlock at an alarming rate. It’s common to find families with at least 5-10 children. Not surprising if you do not use contraceptives. They do sell condoms of course, both imported and local. You can find them at 7-Eleven and pharmacies. The funny thing is these young women can be mothers but not look it. Somehow, they manage to retain their slim bodies and it’s only after you talk to them that they tell you that they already have a baby.

I happened to hook up with a friend’s friend while there. Being with a local helped tremendously as you don’t get ripped off and people leave you alone. Chris even cooked beef steak for me at the beach bbq pit. She sleeps at 5am while I sleep at 1 am! Being a dancer, she is a night person, has 3 mobile phones with her, sms-es like mad, drinks like mad and sleeps very late, or shall I say, early. Filipinos party till 5am in the morning and wake up the next day needing a drink.

Food

A little something about the food. Filipinos are not as concerned about eating healthy as the Thais are. You hardly find mobile stalls plying fruits as can be found everywhere in Thailand. They eat more meat, too much meat in fact. Which probably explains why the lust is on a high level. Meat eaters generally are more into sex, at least from what I gather. And it increases chances of diseases too. Food is generally bland. Even the highly-touted Chinese restaurant near the Black Nazarene church offerred food that I could hardly eat. Such food would be practically inedible in Malaysia, yet there were a lot of patrons. Prices are like double that in Malaysia. The coffee shop has been around so long it’s practically an institution there. Even the cash till register was of a bygone era - without a doubt, it’s an antique piece and they know it.

The best food is street food, i have tried some of the
top recommended restaurants but the food just adds to
the long list of disappointments in Manila. Aristocrat (another food institution) and
Zamboanga restaurants, highly recommended proved to be a little worse
off than the average restaurant fare in Malaysia. Prices are one third higher too. In Zamboanga, a little fly landed on my food, and I couldn’t resist asking the waiter if grilled flies were on the menu too.

In conclusion, it is not the best place to live unless you spend one month on the private beach in Puerto Galera or the Boracay. It is also not the best place to invest partly because Manila is not such a good place to stay compared to KL or Bkk. The choking traffic and pollution will kill you. One does not feel so safe in Manila. The casino manager at Hyatt whom I had a chat with told me that it is very common to read about assasination plots against President Arroyo. It was front page news headlines when I was there. He is another example of how Manila traffic jams reduce the quality of life. He spends up to 3 hours a day commuting to and from the casino. Imagine I was complaining about the 2 hours I spent commuting in KL.

The other minus is the very American way of thinking in terms of rights. They use legal words everywhere. Literacy rate is very high. But that means, they can use words and legal technicalities against you. If you are in business, you don’t want that to happen.