Blogs from Philippines, Asia - page 319

After updating my blog on Friday evening I had dinner at a restaurant down the road from where I was staying. I only had a taco as I was still pretty full from my pizza at lunch time, there was a trio with a female lead singer and they were quite good so I stayed for a few hours and enjoyed a few beers. Saturday morning I checked out of the hotel, they only charged me for the one night even though I was there for more than 24 hours. A tricycle took me to the local bus station, the bus for Naga was just leaving so I jumped on, to get to Legaspi I had to change to another bus at Naga, no problem as the conductor looked after me. The trip was pretty slow ... read more

Kamusta! This is my blog. If I manage to avoid the tropical diseases, poisonous creatures, etc, etc I will use it to keep you all abreast of my escapades in the Philippines. I can also put my most artistic photos here without blocking up your inboxes. I will be working with the municipality of Lanuza Agriculture Department as a Forest Management Specialist (when I know what that really means I will put it here on the blog). The area that I will cover is over 40,000 hectares of rainforest from sea level to twice the height of Ben Nevis. You may be forgiven for thinking that I was just off for 2 years of sunbathing, sipping coconut milk and learning to surf. But I am sure that the work will keep me out of most mischief ... read more

Left Sydney at 1.20pm on Monday the 13th, the plane was delayed about 1 hour. Arrived in Manila 5.50pm (local time), Florita (Mummy) was at the airport to meet me, we had to wait a liitle while till we could leave the airport the reason being that their car can't be used on Mondays between certain hours. All cars have one day with restrictions in order to ease the traffic. Whilst waiting we spoke with a lady who had just returned from working in Lebanon, she was very glad to be back in the Philippines. Mummy had a dozen San Miguels waiting for me though I showed some restraint and only drank a couple. A very tasty dinner was prepared - fish (Lapu Lapu) with sweet and sour sauce, adobo and macaroni. Today I opened a ... read more

Back in Puerto Princessa after spending 11 days on this island of Palawan. It is not known as the last frontier for nothing! We left Puerto early on the 2nd March to catch a jeepney to Port Barton. Trying to find out what time the jeepney left was a little tricky, generally the locals told us it could leave anywhere between 8 and 10am. So we left our pensionne early to make sure we didn't miss it, took a tricycle ride 20 minutes out of town to the bus terminal and found our jeepney. It only left at ten so we had to while away two hours in the dusty parking lot. At least we provided some entertainment for the locals. When we finally left, the jeepney was piled high with boxes, crates, chickens, sacks of ... read more

With the ship still anchored in the harbor I settle into my bunk overlooking the Sulu Sea with a book, and wait... My lethargic spell is broken by the abrupt arrival of five busloads of men, women and children. They clamber off the bus two-by-two. A heavily armed immigration officer unlocks their handcuffs; before they shimmy self-consciously up the gangplank and disappear into the bowels of the ship to be transported like cattle, out of sight of paying passengers, back to their homeland. They are illegal immigrants, caught in search of greater economic opportunities, treated like criminals for attempting to enter a land not of their birth. I'm told an unskilled worker in The Philippines can expect to earn $100 a month, in Malaysia they can command almost three times that amount. The Filipino economy is ... read more