One of the most common questions we get asked is ‘why the Philippines?’ after all there are hundreds of different countries out there with fantastic diving, good schools and great communities to be a part of. So what was it that made us settle down in this neck of the woods?
The quirkiness of the country is always entertaining and certainly tests your sanity at times. For instance ask a straight forward question such as ‘So should I take the next left to reach the market or the one after that?’ and you will probably get an answer similar to this ‘Yes, no, maybe, sure its ok’ or you will be answered with what can only be described as a slight raising of the eye brows in a non-committal shrug type of way. Now this is by no means a rude gesture, in fact it is the common way to answer ‘yes’ – annoying – maybe. Quirky – definitely. The Philippines proudly boasts to be the only Asian country that’s main language is English. Thereby 99% of the educated population speaks a good level of English. Let’s rephrase this – 99% of the educated population speaks a good level of American English! For those Brits out there, this is not only frustrating but also extremely confusing at times. Ask in a British accent for a bottle of waTer (emphasis on the T sound)) and you will get a perplexed look and a question of ‘bread, sausage, coke?’ ask them again with an American lilt for a bottle of waDer (emphasis on the D sound) and they will smile politely and ask mineral?
The shopping malls are always a treat. As soon as you enter the mall the security/door man holding an alarmingly large gun will bid you welcome and proudly state ‘enjoy …whatever mall it is you happen to be in’ Instantly you will have people stare at you, after all you are the foreigner which still holds a large curiosity value to the locals. Upon entering a shop you will then be surrounded with heavily make-upped sales assistance there to help your every need, or really just get in your way and make you feel as though they are watching your every move waiting for you to slip that t-shirt into your handbag and make a run for it. If you decide to ask them for assistance (warning!) you will be left either totally exhausted or suicidal as it normally takes about 10 attempts to get the point across. This is what happened to me the other day.
After entering the department store and politely refusing help from 5 or 6 sales ladies I found the rack of shorts I was looking for. To my delight they were on sale and would make a perfect uniform for our boat crew. The lone sales lady who had not followed the others and wandered off (I should have suspected something at this point) was smiling politely and asking once again if I needed help. To the amazement of Tim I actually said yes and asked ‘do you have any more of these in stock?’ the poor girl looked scared witless and simply said ‘blue? Purple? Pink?’ Now it was my turn to look confused. ‘Um, no do you have any more of these shorts in stock?’ again she answered ‘skirts? T-shirt?, blue’ Tim is by this time curled up in a heap of laughter and was simply saying over and over again ‘told you not to ask’. As you can no doubt imagine we left the store empty handed completely confused and very ready for a cold SML.
Banking is another interesting thing here. We foolishly attempted to send money overseas the other day. To be informed that it was illegal to do this??? ‘Really’ we said in unison. This is obviously news to us and most of our customers and 1000’s of other successful businesses that have no problem in sending overseas bank transfers on a more or less daily basis. We explained this to the very confused bank teller who simply repeated ‘not possible, next please’. We also tried to acquire a credit card for our business. At first we were informed that this was an easy task and would simply involve filling out an application form. As we started the process we were asked ‘Are you foreigners?’ (Really she could not guess this already) ‘Yes’ we politely replied, to which she replied ‘oh, you can’t get a credit card if you are not Pilipino’! Quirky definitely.
This really is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the quirkiness of the Philippines. So, with all these sanity testing little foibles,
why did we settle here? Simple really we love it. The people are endearing, friendly and probably the happiest nation on the planet. They are happy to help, willing to help and more importantly want to help. They are fantastic with children and willing to accept kids into any situation. The standard of living for a foreigner is very good, the local food is cheap and cheerful the local beer even cheaper and very nice. The level of acceptance to being a foreigner living in ‘their’ country is pretty high. And don’t get me started on the 7000+ plus islands each with their own unique biodiversity, local communities that vary dramatically from island to island, stunning beaches, fantastic world class diving on tropical reefs with good vis and great marine life, mini rainforests, mountain ranges and generally good year round weather.
So when people ask us ‘Why the Philippines?’ we simply say ‘because its home’.
