Over the years I’ve written about how things you buy last forever here in the Philippines. I have no idea if products lasting that long is normal, or was it because I was single most of my life and moved before anything ever wore out.
When I moved from San Diego CA. to Luquillo Beach Puerto Rico not much of my Stuff came with me. I sold or gave away most of my furnishings as I had no idea where I’d be living when I got there, I brought all my Military collection of plaques and awards (For the I Love Me EGO Wall)
I arrived in Puerto Rico and lived in the CPO Barracks which had a bar in the lounge and some of the greatest Chief’s (Male and Female that I’ve ever met) We were the single folks and on most bases, the married CPO’s lived in Navy Housing and didn’t get out much.
The Navy told me I had to live on base; I contacted my Commanding Officer in Jacksonville FL. And he called the Base CO and got me permission to live off base. So I bought a Penthouse Condo (In the 1980’s it was only $55,000.00) the building had 22 floors, with 10 condos per floor except for the top (Penthouse) only had five large condos.
Now I had to go shopping to furnish it was expensive but fun, and after retirement, the Navy paid to move stuff I didn’t need to my brothers in Massachusetts.
I found that my $460.00 (Mortgage) per month mostly paid by housing allowance so I now owned it and it could be rented to tourists at $600.00 per week. I moved to a house on the beach with my friend as a roommate. I owned nothing there as it was all in the condo. Hurricane Hugo requested I leave Puerto Rico.
Now I’m in Largo Florida and rented and then bought a house. Off again, buying stuff. I was bored living on the dirt and applied and was hired to go back to sea with Military Sealift Command out of San Francisco. Sold the house fully furnished, and put all my Military stuff I put in storage with my Jeep.
Now for years I was living on ships while working, and taking Vacations at 5-star resorts around the world, Again I lived nowhere and again owned nothing…Well, I still had my stuff in storage back in Florida. I also got an outrageous offer on my Condo in Luquillo Beach Puerto Rico. Yes, I took it.
My father referred to me as the wealthiest homeless person he had ever met.
I took the money from Puerto Rico and flew straight to Manila and banked it. My lawyer said it was legal as long as I didn’t stop in the US. Then I told my wife to build her house.
Furnishing the house, I required all items be purchased here in the Philippines and was shocked that 15 to 20 years later we still owned most of those items still in good working order
1998 I flew in from Singapore with my payoff money in my pocket. On the way home, we stopped at the Clark Duty-Free and Mayang said she needs one of those water Heaters you see in every kitchen in the Philippines. It was “Buy one Take One” so I gave the extra one to my father-in-law. 10 years later at his house, I noticed he was boiling water and refilling it. Since I know that no box for an appliance is ever thrown out. In the box, we found the electric cord and shocked Tatay. Mine still outlasted his! My wife used it this morning. The Rice Cooker only lasts 5-6 years as they run 24-7-365 I refer to mine as the Eternal flame because that little red light never goes out.
Ref, microwaves, freezers stereos, now I’ve replaced 3 stereos but nothing was wrong with the old ones; I just wanted a new one. Members of our family still use them, well one Brother-in-law sold his.
Yes, I buy a lot of Filipino made products, and now my newest Smart Phone is a Pinoy my/phone. If it works well and lasts I’ll but it. My wife will buy knockoff purses from China. (They don’t last long, just like their tools)
If you been here for a few years take a look around at the appliances you take for granted and ask your wife how long you’ve had it. You might be surprised! BTW ask her where she stores the boxes your appliances came in.
I forgot to add my Condo in Puerto Rico to the pictures I sent to Bob.
nice picture
Rahina;
A great place to live.
Paul,
Great article, Thank you. And you are right here things do not seem to be retired/tossed out much. Other than the rice cooker. We have gone through several in the 10 years Kat and I have been married. The A/C in our bed room is 6 years and I asked the service guy if it was time to replace it. His comment was no it will last for many years yet (parts are still available.) Strange in the US it seemed washers, dryers, tvs, radios, refrig. and freezers all died like regular clock work. Thanks again…
Luke;
I think the reason is some where in every town there is a gifted repairman that can fix anything. I had one AC that lasted 15 years, and when it failed I just bought a new one. My brother-in-law asked for it and him and a friend got it running again and still is.
Rice cookers in my house last about 5 years, but in the storeroom is a brand new one so the light will only flicker before there is rice cooking again, and the replacement will be in the storeroom the next day. (LOL)
Hi Paul,
I suspect two factors on things lasting longer in the Philippines is that if something breaks it is cheaper to fix as labor costs are lower than in the USA where it may cost close to if not more than buying a new whatever. The other factor is that Filipinos are for the most part good at do-it-yourself repairs. Enjoyed the read!
Peace
Jay
Jay;
For sure they can repair anything, but they last forever prior to needing repair…As I told Luke above. In the states it is toss it and go to Walmart and get a new one way of thinking. I like the way it is here!
Paul, yeah, throwing an empty appliance box away is hard here. Heck, throwing anything away is hard! I sometimes wait for my wife to leave the house and then sneak items into the trash cans across the street. Then I cover them up with other trash so they can’t be seen. Ha ha, I win! (I know my wife won’t read this). Al
Alan;
Living in Puerto Rico gave me a hint to the female mindset:. “Don’t just say “Throw those boxes out!”
This is what I did: Honey Ko are you planing on leaving me? Listen to her response telling you she’s not. Then ask why all those boxes are still here if you don’t plan to run away? It worked for me, but the boxes were sold to the guy with the push cart.
Then open a beer and smile!
Wow Paul, you have much better luck with appliances than I. Back on the other side of the planet where I lived my first 50 years, I used to buy GOOD-not-cheap appliances to last a lifetime. Here, not so much.
My previous ‘brand-name’ electric fan lasted almost one year, good buy! These last few years I find myself replacing the rice cooker every 9 months or so. The most recent rice cooker died 2 days after purchase and unfortunately no one deemed to mention it to me before the one-week-super-warranty expired, so I had to pay yet another 300 just to repair a new appliance (which took another week to accomplish). Seems impossible to buy anything of decent quality within reasonably less than an overnight trip which I won’t do anymore unless absolutely forced to sacrifice both work and health; already bad enough one annual trek from the interior to BI in Davao.
Irrespective of brand, it’s increasingly unusual for my wife to have any cell phone survive one whole month. I purchased my current still-perfect personal phone in 2010 when my previous one was lifted from my pocket in a jeepney, whereas my wife currently abusing her phone #46. I’ve also learned not to lend the load-phone to my wife when she again kills her “fone”, since when asked a few days later she might condescend to return a few broken parts and demand to “borrow” my 2010 good phone to break. Better to just real-fast buy her yet another new fone, and I’ve now learned to never spend more than 500pesos on the monthly new wife-fone since expensive ones expire equally fast. Yes I know “maybe-ok-for-one-week china-fones” are now P399 but fone-per-week is just a bit too much. I have her most recent (made in the Philippines) 5 casualties on the desk right beside me, all requiring parts “not available” wherever all the fone-fixers in this part of the country source parts.
On a good note, my little toaster-oven still serves well almost 5 years, though it’s not an “oven toaster” – I never could understand why someone would want to toast an oven, whereas I prefer to roast a small chicken. As far as I can see now, its brandname would be “Warning hot surface”, which suggests NOT-made-in-china. I also found someone good on the other side of town who repaired my 6-month-old induction cooker for 200p and (yes I had to go buy) the 5-pesos worth of parts. Now if only I could get some ‘home-service’ to repair my big oven that my wife’s bad poopee ripped the wiring out of; I so much miss baking real bread since it’s an annual overnight trip to anywhere where I could buy some.
Just to alleviate some stress, heh, I’m this minute handed the (usually 200p) monthly water bill for two THOUSAND this month! Perhaps the “tubero” my wife hired missed the connection? Doc said “avoid stress”, but I have a nice new ridiculous water bill to pay instead of purchasing prescribed medicine. Oh, and it’s Monday so of course it’s holiday again, can’t get the water line fixed. Why holiday every week and especially when something important needs doing? Oh well, water shut off now, no water to the house at all. Maybe tomorrow I can make the trek to the water-district office to ask them to send someone to start repairing the water line, impossible to request with a simple phone call. Life is just so fine.
I shouldn’t complain – PLDT DSL works today! … and wow – no mega-“brownout” (yet) today. Best I be careful what I type or that will go down for a few days again too.
ED;
Both comments brought tears of laughter to my eyes; have you ever thought of writing for Bob Martin? You’re a natural. Since you seem to live outside the megalopolis known as Davao, that might be the reason for the poor parts supply. Albeit I have a repair guy whom I believes makes his own parts or has a few old ones he cannibalizes .
The cell phone story I’m the bad one as I’m on a quest to find one that I can read and hear in the same unit. Whereas my wife is quite good about her three phones, yes she carries three phones in her purse, the only thing I can think of is a stark fear of “LOW BATT” Oh and yes she has a backup battery charger in the purse too, and people ask why I leave my phone in the house 24-7. (LOL)
Thanks Paul. I’ve written a few articles in my years, but since Bob requires a regular schedule that I can’t reasonably commit to, better I just reply (or somehow submit) the occasional item as circumstances may dictate and permit, presuming my reply-to-the-list privilege doesn’t again evaporate for a year. The one thing I miss is the ability to specify a proper “Subject” (title) as the revised topic should sensibly have.
I’ve also learned to avoid submitting things too controversial for this forum, no matter how true they are. I am holding various important information items to post once things work themselves through so that what I will write will be fact not anticipatory speculation on my part, presuming of course that I can survive till then.
To your most salient comment, I know dozens of places, people I used to know who would repair phones and just about any and all things decently and cheap back up there where I lived my first 10 years in the Phils in and around Metro Manila. Here in the “boondok” of Mindanao, not so much.
Never mind a decent steak this lifetime hereabouts, I’ve often contemplated anything nefarious enough to put a BigMac in my craw more than once a year. Wife had to make a 3-day mega-trek for some expensive PUJ re-registration, ordered me a BigMac that they actually have way down there, but unfortunately came home with some kind of McDo-fritto-bunned-McManok instead. I was so much looking forward to just one stale cold BigMac, sigh, not this year.
Many people have it so lucky still living where you can actually get what you want, so easy for you that you can’t appreciate it until you can’t get it for whining (the new definition of”winning” in the USA now?) or money. Arghhh, now I crave a “sub” I haven’t had for many years but no way here!
Paul wrote, and I forgot to comment on this last but really should:
“If you been here for a few years take a look around at the appliances you take for granted and ask your wife how long you’ve had it. You might be surprised! BTW ask her where she stores the boxes your appliances came in.”
No surprise. Here our youngest, now 3 years old, is older than almost all our daily-use appliances. Our 10-year-old would be the great-great-grandparent of generations of all except one of our daily-use small appliances. LED light bulbs last longer than small appliances these days, which also isn’t that long; where I came from we used the old incandescent bulbs much more in the winter but replaced them much less often and they cost like 10cents every few years back then. Go figure.
Boxes?
Where’s the box for the new TV to send for repair? Wala! Where’s the wall-mount-bracket for the big TV that I carefully packed to move to our own house and finally use? Wala din? Where’s the box for the new induction cooker you shouldn’t have given a bath and turned on when wet inside? Wala, you burned it last week to light wood on fire? I needed to send my printer for repair – where’s the box? “bayaw” took it for his chickens. etc. etc.
Though we are both many-year immigrants in the Philippines, we seem to live on different planets. Your planet sounds so much nicer.
Life is “More Fun in the Philippines” !!!
Ed;
Scroll up to what I told Alan about the box conundrum. It might be a help to all guys on this site, or you can blame it on me…
Paul,
I will take a Philippine appliance over Chinese anything any day. Anne also has a Philippine smart phone, Oppo. I don’t own a phone. Really no use for one. The only appliances we have replaced are to get bigger ones. Washer and frig went to family in Angeles. Oven went to niece in Laguna as she needed it for school as she is a baker. Some of our small appliances are from the US as we have a transformer for them. Some of the appliances from the US have never been used in 5 years. We have a room full of shipping boxes and appliance boxes.
Papa Duck;
I went through the duel voltage for about six months, after they were repaired a few times because of plugging 1115 into 220 I went to local made 220. The boxes, read my reply to Alan above. (LOL)
“I took the money from Puerto Rico and flew straight to Manila and banked it. My lawyer said it was legal as long as I didn’t stop in the US. Then I told my wife to build her house.”
Puerto Rico is part of the US. 🙂
Dale
So is Guam but Puerto Rico has different as I found out by living there all those years. I paid taxes to the US only on my Military retirement, and to Puerto Rico on my two bars. How long did you live there?
Hi Paul,
One thing I have wondered about is my wife’s mother was born in 1938 in the Philippines which at the time was part of the USA and yet she was not, is not and has never been a US citizen. I don’t exactly understand it, but I guess some l lawyer or bureaucrat or historical scholar could explain it. Maybe some reader or you understand and can explain.
Peace
Jay
Jay;
We supervised the Philippines similar to Cuba without making them a territory, but the Philippines was asked by the US if they would like the same Status as Puerto Rico (At the end of WW-II and the people voted to be an Independent Nation..The choice was theirs. I think they made the correct choice. But better we ask a Filipino. My father and mother-in-law were in the same situation as yours I remember flying here to pick up an East Coast ship, and had to wait here three weeks, and promised my self that like Dug Out Doug, I shall return!
Hi Paul,
Thanks for the good explanation!
Peace
Jay
Hi Jay –
1938 was a commonwealth year. See if you can find the answer to your question by reading up on the Philippine Commonwealth, 1935 – 1946.
However, if I can venture a guess as to really why, it’s racism, given that as far back as 1862, the U.S. prohibited immigration of Chinese people to the U.S. by law in an attempt to preserve homogeneity.
John;
And yet the Chinese Workers were part of the Gold Rush in 49 and and were instrumental in building the US Cross Country railroad.
They were prejudiced against the Irish on the East Coast, and Polish and Italians Germans and all other new immigrants. They were assholes back then.
A commonwealth or a territory in 1938? Commonwealth would imply citizenship. But my knowledge is sleight on that piece of history.
Hi Paul –
Filipinos were nationals, just not citizens of the U.S. since 1899 right after the Spanish-American War of 1898. Nationals but not citizens. Can you imagine if they were citizens since then? First off, there wouldn’t have been a Philippine-American War if they were U.S. citizens.
Secondly, if they were citizens, can you imagine hordes of Filipinos flooding into the U. S. mainland given the prevailing mood in the U.S. at that time?
At the urging of racist Americans (nativists, to PC enthusiasts), the U.S. Congress enacted the Asian exclusion law, that forbade citizens of non-white countries countries from immigrating to the U.S. Only people from white countries were allowed, for example:
European countries were granted immigration quotas as to the number of people allowed to enter the U.S. The quotas given to such countries numbered in the thousands per year, EXCEPT Italy, which was given a quota of only 50 per year because, according to U.S. lawmakers, many Italians have dark skin. Can you imagine Sophia Loren being denied entry at Ellis Island if she were already a movie actress back then? LOL
Here is another interesting tidbit: Because of their unique status as U.S. nationals, Filipinos, mostly Ilocano farmers, including our Carlos Bulosan (America is in the Heart), started arriving in Hawaii from the 1920s to work in the pineapple fields; in California to pick strawberries, oranges, lettuce, and such; in Alaska to work in the canneries. There, they established their own communities complete with bars, restaurants, shops, pool halls and dance halls.
Yes, dance halls, complete with white American women as dance partners for pay. Perhaps you may be unaware, but many Pinoy men, then as now, were/are attracted to white women, especially good-looking blondes.
Here is the killer: These Ilocano men were reputed (and documented in the California judicial system) to be better lovers than their white American counterparts. Although they were discriminated against by white men who saw the Ilocanos as sexual competitors, white American women at the dance halls (and elsewhere?) gravitated toward these Ilocano men strutting like peacocks in their fancy double-breasted blazers and with hair slicked back with pomade, because these Ilocano men knew how to treat a woman better than the white men. Moreover, according to these same women, the Ilocano men were better lovers. Yep, I can clearly visualize the picture!
As to the Chinese “coolies” who were so instrumental in building the U.S. trans-continental railroad, they were already in the U.S. before the Chinese Exclusion Act
of 1882 was passed.
One last tidbit. The venerable Levi Strauss riveted jeans is said to have been invented in San Francisco as a consequence of the work done on the railways, when some workers complained that their work pants were not sturdy enough for the job.
Interesting that the California Judicial system classified men on their skills at being a lover. Do they still do that? Did they hold demonstrations with a judging panel? LOL
Hi John,
Thanks for helping me further my education! I was unaware of the Philippine Commonwealth before WWII. I looked into the Philippine Commonwealth and have gained better understanding of Filipino history. I will look further when time permits.
Peace
Jay
LOL Bob, not anymore. This was in the 1930s, when Filipino migrant workers in California’s agricultural fields called “manongs”, were being discriminated against by white men who felt threatened by the “manongs” successes with white women.
Manong (singular), btw, is an Ilocano honorific term reserved for older persons.
Manong is used in many regions of the Philippines, including here in Davao.
John;
This conversation sounds like it was on CNN yesterday with all those privileged racist white men being bandied about. The Chinese were imported for the building of the railroad as the ones here were already working. The owner of the Western railroad sent recruiters to China to get them.. Back to CNN for the rest of the story (LOL)
John
I thought it was guys from Mexico wearing those Zoot Suits with their hair slicked back getting all the girls. Who copied who?
Paul –
I think the Filipinos copied their suaveness from Clark Gable. LOL
John,
Now that I will believe!
When I went to Australia in 1964, the immigration laws was restricted to “Northern European caucasians. However after I got there I met people who were born there of Chinese nationality. At that time Melbourne had the largest Greek community in the world, second only to Athens. However, even though I lived there for 17 years, I never met any black people from Africa.
Interesting country and people. Everyone who was not born in Australia, was either a “wog” or a “pome.” The last term is ironic since it meant “prisoner of mother England.” Which the early settlers were made up of. So,, most “Aussies” were in fact the “pomes.” Wog was interesting too since if one was ill for any reason in “Oz” they had a “wog”, sick or bug of some sort. All Americans were “Yanks” and not well liked. During WW2 Yanks were overpaid, over sexed and over here. A hammer was a “American screwdriver.” It was an interesting time since we were all involved that “Vietnam” thing. Of course it was all America’s fault.