What’s up my sleeve?

I have mentioned several times lately that some big changes are in store for this blog. Actually, when my plans are complete you won’t even be able to call the site a blog anymore! That’s right, we will be changing to a “Web Magazine for Ex-Pats in the Philippines, and those who want to be,” or something like that. I’m still ironing out details, honestly. So, what is the difference between a blog and a web magazine? Well, lets have a look at that.

Yes, the site will still revolve around blogs. Oops. Did I say blogS? Yes, I did. Instead of the site being a blog, I will be changing it to a site that houses multiple blogs. Right now, we have a single blog with many different authors all writing on that blog. What I envision coming is having multiple blogs, which will result in each author having his own blog. Let’s fact it, each of us writing has a little different outlook, and I am sure that each reader has his (or her) own favorites among the authors, so it will be easier to more closely follow your favorite author, but still easy to follow each of the other authors too. To accomplish this, the home page of the Magazine site will be a single page that ties all of the different blogs together. When you go to the “Home Page” you will see information from each of the authors, and other information too. Then, let’s say you want to follow AmericanLola, you can click over to her blog, etc.

In addition to each author having their own blog here, there are some other aspects of the Web Magazine that I am envisioning:

1. A Video Blog, or Vlog. Each author can post on the Vlog with videos from the Philippines. These could be their own videos or videos from around the net (You Tube and such) that they feel would fit in with the Magazine theme. It could be as little as one new video per week, or it could be a new video each day. That is something we will just have to see. An example of what a personal video might be would be if I took my camcorder and went to town and documented a jeepney ride, or if I went out in the Province and rode a carabao, that could be put on video and shared with the group. Maybe something serious, maybe something silly. It will vary!

2. Photo Gallery. I am envisioning a Photo Gallery where each person (author or even readers) could have their own Photo Album where they can share pictures with the group! For example, if one of the readers comes for a vacation in the Philippines, they could put up some photos from their trip for the rest of the community to enjoy.

3. Job Board. One of my favorite Bloggers that I follow is Darren Rowse, and Australian who is known as the “ProBlogger.” For the past year (maybe more), Darren has had a place on his site where Job offerings are advertised for Blogging Jobs. There is also an area where people can post for jobs that they are looking for. I think that this would be kind of a natural here on the Live In The Philippines Blog. Any jobs that are available for Ex-Pats could be advertised on the site. One of the most frequent e-mails I get is “what kind of job can I find there.” Well, there are not too many jobs for Ex-Pats, but if we could get a roundup of them here, that might be a great resource. Right now, the biggest challenge that I face on this item is being able to find the jobs to list! But, I am thinking about it, and I really want to do this, so I’ll probably figure out a way to get it going!

4. Forum. We’ve been talking about doing a forum in connection with the comments discussion lately. There is so much topic drift in the comments that I think a forum would be a natural here. I am not 100% decided on this, but I feel that it is something that will probably happen.

So, as you can see, we have a lot of work ahead. It is something I’ve been kicking around in my mind for a couple of months now, and we have just gotten down to serious work on the site. It may take a couple weeks, or maybe more. Maybe it will be a couple of months before everything is in place and we settle down in our new “virtual home.” But, it is something that WILL happen!

The main reason that I am posting this is because I want to hear about what the community thinks. Are there other features that you want to see? Do you see something I listed above that you think we should not have? I want to hear your comments! Let me know what you think.

Don’t worry… Be happy!

DON’T WORRY……..BE HAPPY

Hi all, I just wanted to write this little piece because something happened the other day that got me thinking.

I was getting a taxi to my destination. Now I don’t regularly use taxis these days, I try to use jeepneys, but my destination was far so it was a necessity this day.

So, after I flagged down the taxi on the street, having received the usual “hey Joe’s” and waves and whistles etc from the friendly locals, I sat back and relaxed as the driver pulled away.

I had never met this driver before but he started chatting to me. He asked me where I was from, my name, things like that. It is naturally in my personality to respond and communicate so I answered him, going into some detail and descriptions of my home town, explaining it is north of London. He loved my accent, “very British don’t you know” and we chatted and talked the entire journey which was approximately 20 – 25 minutes.

The thing that got me thinking was one comment he made which I thought was very sad indeed. He said to me, “You are the first foreigner I have had in my taxi who behave this way”. I was not sure what he meant, so I asked him to explain.

He proceeded to tell me that when he picks up a fare he always tries to hold a conversation with the person he has just collected. He explained that many Filipinos are quiet and do not talk when sitting in a taxi, but the thing that made me feel bad was when he told me every foreigner he has picked up so far in his taxi has been “strict”. He further explained that meant they have barked out the destination to him and sat back in silence for the entire journey, even when he has attempted to strike up a conversation he has received a one word answer and then eye contact is broken and that is that!

My driver told me it makes the journeys often very boring and even uncomfortable sometimes.

He was so happy to be talking with me, his eyes were alive, he had a big big grin on his face all through the journey and he was great company. I thoroughly enjoyed chatting with him about many different things and the hot journey I was taking seemed to fly by. He said, “I have made a special friend, thank you to talk to me and be nice to me”. My God, I felt awful, because surely, as foreigners in another country we should be communicative and polite and how hard is it to be just a little bit friendly?

Of course we all have bad days and we feel tired and fed up and not very happy. But that is a universal condition, not just a suffering of the well off white man. How is the driver expected to feel driving in searing heat day after day and then someone gets in the taxi who has a face like they have chewed a wasp.

It takes nothing to smile and communicate just a little bit with somebody. You don’t have to dissect War and Peace or make intelligent comments about every verse and chapter of the Bible, but hey, you can give a little smile and make someone’s day cant you?

I feel embarrassed that foreigners are like that here, particularly in the “land of smiles”.

I know this is only one taxi driver and many people possibly have different experiences, but I myself have seen white people walking around like there is a bad smell under their nose and I just have to laugh at them.

A little conversation, eye contact, smile, a little laugh, and hey, it makes all the difference.

I came to this country to get away from the miserable society that doesn’t communicate, lets not spread it here as well.

So come on, don’t worry……be happy………………..

Moving around and getting a feel for the place! Part 2

Ok, so yesterday in part 1 of this 2 part series, I told you about how we have moved between a number of different locations in General Santos and Davao since living in the Philippines.  I explained to you why I thought that renting was a good idea, and I also told you that in today’s 2nd part of the series I would explain how this has affected our thoughts about the future.

Through the things that we have learned by moving to different areas, we have found that we enjoy being close to town, near the places where we go to a lot.  For example, I like to go swimming and to the gym at Marco Polo Hotel.  I can walk there from my house in about 20 minutes or so, which I enjoy.  We are also very close to the malls – there are 4 malls within 10 minutes by taxi from our house.  About the only mall in town that is further is SM, and it’s about 15 to 20 minutes away.  So, convenience is important to us.  Also, schools are important.  Our daughter goes to a school that is less than 5 minutes walk from the house.  Our two youngest boys attend a school that is about 15 minutes by taxi.  So convenience is in place for us.  We have learned that if we were to build a place of our own, or buy an existing house, we would probably enjoy a place that is in the neighborhood where we live now.

But wait!  Earlier this year we bought land on Samal Island, which is somewhat removed from the City.  Physically it is close, but access is by ferry boat, so it takes time.  Why would we do that?  It doesn’t fit in with what we have learned.  Well, actually we fell that it will fit our lifestyle perfectly.  You see, by the time we intend to live on Samal Island, our lives will be different.  Our kids will be finished with school, and our business life will be winding down to a more serious level of retirement.  That makes living in a more remote area more practical and we feel that our lives will fit this new lifestyle nicely.  But, we will still be doing some testing.  You see, we intend to build the house in the next five years or so, and we won’t live there full time until about 10 years from now.  So, we will have 4 or 5 years to use the place as a weekend getaway, etc.  That means that in that 5 years we can make a final decision as to whether or not we want to live on the island or not.

OK, I know what you are thinking.  You are thinking that we are spending our money on the land and house on Samal and are not 100% sure that we want to live there!  But, you are missing one point.  There is a big demand for tourists to stay on Samal!  If we decide that we don’t care to live there, we will turn the house into a short term vacation rental, and can still make our decision to stay in the City where we know we are comfortable.

I don’t think we will be doing the Samal rental thing, though…. both Feyma and I are practically counting the days until we can live on Samal Island!

Moving around and getting a feel for the place! Part 1

On this blog, I have long advocated renting your house first when you move here. Why? Isn’t it a waste of money to rent? Actually, it is not, and we’ll talk about that later in this post. But, putting money issues aside, do you realize how advantageous renting can be? It can really give you a chance to move around, get a feel for your new home country, learn a few new things, etc. Let me give you a little rundown on my experiences.

Let me say first, that we have moved more than we intended to, no doubt about that! It’s been a good experience, though, and quite helpful to me.

When we first moved here, Feyma and I lived in General Santos City. We rented a beautiful house from a British man and his Filipino wife. This couple had moved here and built the house, then they had some marital problems (due to another subject I’ve talked about – aggressive women chased the guy and he enjoyed it!) they split up. He stayed in the Philippines and she went back to Britain. The house was very nice, and we rented it very cheap, since they had a hard time finding a renter. As I recall, the house had been marketed for sale at P5 or P6 Million. We paid P11,000 rental. Under the rules of real estate that I knew back in the States, a house should bring the owner about 1% of the property value per month in rental to be a money maker. If they had been able to rent that house at that percentage, they would have gotten P50,000 per month. So, I paid about 1/5 of what the owner should have wanted to get in rent for a property of that value. Nice deal, don’t you think? We liked the house, it was beautiful – big yard, marble walls and floors, etc. – but we decided that General Santos was not where we wanted to settle down. We lived there 2 years before moving to Davao City.

When we moved to Davao City, the housing market here was tight, it was hard to find the right place to rent. We ended up settling for a nice place, but the size was only about half of what we needed for our large family. We paid P12,500 per month for rent, which again was quite reasonable. But, we were very cramped there. We signed a one year lease on the place, but after less than 6 months we found a more suitable place, so under the terms of our contract we moved out and forfeited our security deposit (as I recall it was 2 months rent).

After moving from that place, we ended up in Marfori Heights Subdivision in a very large older house. The house was built back in the 1960’s. It had a wonderful huge yard, and the house was absolutely huge too! We actually called the place by the nickname “The Auditorium” because it was so big. We really liked this place, and we lived there for 2 years. We would have stayed longer, but we had some trouble with the landlord, which I have also written about here on the blog.

When we moved from Marfori Heights, we ended up in a gated subdivision, Woodridge Park Subdivision. It is a very nice place, akin to some of the nice neighborhoods in the States, with large stately homes and such. We moved out after one year because the house had a lot of things wrong with it, and the landlord was unwilling (read – he didn’t have enough money) to fix the problems. Broken water pipes underground caused our water bill to be 10 times what it should be, toilets and showers leaked water all over the place, etc. And, this was a relatively new house, and an upper class house at that! We were paying P50,000 per month in rent, and the place was falling apart, so we decided to move.

We always loved living in Marfori Heights, it was so near to everything, so we decided to move back there after leaving Woodridge. As a matter of fact, we moved into the house right next door to where we had lived before, and we are still living in this house. We really like it here.

Now, why all this moving, and why am I recommending that you rent for a while and do a little moving around like we did? Well, every time we move we learn a little bit about what we like and what we don’t like. We always thought that those gated subdivisions were so nice, but after a year of living there, we found that we didn’t care for that lifestyle. Renting allowed us to re-evaluate our decision to live in General Santos City, and I’m glad that we moved to Davao City, because we both love it here. See, every move taught us something that we would not have otherwise known. This is why I feel that for somebody who is new in moving to the Philippines, this is a very desirable thing to do. Look at the British/Filipina couple that we rented from in GenSan, they built a beautiful house, and it didn’t work out for them. In the end, they had to get whatever they could for their house and try to rebuild their lives. Don’t let that happen to you!

Now, why do I say that renting is not a waste of money? Well, you have to consider the cost of money. For example, I pointed out above that we rented a P5M house for P11,000 per month. Let’s break that down and see how much of a waste of money that was:

1. To buy this house, it would have cost P5 Million. Let’s just say that the dollar is at P50:$1 (I know it’s not, but we are just making an example here, and the math will be easier). To buy the house would have been $100,000.
2. If I had taken that $100,000 and invested it in a secure investment instead of spending it on a house, how much money could I have earned on it? Well, let’s say that a very conservative investment would have brought me 5% return. So, $100,000 would have brought me $5,000 per year.
3. My total rental payments would convert to $220 per month, so one years worth of rent would be $2,640.
4. By putting the $100,000 into an investment, and paying rent out of my returns, I would keep the $100,000, pay all my rent, and still walk away with $2,360. Not bad, huh?

So, as you can see in my example, I would actually make a profit by renting rather than buying in this case! No matter what the exchange rate, if the rest of the numbers in the example were the same, the results would not change, it is cheaper to rent than buy!

Tomorrow I will have the second half of this article about my future plans for a home.

What to do with your retirement time

I hear from so many people that once they retire, that’s when their life gets real busy! They can’t figure out how they ever managed to work a 40 hour week, because they seemingly have no left over time in retirement! I consider myself to be somewhat retired, since I kind of do whatever I want anyway, and I know that I am way busier now than I ever was when I had a “regular” job.

So, what keeps me busy? Well, I like to travel around the Philippines (primarily traveling around Mindanao), I have picked up a new hobby – photography. In conjunction with my travel, I enjoy trying to learn about new cultures (particularly the various Muslim cultures in Mindanao). I like meeting people, which also ties in with my travel. I am in the midst of trying to learn a new language (Bisaya). Have you noticed any pattern there? They all kind of tie in together. I am in heaven when I take a trip to a Muslim area (especially in the ARMM – Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao) with my camera in tote, take a lot of photos of the area, feature my pictures on my various blogs, meet the people, try talking to them, etc. I can tie this all in together, and I have a great time! In addition, I have figured out a way where I actually make an income doing these things that I love! That’s right, by publishing articles and photos both on my various websites and also in print media, I have been able to earn a fairly nice living by doing the things that I enjoy.

What about you? What will you do when you settle in here and retire? A lot of people enjoy kicking back and the beach and drinking beer. Hey, that sounds nice too, but after a few days of that I’d get pretty bored! Honestly, there are so many things that I look forward to doing, it could be years before I run out of things to keep me busy! Don’t take me wrong, there will certainly be more than a few days at the beach, and 3 or 4 bottles of beer to go along too. Actually, though, I don’t drink much. On average, I probably drink 4 beers in a year, so I guess I’ll keep busy with other things too!

How about you, what things do you look forward to keeping yourself busy in your golden years? Do you have a plan, or will you “play it by ear?” For me, I’ll do a “little of both,” I guess.

Living in the Philippines – Looking at the life you left behind.

Will you be one of those who looks longingly at the life you left behind ?

I want to start another post that I hope will be of interest to all readers and contributors, as its Bank Holiday in the UK today, we are not working, you know how it is, geeeeeze when you get the chance of day off work, you dont know what to do with yourself, in my case, and being alone by the way, I decided to take a drive to to the mouth of a river I know, there are a couple of pubs there ( Bars for our American cousins and far east readers).

Well actually they are not like sports bars or anything like that, they are old english country public houses, many of them have been there for hundreds of years, and they are still popular today, the ususal British Bank holiday day trippers were all there, drinking lager, beers, spirits and munching away at baskets of snacks and fries, just looking across the river to the yaughting marina, the weather was fine.

Thats the problem with public holidays, it kind of gets you out of your routine and gets you thinking about life in general and just for a moment, your mind wanders – in my case it wandered across the continent of Europe, over the Former Soviet Block, over Mongolia and down through Northern China, and finally yes you guessed it – into the Philippines.

i thought for a moment as I scanned people with their families, couples chatting, children playing on the beach, it was a typical beautiful english summer day, the type that makes you glad to be alive, and I contrasted the views at that moment, with the views back in the Philippines, I thought about what Angie or Tina said about the trials and cultural differences in inter-marriages, and wondered when push comes to shove, what if anything will I be leaving behind.

I have a freind who recently went to live in the Philippines, he took his Filipino wife with him, because he wanted to get away from it all, get away from the life in our country, in favour of a better life in the Philippines, I remember some of the posts that Bob has made, he often says “Not all foreigners make a life here, some come, stay for a while, and end up leaving, for one reason or another, they decide its not exactly the life they thought it would be”

Whilst I am not being negative, its good to explore just exactly how one will react in the same situation, I received the news only this week, that my freind is back in UK, he lasted exactly 9 months, he could not take it any longer, in this marriage, one person wanted to stay, one did not, I bet your all thinking the obvious ! the wife was happy the husband was not, hmmmmm so did I, but I thought wrong, actually, the husband was quite happy, that is the foreign husband, it is the wife who was not happy, she was never happy leaving the west, and never wanted to settle back in the Philippines, in the end the pressure of what was left behind became too much, in the end it was all about financial matters, and when push came to shove, the Filipino wife finally got her way.

I have another quick story, its about another freind of mine, all his life he has worked in foreign countries, he is a construction foreman, he has worked in 100’s of countries, no matter how many times he comes back to visit UK, he is off like a shot, 2 weeks and he has had enough, the problem is, he cannot settle back in his country of birth, he complains all the time about the cost of living, the mentality, the weather, you name it he complains about it.

It occured to me that in both these stories there is much to be learned, moving to the Philippines in our example did not work for my freind, although he was perfectly happy, one part of his life was not, suprisingly it was his Filipino wife, she longed for the things left behind, of course if one moves to live in the Philippines, there will always be things that you miss or long for, you will get homesick, it will be no different to all the ladies that leave their home in the Philippines to travel thousands of miles across the world to make alife, look how well they do – we applaud them all, they are fantastic ambassadors for their country, the Filipina is an inspiration for all of the peoples of the world.

Will you be one of those people who looks back at the life you left behind, whenever you go, wherever you wil be, it would be unnatural if you did not look back sometimes and think about the life you left behind, there will be many things you will miss, there will be good and bad, things that you are lucky enough to have, and things that you no longer have.

Maybe you will miss your friends you left behind, when freinds are left behind, new freindships will be made, I did look back today at some of the things, the views of my country that will not be so apparent anymore, we often complain in our country about our political leaders, as Ian and Rick will probably testify in my defence, my goodness do we make fun of them, we complain about everything that is not right, and then in another breath, we make comments in the Philippines about how things would never be done that way, or this would not happen in my country.

I am trying to show that for every life we carve out for ourselves, there will be things about our country of birth and home that we will miss, and yet when we do move to the Philippines, the decision we took will bring with it many benefits, its about one of Bobs favourite phrases, “Balance”, will we and I count myself in the we by the way, will we be able to make that balance for ourselves, giving up some of the things we left behind and embracing some of the things yet to come.

We cannot live in a utopian society, that would be perfect if we could, sadly its not a reality, in my country, I can think of the security of our Social security system that we all take for granted, the transport infrastructure that we constantly moan about, and yet really if we examine it, its fantastic compared to the Philippines.

I can think of many things that will be left behind, one of them I thought about today was the quality of BBC programming, you see we pay a state licence fee to watch it, its mandatory everyone pays for the BBC regardless of whether they watch it or not, I know in the Philippines I will get BBC World on cable, but I know I will also miss the quality of BBC programming like never before.

There are many things that come to mind, yes I think I will probably be one of those who looks longingly at the life they left behind, the question is simple “Will I allow the life I left behind to pull on me to such a degree that it causes me to throw the towel in and head back to the white cliffs of Dover” I hope not, but I think with lots of support like this blog and peer support groups in the Philippines, I am sure I can make it….I hope all of us can, but we cannot discount that what happened to my friend, could happen to us.

And to finalize my post, Bob made a post about burning your bridges, and refraining from doing it, it was a good tip Bob, sadly my freind did burn his bridges, he is now homeless, unemployed and has no money, he cannot make a claim for social security because he has been out of the country for more than 6 months, my freind will have to start all over again, fortunately he is with his family, here again the importance of close family has been shown time and time again, so having read this post, what do you think, are you in agreement with me, its not easy to let go of your former life ?

Your comments are appreciated and your thoughts, what was your experience, did this happen to you, do you longingly look back at the life you left behind, if so how do you cope ?

More Cebuano Speaking Tips

Today we will talk about several tricky little things you need to get used to before you can speak Cebuano properly.

The first is, how to say, “No.” Have you noticed that sometimes they say, “Dili, “ and sometimes they say, “Wala?”

‘Dili’ (which has a glottal stop at the end) means ‘will not, (I) do not, or does not

‘Wala’ (which also has a glottal stop at the end) means, “Don’t have, have not (done), or did not (do).”

Do you have a pencil I can use? No, I don’t have one (Wala)
Did you go with Bob to Buda yet? No, I haven’t gone. (Wala)
Do you have apples here? No. (Wala)
Have you tasted our octopus cooked in ink? No, not yet. (Wala pa)

Are you going with us to see the parade tomorrow? No, we have to do some shopping. (Dili)
Does your son attend Ateneo? No. (Dili)
Do you sell apples here? No. (Dili)
Do you know how to sing? No. (Dili)
Do you like to eat dried fish? Not really. (Dili kaayo)

Okay for practice, have someone ask you questions in English and you try to give the right negative answer in Cebuano. Make sure you ask someone who knows the right answers!

The next mystery we will tackle is how to say ‘we.’ This is probably the hardest one to get straight! I still catch myself using the wrong word for ‘we’ sometimes.

In Cebuano, there are two words which we translate ‘we’ in English. They are, in the first class pronouns, ‘kita’ and ‘kami.’

‘Kita’ includes the people being spoken to. “Hey, let’s all go see that new movie!” (Kita, the inclusive, includes all who are in the group listening to my statement.)

Mag-adto kita sa pagtan-aw niadtong bag-ong salida!

‘Kami’ excludes the people being spoken to. “Jul and I (we) plan to eat at Countryside when she visits CDO.” (Kami, exclusive, tells the people listening what we will do which, incidentally, they will not be doing with us.)

Mokaon kami ni Jul sa Countryside pagbisita niya sa CDO.

It is important to know that when you, a foreigner, speak to a group of people and use ‘kami’ it can be understood that you are speaking of yourself and those like you, excluding Filipinos, especially if you are talking about the way WE do things, or what good things WE do or have done. You may be thinking a collective WE, but if you say ‘kami’, your listeners are excluded.

When you pray out loud, in case you have the occasion, you always use ‘kami.’ You do not include God among those giving thanks or making a petition. He is excluded from those praying and is the non-included listener. Makes sense, eh?

As second class pronoun, ‘us/our’ is translated ‘nato’ (inclusive) and ‘namo’ (exclusive).

A Grandma’s tale – Then and now

by Billie Martin

Well, here I am, Billie Martin, Bob’s mother. I would like to say that I have met Feyma’s Mother and family many times and I dearly love them. Feyma’s mother and I can’t speak the same language but we love and respect each other. Sadly, I didn’t get to meet her father, he passed away just three months before my husband died.

Let me step back a bit and tell you how it was for me when Bob, Feyma and the children moved to General Santos.

I will tell you a little about myself. I am a very happy person and very seldom get mad and my husband was the same way. We tackled our problems straight on and with positive thinking and a sound mind. I tend to tease a lot and have a lot of fun in life.

In 1979 we lost our only daughter in an auto accident with a drunk driver. My husband and I both felt and I still do today that the Lord needed her while she was young and innocent. The man that hit her died also and just maybe that made it easier on my husband and I. Charlotte was 15 and a half and a beautiful young teenager. She had beautiful red hair, freckles and a wonderful smile. She was a fire baton twirler at school, coming home from her first night practice when she was killed. She was a very thoughtful, caring young women. When we lost her, of course we missed her terribly and when I was weak my husband held me and when he was weak I held him. Our whole family prayed to her each evening as I still do today. A death is something that you can’t do anything about. You have to look at all the good things that people do for you during that time and at all your wonderful memories and that helps you throughout everything. Your memories of all the good get better and the bad slightly fade, but you never stop missing your loved one.

In 1993, Robert (my husband) and I had 5 moves and we were both quite tired, but we just kept busy and did what we had to do. Tuesday morning April 20th my husband didn’t come down for breakfast, so I went to tell him breakfast was ready. When I found him (I won’t go into details), he was already gone. I immediately called 911 but it was too late. I had a memorial service the next day in St. Johns, New Brunswick, Canada where we lived and then flew to the States and had the funeral. We had only lived in our home for 3 weeks and had just gotten back from the states where we saw our sons, Bob and Mick. Three weeks later I went back to Canada and had our things packed and moved back to the States.

Robert had only been with the company that he worked for for 5 months, they had pursued him for a while, because he was a very well known executive and vice president in the paper industry. They tried to get out of their contract with him and I had to battle them through the court system for almost 6 years to get them to honor the terms of his contract. You can all come to the conclusion that I was just exhausted and just wanted my life to get better.

I’m sorry for rambling on, but we are finally to the part when Bob and Feyma decided to move to the Philippines, which came 7 years after my husband’s death. I couldn’t find the words to tell you how heartbroken I was. I love Feyma as if she was my real daughter and so I felt like I was losing 5 family members all over again. I must say that I couldn’t see Bob’s side at all and he couldn’t see mine. We argued all the time and it got to the point that we couldn’t even be around each other. Bob and I had always been very close. One thing that I forgot to say was that I was very close to Bob, Feyma and their kids and saw them almost daily. Those unconditional hugs and kisses from their kids saved me when I lost my husband.

When they moved, I was very broken and numb. Bob and I continued to argue. Well, the Lord works in mysterious ways. The day before Bob had his stroke, we got in an argument and I am ashamed to say that I told him that I wouldn’t ever go to the Philippines because I felt that it was so dangerous, He said “what if I die” and I said that I couldn’t come.

Well, a few days later Feyma called and told me about Bob’s stroke and that he almost died. Guess what? The mama booked a flight and came. Isn’t it sad that it took Bob being sick for me to come? This is my 4th trip to the Philippines and it’s a long hard trip but I am in good health now and eager to come each time. I came for Thanksgiving and Christmas last year and now for two of the children’s birthdays. I now love it here, especially Davao City. The heat and the poverty get to me but there are a lot of wonderful things I love. For as long as my health is intact, I plan to come here yearly. The people are wonderful, the PORK AND FRUIT ARE THE BEST. I forgot to say that I know that God sent Bob, Feyma and the children here for lots of reasons.

I’m afraid that I rambled on a bit, but it was fun to tell you how I felt then and now.

Love and Hugs,

Grandma Billie – the other “America Lola”

Air Philippines – still the same?

You may recall a few weeks ago I wrote an article about my flight from MANILA to DAVAO being changed or cancelled and I found myself on a flight to CEBU then onto DAVAO, and nobody had informed me.

Well I had a friend travel the reverse and the same happened to him without any warning he was put on another flight and again found himself in CEBU, before going to DAVAO.

And yesterday a friend from the UK had his direct flight to DAVAO and his flight number changed and imagine his shock when he tried to get off at DAVAO to find himself in CEBU!!!

Now does anyone know why? Two flights booked over the Internet one booked a week before at an AIR PHILIPPINES office.

Apart from a small delays it is only an irritation, but imagine if you had a connecting flight or even international connections to Singapore, what would happen then?

I have heard taxi drivers tell me that the business into DAVAO is greatly reduced, again can anyone tell me why?

Mom’s shocking adjustments!

Well a week ago I post about my mother-in-law coming here for a visit. She’s here with us now for over a week. I’m really shocked of some of her adjustments being here in the Philippines. As you recall she was here like 8 months ago. At that time she had a hard time adjusting to the heat here. When we went to the mall to shop we had to stop by at the coffee shop for her to have shake or something cold to drink before moving on with our shopping. She had to cool down first. Just to walk around SM at that time we had to have cold drinks twice. She didn’t like it because its really a hassle to stop. That’s Christmas time too so the mall was packed. She’s just was not so comfortable at that time.

Now that she’s here at our house for over a week some shocking stuff that Mom had done. First she didn’t complain that much about the heat. Sometimes if I come to the room where she’s staying at our house lots of time the air conditioning is off. Wow, for me thats amazing. Before we had to turn on the air conditioning even if she’s at the other room so that when she comes back there the room would still be cold. She also hangs out a little longer outside her room to talk to our nieces and workers. We like it that she’s kind of adjusted here so that she will have more fun coming here. Hopefully by next visit we can bring her somewhere outdoor maybe like at the beach. By then she will enjoy having just cold drinks while watching the kids swimming. Just hoping though. . I felt sorry for her sometimes because the kids just would not leave her alone. They want to stay at her room every minute. Sometimes I will tell the kids to play at their room so that Granny can rest. If she hear me tell the kids that she will say that I came here to be with this kids so just let them be at my room. I guess she has some rest when the kids go to school during weekdays. She really adores her grandkids. She’s also adopting some of my niece here in the Philippines. Shes the granny to them now.

Mom likes a lot of the food here now. One thing that she loves eating here in the Philippines is pork. For one is the pork liempo. It’s the thigh part I think of the pig and it’s roasted. If she could she wants that food everyday. Another pork thing is the pork rind. In the mall here theres a place you can buy pork rind. So it’s really fresh, they will cook it in front of you. You can choose any flavor you want. She like it because its still hot and crispy. She’s the pork lady. . When she first came here she said that our meat has a gamy tastes. Now she doesn’t think that anymore.

Really she can already retire here if she wanted to because for me she can already adjust the life here. Maybe she might be even feeling better if she lives here with some of the health problems shes having right now. I really hope that later she will decide to live here so that we don’t have to be worried about her.

We really enjoyed having here for a visit. The kids would have a good birthday celebration then. It’s complete because Granny’s around. Good gifts too. . Mom thank you for visiting us again. We love you a lot.