The second installment:

Well, two days after that first chat, I was beginning to convince myself that they had simply been two young girls amusing themselves at the expense of a gullible western guy. Still, I knew that they wouldn't be well off, and 4 hours online must be costing them something. Wait ... here she was ... 'Ruby***' online again. I don't recall which of us made the first contact .. almost certainly I did, but we chatted for a long time again - not quite as late as on the first occasion, but it was still almost 17.30 in UK when I phoned to say goodnight!

Well, from then on we chatted, phoned and/or texted almost every day and I quickly realised that I needed to meet this wonderful young lady in person. I told Ruby that I was going to come and visit ... we discussed possible dates and arrangements. Ruby went along with these discussions - she was working 6 days a week, Monday being her day off, so we agreed that I should arrive on a Sunday, and leave on a Tuesday. This would give me eight complete days in the Philippines, including two of Ruby's days off. I thought of booking two weeks, but felt that one week would probably be quite long enough on a risky gamble like this. Ruby told me that she may be able to persuade her supervisor to let her have another day off, but would leave it till I was there in person, else her supervisor simply wouldn't believe her. So, just under 3 weeks from our first chat, I booked flights to arrive at Davao on the last Sunday in May, leaving again on the first Tuesday in June.

I sent Ruby an SMS to tell her I had booked the flights, and giving her my arrival date/time ... 20 minutes later she was online, expressing immense surprise ... she hadn't really believed that I was serious about coming, but now she knew that I was. She confessed to me that sales girls really weren't allowed time off, but said that she would resign from her job so that she could spend all her time with me. I told her that she must not do this. I said that we would make the most of the time she did have off and I'm clearly not quite the gentleman that Alan is, because I suggested, tentatively, that we could spend the nights together - though I did promise that we would not do anything that we weren't both comfortable about.

I told Ruby that I would be able to make my own way from Davao airport to Tagum, and I would meet her from work on the Sunday evening. Over the coming days I was introduced to a few of her friends online - her boardmates, work colleagues, a husband of a work colleague and even her big sister. Some doubts arose in my mind during these days - was this an organised gang of scammers .. the girls prospecting in pairs, offering the punters a choice, and one of these friends was her 'pimp' ... all sorts of possibilities came to my mind but, deep down, I knew that Ruby was a good person. As it was, Ruby and her friends offered to arrange everything - the colleague's husband would come with a hired car to meet me at the airport, she would book hotel room etc. I offered to send money to pay for these things, but Ruby said that it wasn't necessary (I learned, later, that she had borrowed money 'Utang', from various sources, not only to pay deposits, but to fund her internet time etc).

Then, a problem became apparent - the two principal hotels in town were fully booked because there was a conference locally. Once again she said that she would resign her job and we would stay together in Davao city. And again, I said no - that I'd rather cancel my trip than to let her prejudice her employment. I told her that I'd rather stay in her boarding house with her, although I knew that this would be very basic and almost impossible. I managed to get hold of another contact in Tagum, to ask her advice - she suggested a third hotel. Ruby said that she'd looked at this hotel, but that she wasn't happy - it wasn't of a suitable standard for her important guest. When pushed, she admitted that the problem with it was that it is quite basic and there was a shower, but no bath!Well, of course that didn't matter to me at all ... I haven't had a bath in about 20 years! So, it happened that the hotel was booked and everything was set for my visit.