The call that didn’t come

Again, this week, I am sharing my column from SunStar Davao here on LiP.  This article is appearing in SunStar on Friday, November 6, and the same day here on LiP.  Enjoy the article.

Does PLDT know what customer service is?  It would seem that they don’t, based on my recent experience with them.

I earn my living on the Internet.  All of the money that I earn comes through my work on the Internet in one way or another.  Because of that, it is important for me to have a reliable Internet connection.  If I don’t have good Internet, I can’t earn money!

Because of the fact that Internet connectivity is so important to my livelihood, I have multiple Internet accounts.  I recently got a third Internet account, through PLDT, with their MyDSL service.  I had been a MyDSL customer from 2002 until 2008 and had always been very happy with the service, until May of 2008 when they cut off my account three times for no apparent reason.  Every time I would inquire, they would get me hooked back up, but it was a hassle to never know when my service would be off again.  Because of that, I canceled the service at that time.  I got two different Internet connections with different companies when I had the PLDT disconnected.

About a month ago, I decided to give PLDT another try, since I had been happy with them for a number of years, so I got a third connection.  Having backup connections made me feel secure that I would always be online, and if one was interrupted there were still two more backup connections.

Well, the other day, my PLDT connection stopped working again.  I figured that it was just a regular outage and would resume in an hour or two.  By afternoon, though, and still no Internet from PLDT, I was a little concerned, so my wife went to the PLDT office to find out what happened.

The people at PLDT informed my wife that they had disconnected my account.  Hmm.  Why?  My wife assured them that the bill was paid, and we owed nothing on the account.  PLDT informed her that indeed the bill was up to date, and the problem was an account issue with PLDT’s computers!  Because there was a problem in their own computer system, they cut me off!  They even told my wife that there were “a lot of people with the same problem” and they were all very angry about the fact that they had been cut off.

I understand that problems happen, and must be worked out.  Here is what I don’t understand, though.  PLDT is the phone company.  They know my telephone number.  Why didn’t they call me and inform me that they were having a problem and would need to terminate my account (hopefully temporarily)?  Is that not the way customer service is supposed to work?  Inform the customer of what is going on.  But, PLDT, as they always have done, just cut off the account without any notice.  A simple phone call would have been so nice, and as I say, they certainly know my phone number.

Philippine Internet Comparison

As I’ve mentioned in the past, there always seems to be a lot of interest whenever I write about Internet speed and Internet providers here in the Philippines.  In the past, I’ve used several different providers here, and each has advantages and disadvantages.  Right now, I am kind of experiencing a “glut” of Internet, but I kind of like it.

What do I mean by a “glut”?  Well, I mean that I have an oversupply of Internet connections!  If it’s possible to have an “oversupply,” that is.

I wrote back at the beginning of August that I had found Internet Heaven here in the Philippines.  Well, unfortunately, heaven was nice while it lasted, but after not too long a time, it kind of slipped down to purgatory instead of heaven.

Yes, when I wrote about being in Internet Heaven, I was talking about my new Internet Provider, SmartBro ShareIt.  ShareIt is a service provided by Smart Broadband, which provides an Internet Connection of “up to” 2 Mbps, and utilizes 3.5G connectivity from the Cellular network of Smart Telecommunications.  When I got ShareIt, I was extremely happy with the service.  The speed was great, and everything seemed wonderful.

At the time I got SmartBro ShareIt, I already had two SmartBro Canopy systems here at the house.  The SmartBro Canopy system is a different type of connectivity from Smart Broadband.  This one puts an antenna on your house, which picks up connectivity from the Cellular tower near your house.  The Canopy system is similar to ShareIt, but provides a connection of only “up to” 512 Kbps.  I was pretty happy with the Canopy system, and had been using it for over a year already.  My plan was that after I tested out the ShareIt system, I would cut off one of my Canopy accounts, then get a second ShareIt system, and cut off my other Canopy account, thus ending up with two SharIt systems.

I did go ahead and close one of my Canopy accounts, and nearly got the second ShareIt system.  However, back around the beginning of September, I started having problems with ShareIt.  The speed was still good, but it started happening that about one or up to two days per week, I had no signal on the ShareIt.  On those days, my Canopy system still worked, so I still had Internet.  But, if I had switched to two ShareIt systems, I would have been without Internet service at all, which is something I don’t want.

Another problem that I had found with ShareIt is that it did not work well at all with VOIP.  Thus, my Vonage IP phone system worked terribly on ShareIt.  Even though the speed was very fast, the VOIP just was terrible.  I could hear the person on the other end fine, but they could not hear me well, lots of flutter in my outgoing signal.  My previous experience with the SmartBro Canopy system was exactly the opposite, the person on the other end of the call said the connection was super, but on my end of the line, I was hearing only like half of what was being said!  Hmm.. this just was not acceptable.

Prior to using SmartBro (either system), I had been a customer of PLDT DSL for about 7 years.  I was always happy with the service until May 2008, when I started having billing issues with them.  They kept cutting off my account.  They said I didn’t pay my bill, even though I had receipts.  When I showed my receipt, they would hook me up again, but it was a pain that I was cut off 3 times in one month!  So, I switched.

Well, having the two SmartBro systems was pretty good, except that I was still unhappy with my VOIP situation.  And, having a US phone number is important to me for personal and business needs.  With this, Feyma and I decided to once again get a PLDT connection, which was installed on Saturday last weekend.  So far, I am very happy with it!  Funny thing is that it is the slowest of my three connections, yet it gives me the best VOIP experience by far.  Also, the surfing “feels fast” as well, even though the connection is not as fast as it is supposed to be.

So, now I have three different Internet Connections, provided by two different providers.  Just for clarity, though, PLDT owns Smart, so it could be said that all three connections are through the same provider, though.  Given that I have these three connections, which each use a different technology, I decided to do some testing.  Below, I will provide the testing results, and my thinking about each different connection.

All speed testing was done through Megapath’s speed testing service, at their San Francisco server.  PLDT and Smart have their own speed testing, but I prefer to use a speed test that the provider does not control, and also I prefer a US based server, since I am more interested in the speed to the rest of the world, not just the speed between Davao and Manila.  Speed tests were done 5 times, and a “middle” result was given for the result of the test.

PLDT DSL

I had the “Xperience” account, which is rated at “up to” 1Mbps.  It is a DSL service through my phone line.  Although PLDT does not offer any written speed guarantee, they told me that they promise 70% of the rated “up to” speed, so I should expect 700Kpbs at any given time.

Test results:
Latency:  125ms
Download Speed:  332Kbps
Upload Speed:  245Kbps

Works great for VOIP and downloads.  Even though it is well below promised speed, I am pretty happy with the results.  I will be asking for PLDT to do some “fine tuning” to see if they can’t get the speed up to where it should be, though.  Even if it remains where it is, though, I am pretty happy with it.  Speeds through the PLDT testing site are more up around 400 to 450Kbps, and that is the site that they will use for testing.

SmartBro Canopy

I’ve been using SmartBro’s Canopy system since May 2008, so almost a year and a half now, and have been pretty happy with it.  My only real complaint is that it is not too great for VOIP.

Test results:
Latency:  230ms
Download Speed:  409Kbps
Upload Speed:  235Kbps

Rated speed is “up to” 512Kbps, and I often get speeds even a little faster than that.  I suspect that the reason VOIP performance is not that good is because the latency is a bit higher than I would like.

SmartBro ShareIt

I’ve been using SmartBro ShareIt for about 2 months now, and I am very happy with it, for some applications.  When it comes to speed, it simply is unbeatable in my experience in the Philippines.  However it just is not usable if you want to do VOIP.  Also, it has been experiencing outages of up to 24 hours at a time regularly lately.  Because of this, if you don’t have some backup connectivity, you are likely to be frustrated with ShareIt service.

Testing results:
Latency:  315ms
Download Speed:  1.71 Mbps
Upload Speed:  417 Kbps

If I just want to surf the net, I want to use ShareIt every time!  For downloading files, it’s great too.  There is a podcast that I enjoy listening to everyday, which is a download of about 40 Mb each time I want to listen.  The download time for that file is rarely more than 2 minutes.  Not bad at all!  But, for anything that requires upload too… ShareIt tends to suffer.  VOIP is unusable.

For now, I’ve decided that I’ll be keeping all three connections, and using them for different things.

I have each of the three connections on a WiFi Network, so I actually have three different WiFi connections in my house!

Oh, what about the prices?  Well, they all cost exactly the same amount – P999 per month.  Having all three is not costly in my opinion – P3,000 per month, and I’ve got multiple connections, redundancy.  I should have Internet access all the time, or at least close to all the time now with the redundancy that these three connections give me.

Addendum: I originally wrote this article about a week ago, but other events pushed it’s publication date back.  During the time since I wrote the article, the flooding occurred in Manila.  During the Manila flooding one Internet provider or another was down at almost any given time due to the weather, but through the entire crisis, I had Internet connectivity at all times because at least one of my three connections still worked.  I must say that during the weather crisis the most reliable connection was the SmartBro Canopy system without a doubt.

The Compound Tower

Wouldn’t be able to spend all day on the Internet without The Tower. Sits about 10 ft from our front porch here in San Miguel, Jordan in Guimaras province;  I call our place “The Compound”. We have thirteen folks currently residing here. Oh, I could take a short walk to the local Internet cafes. Only 20 pesos an hour, not bad. But I wanted a high speed, super-duper, fast-as-lightning Internet connection where I plug in my MagicJack and talk to my Dad in Vegas or anyone else with a landline back in the States.  A connection where I could whiz (lot of that goes around here in our little rural province) around the Internet with blinding speed.

Went to the Smart store in nearby Iloilo at the SM City Mall. Explained my desire to have broadband service. Said a business that was fairly close to us had service, Albert’s Motorcycle Shop (wife tells me the shop owners’ were sponsors in our wedding; we had two weddings, but that’s another story.) Every time I turn around we run into someone that was a sponsor or someone who is a relative, and Sainted Patient Wife asks if I remember them. I can’t even remember what I had for breakfast this morning let alone someone that attended our wedding five years ago or a relative I had met years ago.

The nice lady at Smart says they will send someone to survey our site to see if we can get their broadband service called Smart Bro. So I gave the lady 999 pesos in advance for the first month’s service, and wait for a Smart Bro rep to show up.

A few days later a guy pulls up on a motor scooter by the name of Moises. “The Compound” sits quite a bit lower from Albert’s Motorcycle Shop tower location; Albert has a 35 foot tower, but we might need a higher tower. “How high?” I ask. “Maybe 60 feet, sir.” replies Moises. “How much?” I ask. “18,000 pesos, sir.” replies Moises. That’s a pretty good chunk of change, I gulp and think to myself. Moises says he will do a site check from his tower at 35 feet and let me know how it goes.

Moises texts me later in the day. Thirty-five feet won’t work. No LOS (Line of Sight) at that height. No signal. Do I want to go with the 60 foot tower? I text him back to go ahead with the 60 footer. Now just a couple of weeks before “The Chief”, the local police officer who of course is another relative, came by with his friend Roy ( of course my wife is related to Roy’s wife.) Roy is now our architect/contractor on some work being done at “The Compound”. Anyway, “The Chief” warned us at the time that installers are putting up Internet towers for some foreigners, and charging exorbitant prices. Now did that warning pop into my head when I gave Moises the go ahead on the 60 footer? Nope. I wanted my Broadband, high-speed connection no matter what.

I trusted Moises. He guaranteed me I could get my signal with a 60 foot tower, and I took him at his word. Here in the Philippines some things are just like back in the States. You make a judgment about a person, and decide if you can trust them. I looked inside Moise’s bloodshot eyes and took him at his word.

Well, the family is not happy about all this. They are all out in the front yard by my brother-in-law’s nipa hut talking in a frenzy in their local language. I ask the wife what’s going on even though I sensed I had figured it out. Sainted Patient Wife says the family believes I am paying too much for the tower. “Are they paying for it?” I asked my wife. She says my sister-in-law thinks I should get someone else to give me a bid on it. Probably a good idea, but Moises is the authorized installer for Smart, I’ve been waiting long enough to get the Internet here, and I will not wait any longer. Wife lets it go (for now) knowing I am getting irritated (I also got irritated in America so she recognizes my irritability here as well.)

A few days before the tower installation is due to happen, my wife informs me that Roy, our architect/ contractor could have put up the tower for 10,000 pesos. She wants to know if I had given any money to Moises yet. I said that I had not given Moises any money yet, but that I HAD given him my WORD that Moises was going to be the one to install the tower. If Roy installs Internet towers why was I not told this a couple of weeks of ago when he came by “The Compound” I ask Melinda, my Sainted Wife? (Let me please tell you, however, that I really like Roy. He is very smart, organized, and personable.) She says she doesn’t know why.

The crew of 5 comes in to install the tower. Moises tells me that he is only going to try to see if it works with a 50 section even though the tower the crew brings is 60 ft., broken down in 10 ft sections. He said it was too risky to go higher. I advised him that he was going to install a 60 ft tower as he promised if that is what it takes to get my signal. I also remind him that he told me before that he had climbed a 200 ft tower. He said he will go to 60 ft if there was no signal at 50 ft.

The tower goes up in 10 ft sections at a time. It is about 3- inch thick iron with supports welded on for climbing. It is supported by guide lines positioned throughout the front yard. A young man, not Moises, climbs the tower as the other workers get each section up to him with a rope. The guys get up to 50 ft, Moises hooks up the Ethernet cable to my computer, and gets no signal. Have to add that final 10 ft. section. The last section goes in, we have a 60 ft tower, and Moises (and I) are excited because we get a signal from the main tower, a very good signal. He goes to the Smart Bro website and reboots the computed as directed and then—-no signal, NOTHING!

He tries for another hour or so to  get the signal back. Still nothing. He then advises me he is an installer and not a technician; I had already figured that out for myself. He says he will be back tomorrow morning (hopefully with some help.)

Next morning Moises comes back with a friend of his who is a computer tech. The computer tech configures some LAN settings on my computer, gets the signal back, and I am online. I am overjoyed and thrilled to no end. So here I am staring at this monitor all day and typing. But I enjoy it. If you’re going to write a blog, what better place than the Philippines!

You’re Welcome To Visit…

We’ve all met them, the bad guest, hell you or I could be one, and I would just hope, that’s not the case. In my whole barangay there were only two of us Kano. And the problem was guilt by association, whenever the other Kano causes an upheaval in the purok; I am the one who has to hear about it and try to quell the bad feelings.

I tried to explain to him that living in someone else’s country, is like visiting their home. They may invite you in, sit you down and offer you hospitably, you have the right to accept what is offered, and enjoy sitting in their house. But, you have no right to re-arrange their furniture.

If you feel that you have the knowledge, to fix what you believe to be broken in their country, than I suggest you quickly return to your own country and repair it first, as you must have all the answers.

My problem solved itself, as he got so sick of butting his head against the wall (or a Navy term “Pissng up a rope”); and sold his house and went back to the states. His social experiment lasted only three years, and a lot of cash, as he sold his house (brand new) for one half of what it cost to build. I know he was not a bad guy; he just came here without a clue as to what to expect.

When I was in the Navy and stationed around the world, I noticed that a lot of people on the base seldom left it. I had a name for them “Perimeter Lizards’” those who would go up to the fence, and peer out. Then complain about the locals, and what a mess their country was. How could they know?

I fought to live off base with the locals, and would argue with the Base Commander, that since I was the Commissary Officer, I needed to view the local culture to better serve my customers; pure B.S. but they all approved my request.

Which left me with friends and memories that will last forever, thanks to my being part of their life and they part of mine

Living in the Philippines was my choice, as during my ten years as a Merchant Seaman, I lived nowhere. My only connection to anywhere was a storage locker in Florida where I kept all the things important to me. My Father called me the richest homeless man he ever met. When I was paid off a ship I’d just pick a place on earth and go on vacation for a couple of months.

On one of my vacations here in the Philippines I visited a retired friend here in Olongapo City, Luzon, and married his wife’s sister. One of my better plans, and I’ve not had that many. My point is I choose to live here, and have no reason to complain, as my wife won’t let me!

P.S. Not everything is Tongue-in-Cheek!

Putting it to use

For years, I would try to speak to Filipinos in English, because that was the only language that I knew.  I mean, English is a “second official language” of the Philippines, and almost all Filipinos can speak English, right?  Funny thing was, though, that many times I found it difficult to have a meaningful conversation with many Filipinos in English.

I could always tell that many of these Filipinos I was trying to speak with could speak English, but they were embarrassed to speak with me in English.  Sometimes I would ask them why they won’t speak with me in English.  I would almost always hear the same response:  “I’m shy, Sir” or “I’m ashamed, my English is not good.”  My response to this would always be the same, I’d tell them that their English was certainly much better than my Bisaya or Tagalog!  That was certainly true, too, because I actually could not speak Bisaya or Tagalog.

In the past two years that I have been learning the language, as I learned more and more, enough to actually be conversational in the language, I started learning what people meant, or how they felt when they told me this.  I learned about it and understood it because although I could speak enough Bisaya to hold a nice conversation, I felt shy or embarrassed.  I mean, what if I didn’t speak perfectly?  It would be embarrassing, I might be ashamed!  Maybe they would laugh at me, after all!  How could I ever put my new language skills to work?

Well, one thing I learned about this whole thing was that when you learn a new language, it takes time to become comfortable with using it.

Honestly, I don’t know if I ever got to the point where I could say in my mind that I was comfortable.  What happened, though, was that I came to a point where I didn’t care if I made mistakes!  I looked at it as an opportunity to practice, but also to learn more by having people correct me!  So, I decided to start speaking Bisaya a lot more.  This was a few months ago.  I guess I decided this back when I went to Cebu in May of this year.  It was a perfect opportunity to speak the language, and I thought I better go for it.

Now, whenever I am out around town, I try to speak Bisaya almost exclusively.  Also, I find ways of getting Bisaya practice online too.  I especially like to post things on Facebook in Bisaya.  Whenever I post a message or a status report in Bisaya on Facebook, there are always tons of people who respond to me, and engage in conversation with me.  Hey, I am not always perfect in my use of the language, and sometimes there are people who correct me, or point out errors that I made.  But, now, I don’t feel embarrassed when I make such errors.  I just say thank you, and make a mental note of the error I made, trying to avoid doing that again in the future.  Truth is that I’ve had a lot of fun using Bisaya on Facebook, and I’ve made a lot of new friends on Facebook by doing that.  Also, whenever I am out and about in the City, I find it fun to use the local language to interact with people.

So, by learning a new language, though, it has given me a new appreciation for how Filipinos feel about speaking in English to a native English speaker.  It is not something that is easy to get over.  I do feel, though, that when you are learning a language, you get to a point where you just say “what the heck, I’m gonna go for it!’

I’m glad I’ve reached that point!

Can I adjust here?

When I was preparing to come to live in the Philippines, I would have daily conversations with my wife and just try to get a grasp on her daily routine and just exactly what it was going to take to get adjusted in a different county and in a totally different living situation.

I have been living as a single man for a long time and I guess I was set in my ways for many years. So I knew what I was up against was not only adjusting to a whole new country and culture but also living as a family member and head of a household.

I took and still take my responsibilities here in our house very seriously as I have the charge with not only supporting me and my lovely wife but also feeding, schooling, housing and guiding two younger sisters and a younger brother of my wife Riza. Did I bite off too much at once ? That’s still open for debate but I know that in the eyes of my in laws and wife it is a life changing situation as they are from a very poor financially but very rich in pride and family support.

With that said I’ll get back to my adjustment here, some have said there is no way to prepare you for what you are going to experience not even the trips you take there will prepare you for actually living in the Philippines. I kinda shrugged all that talk off and said to myself  “I know what I’m in for and what to expect” after all I talk to my wife everyday and know what she does  and her daily routine.

Not even close my friends!

Aside from learning about the people and their reactions I had to learn a new way of communicating, oh sure wonderful peeps like Bebe Metillo will teach you proper Bisaya and such but you know what, the people don’t really speak proper bisaya they speak in slang kind of like we have redneck talk.

I learned a simple “oh” means yes I hear you and people are called deng, dong, day and a whole host of others, so my point is really, if you think you have a handle on it, forget it, there’s only one way to adjust and learn and that is to come experience living here for yourself.

I'm in Internet Heaven

A lot of people always ask me  – “How’s the Internet in the Philippines?” And, the question is not surprising to hear.  One of the big reasons is because you always hear about how bad Internet Connectivity is here.  Slow.  Unreliable.  In and out.  Generally Bad.  That is what you always hear.  Well, my experience has been that it isn’t as bad as you hear, although it is not great either.  Right now, though, I must say that I am in Internet Heaven.  I’ll explain in a bit.

Firstly, let me say that Internet-wise, I came to the Philippines unspoiled by super-fast broadband.  I lived in a relatively remote place in the USA, no broadband available.  At the time I moved to the Philippines, broadband was just starting to become available in residential areas anyway, but had yet to reach our location out in the sticks.  So, I had grown up on dial-up connections.  When we moved here, I was disappointed in the Internet anyway, it was not nearly as good as the dial-up I had experienced in the USA.

When we moved from GenSan to Davao, in 2002, I was pretty happy with the Internet that I was able to get in Davao.  We were able to get DSL for the first time in my life.  Speed?  Ha ha… it was a blazing fast 256 Kbps connection!  Well, that was fast for me, compared to what I had been used to, and I was pretty happy with it.  That connection was from PLDT (Philippine Long Distance Telephone).

I remained a PLDT customer for 7 years, and always had their most premium residential plan.  In the end, I was “supposed to have” a 3 Mbps connection, although I rarely even could get speed readings approaching 500 Kbps.  I left PLDT because they kept cutting me off for no reason!  First, they said I didn’t pay my bill, even though I showed them a receipt for payment.  The next time cut off my account, they could give no reason.  Finally, they cut me off for the third time in a month, and the reason they gave (after several days of me demanding to know why), was that they were repairing a cable in my neighborhood, and that I would be off line for “at least 2 weeks.”  That was all I could take, so I terminated my account with them.

I got a connection from SmartBro at that time (June 2008).  The account was only 384 Kbps, but surprisingly, I could not tell any difference between that and the 3 Mbps that PLDT was supposed to be providing for me (at a much higher price).  I liked SmartBro so much that I got a second SmartBro account in just a few days.  I have a number of computers operating in the house, so I wanted to get the bandwidth that two accounts could offer me.  The account was only P999 (about $20) per month anyway, so I was not too worried about having to pay for two accounts.

A few weeks ago, I read an article about a new service from SmartBro called “Share It.”   This “Share It” service is also P999 per month, the same price I was already paying.  The catch was, though, that the connection was 2 Mbps instead of 384 Kbps.  Wow, that’s like 8 times the speed!  Same price!  How could you possibly go wrong?

With the Share It service, you pay an initial fee of P2,500, which gives you a wireless router that allows you to share the service among 5 computers (no wonder they call it “Share It” service).  I already have two WiFi networks in my house, sharing the other SmartBro accounts, so I really didn’t need another WiFi router, but it is necessary, because this WiFi router is also the modem for SmartBro Share It service.  You see, you put a Smart Broadband SIM inside the router.  The SIM looks just like a Cellphone SIM card, and it lets the Router connect to the 3.5G service on the Cell Network (HSPDA service).

I got the router on Thursday last week.  When I got home, I put the SIM card in the router, plugged it in, and was on the Internet through the new service in less than 5 minutes.  It is simple to hook up, and no hassle!  Through Internet Speed Tests, I get results ranging from 1.3 Mbps to 1.9 Mbps all the time.  Very reliable, and very good!

As I have been writing this article, there are 3 people connected to the Share It service right now.  I am also listening to a US Radio station while writing.  I just finished using my Vonage telephone to talk with my Mom.  All of this going on at the same time, and Internet Speed is excellent, even with all of this activity.

Wow, talk about heaven!  I am very happy with SmartBro Share It service, and I recommend it to anybody who is looking for a good broadband service here in the Philippines.  P999 per month for 2 Mbps or so?  How can you beat that?  As far as I know, you can’t!

Communication better then or now?

I am really so amazed now at how easy it is to communicate somebody from the other side of the world. Can you believe it, just 2 decades ago it was hard for me just to make a phone call to Bob in the States. I had to go to the phone service office and make my call there. I had to wait in line for my turn and its only on the weekend too. Can’t call abroad during weekdays. There are times when I would go to the office that the line to call abroad is off. Gosh, I had to wait until the next week for me to call again.  I really wonder sometimes, how did we make it? During that time we were also using the post office to send our mail. It took me like a month to get Bob’s first mail and vice versa.

Nowadays with email in just seconds the other person gets it instantly. You can even use your cell phone now to send email. Cell phones were popular in the States in the mid or late 90’s. I remember when we took our vacation here in the Philippines in 1999.  My goodness I didn’t know then about texting. As soon as the plane hit the runway, you could hear a lot of noise in peoples pockets. At first I thought the people were just playing games. I didn’t realized that it was a text message. Philippines were way ahead on that than in the States. As you know the texting were being popular in the States in the early 2000s. If not that we move here I probably don’t know and would be lazy of texting. I hated it at first. I hated carrying a cell phone here. In the States I usually leave my cell phone in my car or just inside my purse. Now, I can see a lot of people in the States carry their cell phone with them. A lot of people now know how to text too. Once in awhile I received text from my friends from the States and some other countries. I think its more expensive here for texting than in the States not sure on that though.

Here even the people plowing the fields in the middle of nowhere has a cell phone in his pocket. Sometimes me and my nieces here were talking about their neighbor in Patag, my birth place. In that place a lot of times you can’t get signal from our cell phone provider. We have to find a good spot to get the signal. Its really a pain. We will have a good laugh sometimes my niece told me that a their neighbor in Patag whose job is to get coconut wine (tuba) from a coconut. What he does he will climb the coconut tree and he will text or call his daughter who works in Manila or other place in the Philippines. He has good signal on top of the coconut tree!

A thought struck me a few days ago. A friend of mine lives in the States for over 2 years now. She’s been having difficulty adjusting to being alone there. I mean with just the husband and the kids of the husband with them there. I feel she’s really lonely for a family there. My gosh I was thinking of my time in the States before with myself and only Bob and his family were my immediate family there. I didn’t have any close relatives in the States. For me it was very hard at first. A lot of nights we have to run to Bob’s parents house just for me to cry my heart out with mom (Bob’s mom). She was really a big help for me and Bob. I found some friends. They too were having difficulty, but at least some of them had cousins or friends that live in a different State that they can communicate. They also tried to tell mom their lonely times there. Thes get together were the best part we could talk and share our loneliness. Calling to the Philippines in the mid 90’s was getting better then. We have what we called the calling card. Just scratch and get the number in the back of the card. It was pretty good back then. Sometimes the connections were horrible, can’t hear the other end or they can’t hear me. It’s frustrating sometimes, but it helpedw me at that time. I have been trying to connect with some of my friends back in the States. Most of my friends were way older than me a few were younger. The older ones, they will just let their kids do the email and stuff.  The kids would tell me that “mom’s not really into the internet thing”. Usually we just talk on the phone. Lucky for me we have Vonage. It’s just like talking on a regular phone. Good connection too. It’s a US line and it rings here in our house in the Philippines. So, I can talk with my friends anytime with no problem. Some friends want to communicate in Skype no problem too. Of course to have internet here you get an internet provider. Right now we are using SmartBro. We are happy with it. We even have 2 SmartBro accounts in our house. It’s easy to get it too.

Now, to connect with an old classmate or long lost family member just use Google or some other way of looking up in the Internet. Amazingly you will find what you are looking for. The internet really is the best way to communicate. I know most of us can’t live without it. I know for sure if our internet be off in just few hours we really get upset. We are internet and cell phone addicts.

Do you think the instant communication would make the people more homesick?  Would it be better do you think to not communicate with the loved one (the person that lives abroad) more often for them to adjust easily? What do you think guys?

Cheers!

A gentle and quiet people

Filipinos are a very gentle people.  They are very quiet and demure.  They speak very softly, sometimes so softly that sometimes it is difficult to hear what they say.  Of course, you already know these things, because we hear it all the time.

STOP!  Wait, is it true?

If Filipinos are so gentle and quiet, then why do we also hear complaints from our fellow foreigners (myself included) about the noise problem here?  Oh, I know… you are saying that the noise is from the dogs, the roosters and the traffic.  Is it, though?

I did not plan on writing about this topic today, but a while ago I was in my office making some coffee.  I keep all my coffee supplies in the office and have a little “coffee station” there where I can brew up some wonderful coffee concoctions.  When I was standing there waiting for the brew to finish, a group of construction workers next door was taking a break.  They were sitting in a group of a half dozen or so, and talking.  These guys were probably 60 to 80 feet away from me, and I could hear the entire conversation!  And, I didn’t have to strain to hear it, or be quiet so I could “eavesdrop” on them.  No, even if i was loud in what I was doing, the conversation could not be avoided.  And, I was inside the house and in a different house from where they were!  They were downright loud!  They were not abnormally noisy either, not fighting or arguing, just having a normal conversation!

The same thing happened yesterday.  In the morning I went into my office and sat down at my desk to get to work.  In the mornings, I like to keep my office windows open to let the morning air permeate the office.  Yesterday morning, though, when I sat down, after only 5 minutes or so, I had to get up and close the windows, because all the conversation among the construction workers next door was just so loud, I couldn’t even concentrate!  Even with the windows closed, I could still “listen in” on what the guys next door were talking about!

Another example of this is in my own household.  A lot of times, if I am upstairs in the bedroom of my house, with the kitchen directly below me, I can listen to the entire conversation of my kids and other family members downstairs!  Sometimes, if I am watching TV, I even have to turn up the volume so that I can hear what is said on the TV show over the conversation downstairs!  And, I am not talking about hearing muffled noises from downstairs, I am talking about being able to understand everything that is said!

Why is it that we have an image in our heads that Filipinos are very quiet and gentle people, but in actuality they can be quite noisy?  As this thought came to me because of the “conversation” next door this morning, it kind of amazed me.  The truth is that Filipinos can be quite quiet in talking, sometimes very reserved.  I find this to be the case when they talk to me, as a foreigner or an ousider, not part of their “core group” – but when the group or barkada is all together, all inhibitions go out the window, voices move up to “loud” and the conversation is ON.

What do you think?  Have you noticed this too?

LiP Downtime

I want to announce that this coming weekend, LiP will have some downtime. I have a few issues that I need to fix, and some new features that I will be installing as well. I’ve been needing to do a couple of things for sometime now, but have been trying to avoid having the site down. Some of this is stuff that I can’t really do “on the fly” while keeping the site live, so there will be a bit of downtime.

I have not finalized everything as of yet, but my thinking is that we will be looking at around 2 hours downtime, unless something seriously wrong happens!  You just never know what will happen when it comes to technology, but I don’t expect anything too difficult, so we will see.

As of now, I am expecting that I will start with the maintenance Saturday afternoon, Philippine Time, which would be late night Friday in the USA, or Saturday morning early in Europe.

When I have more precise information, I will announce it here.  For now, this is just a “heads up” for readers to expect some downtime on LiP this weekend.

I apologize for any inconvenience.

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