Sadly our Fourm Administrator Keith started this topic last year, and didnt get any takers, ok I am a Brit but I will talk about Philippine life a little as we didnt get anyone from the Philippines who was prepared to submit a contribution, I have spent 3 months in 2004 living in the Philippines in batches of 3 weeks at a time, having lived there for a while, I started to get a feel for what life is really like.

I found the following:

The Philippines and in fact the Filipino people are and can be a strange phenomena at first sight, many have commented in the past about social issues in the Philippines, the country and its people can and often is very frustrating for Foreign Nationals, the first thing I noticed most of all, is their obsession with the label "Foreighner".

For one thing we may use it here in UK also, but as we are a much more cosmopolitan and multi national country, with many natiionalities both living and commuting between Europe and other countries, we tend not to use this word, the Filipinos sadly do still live in a culture that they are Filipino and everyone else is a foreigener.

I have tried to explain this to them, in conversations that they will never become truly international, or that Manila NAIA will never become an international Hub for travel if they truly persist in treating everyone as a foreighener, the other word which tends to come from the U.S.A. is the word "Alien", in my own view the word Alien is offensive, Aliens to me come from Mars and Venus and from many lights years away, the use of this word does not endear me to the authorities in that country, a fact which may cause some mirth with Filipinos, who does agree with this, sadly it is still perperuated by official orgnaizations such as banks.

What also tends to shock many Westerners, is the total lack of internal infrastructure in the Philippines, albeit the country is poor, and is classified as a third world member, the internal road system in the provinces, is appalling.

Although around the major cities such as Metro Manila, the roads are acceptable, the complete lack of travel links between islands is dissapointing, making connections between the Islands difficult.

Philippine Social life is also something which intrigues me whenever I go, on the one hand some of the social life exists on a 2nd level, that is the Barangay social life, this life seems to exist in a sub culture within a mainstream culture, the mainstream culture, being the intelligentsia of the country, that is professionals, Doctors, Surgeons, politicians, the rich, and other professional people, these ones I refer to as the Cosmopinoys, you may note that thse patricular ones, tend to be the people who run the country, and provide the specialist services that enbale the majority to exist and survive, although this is true in many countries, they go to parties, have nice houses, and to my surprise, they actually smoke cigarettes, something that surprises me even more in the Philippines.

It is not uncommon to see cosmo Filipinas hanging around and lighting up, whilst in the many Bobs cafe's and bars in the cities, when you start to really look at the Philippines you start to find that it is not much different to any other developing country trying to find its own place in world affairs, sadly the country is dogged by lack of Foreign Direct Investment, due to the obsession in the Philippines of political discontent with its elected representatives, unstable democratic institutions, and the ever increasing threat of military coups.

Although the Philippines appears to be a stable Republic with strong democratic credentials, a President and senate, with a congress of representatives, the constant backstabbing frustrates the President and present Government on achieving any sense of development or stability, as they are too often spending so much time on securing their positions.

The Economy itself which filters into social life, is a low wage, low price, market economy, where labour is plentiful and cheap, but still has a unemployment of some 9 per cent which is fairly high by any standards, the Philippine population is growing at a phenomenal rate, and should reach 130 Millions by 2040, this means that increasingly, the barangay structure of social life will ever increase, the gap between rich and poor will ever more widen, and the race for its inhabitants to leave the Philippines in search of better life chances will grow even more, even today, Filipinos are the worlds largest trans migrational work force in the world.

To be continued.

Next Barangay Life.