Bradley's Old Fashioned Weblog

Recent updates

  • Poor Dapper, I Took Her Horny

    Dapper’s Coming of Age

    Shortly after returning from a trip to the Philippines at the beginning of last March, our eldest cat, Dapper, went into heat for the first time.  For anyone unfamiliar with the term, it means her hormones kicked into overdrive, turned her into a little hornball and caused her to be non-stop noisy.  In the picture above, you can see her showing off her cat cooter, a typical symptom for cats in heat.  For a week at a time she would be going nuts, and in the process she would keep us up all hours of the night.  It was starting to make us go nuts as well.  No amount of verbal reprimand or slipper throwing would quiet her.  So, after the second time she went into heat I decided something had to be done, and that something was spaying.

    Spaying would prevent her from going into heat again, which meant that she wouldn’t be meowing all night and we could get a decent nights’ rest again.  Dapper was one of those unusual cases, in that she would go through a heat cycle, be normal for 3 days, and then start up again.  From what I read, cats typically only go into heat once every 2 to 3 weeks.  Dapper’s hormones must have been working overtime.

    Other benefits to getting her spayed would be that she would be in compliance with the Singapore standard.  Cats here are supposed to be spayed at six months, and Dapper was already close to her 1st birthday.  In addition, spaying supposedly lengthens a cat’s lifespan.  Dapper has been with us for a year, and I’d like to keep her around as long as possible.

    So, in the spirit of keeping her safe, and keeping us sleeping at night, I looked into getting the operation performed.

    Penny To The Rescue!

    My wife and I have a friend named Penny that lives in Yishun.  She’s something of a fanatic when it comes to taking care of cats, but in a good way.  She lives a quiet life and dedicates the vast majority of her time and funds to caring for, as well as spaying/neutering the local feline population.  I’m not quite sure where she gets her funding from, but she seems to have made it her mission to spay or neuter the entire feline population of Yishun, and she’s well on her way to accomplishing that goal.  I imagine she gets donations from individuals who have money, but no time, whereas Penny has time, but lacks funds.  So, that works out pretty good.

    On average, she manages to spay or neuter an average of 8 cats per week.  Typically, having a cat spayed or neutered can run you between 80 to as high as 179 SGD, depending on where you go.  Shocking, right?  Due to the volume of cats she brings in, she has a special deal worked out with Mount Pleasant Animal Clinic to have the operations performed for 50 SGD per cat, or 70 SGD if they’re brought in pregnant. 

    We took advantage of this fact and talked to Penny about having Dapper brought in for spaying.  Doesn’t hurt to use a discount if you have one available right? She was happy to help out and we agreed to meet the following week in Yishun.

    Horny Remover

    With the problem more or less resolved I was relieved, and started teasing Dapper that I was going to “take her horny.”  This is sort of a personal joke based on an “Engrish” picture I found posted on the internet, which showed the window of a spa or beauty parlor that offered “horny removal” as a service.  I imagine they were talking about callouses, but from a native English speaker’s perspective, “horny removal” on the window of a spa that also advertises full body massages is seriously funny!

    Dapper Fights Back

    Well, Dapper had one last trick up her sleeve for me, and it wasn’t good.  The day after I made arrangements to have her spayed she went into heat again.  I had read that having a cat spayed while they were in heat could cause complications, and could be more expensive, so I was worried that it would cause problems with the arrangements I had made. 

    My wife was urging me to put off the operation, but I decided to wait it out and see what happened.  With Dapper going into heat so frequently, lining up a time when she was ‘normal’ and when Penny was available seemed like a tricky business.  Thankfully, the night before her operation, her heat cycle ended.

    Curiosity Spayed the Cat

    The morning of Dapper’s operation I got up early to make sure everything was ready.  I’m sort of a night owl, so I didn’t get much sleep, but I was anxious to get the whole thing over with.  After getting ready, I brought down the cat carrier from on top of the wardrobe.  Being the busybody she is, Dapper immediately came to investigate.  I decided to try to take advantage of the situation and opened the carrier door and took a step back.  Sure enough, she went ahead and poked her head into the carrier, giving me a hassle-free opportunity to push her the rest of the way in and get the door closed.

    Surprisingly, she didn’t seem too upset about being locked in the carrier and was quiet as I took her out of the house.  I expected her to have a fit and start meowing, since the last time I took her out of the house in the carrier it was to drop her off at a cat-sitter while my wife and I were on vacation.

    Taking Dapper’s Horny

    So, Dapper and I made our way to Yishun and met up with Penny, who was waiting for me at the McDonald’s at Northpoint Mall.  She had three other cats with her, each in their own carriers.  We hopped onto a bus which would take us to the clinic.  We were an interesting sight, carrying two cat carriers each, and with my being a caucasian foreigner on top of it.  Despite it not being necessarily illegal, it’s still an uncommon sight to see cats on the bus, much less four at a time.  Most of the passengers were amused and some even made “meow meow” sounds to try excite the cats.  Dapper took it all well, and laid down quietly in her carrier.  I think she enjoys the vibrations from the bus.  Penny’s lot, on the other hand, were noisy and terrified.

    We reached the clinic after a short ride and I stroked Dapper for a while before passing her into the hands of the vet.  Hey, you never know.  What if something goes wrong, right?  Dapper is a very sweet cat, even if her horniness was driving me crazy.  I left the clinic hoping for the best and went around the corner with Penny to sit down for a while.

    Thursdays With Penny

    There is a hawker area right next to the clinic and Penny offered to buy coffee.  I’m an avid coffee drinker, so I couldn’t turn her down.  It turned out to be a great way to spend an hour. 

    We got to talking, and Penny’s a very interesting woman.  We’d spoken briefly before, but never at any length or about anything other than cats.  She’s very outspoken and she has a lot to say, not just about cats, but about Singapore, and life in general.  The most amusing point of our conversation was that she hopes to travel to Australia and snag herself an eligible bachelor that she can settle down with.  Coming from Penny, with her blue-highlighted hair and no-nonsense attitude, it seemed so out of place that I still smile when I think about it.

    As we finished our coffee and it got close to lunchtime, we decided to get going and agreed to meet up again at 3:30 to pick up the cats.  I took the opportunity to go back to Tampines and meet up with my wife during her lunch break to check out the new mall, Tampines 1.

    Dapper Comes Home

    When we went back to pick up the cats, Dapper was awake in her carrier, if you want to call it that.  She was in an anesthetized daze, watery eyes and all.  Of course, that’s to be expected right after a surgery.

    When I got her home later, she seemed unsure of where she was, and she couldn’t seem to stand up, so I put her in her cat bed and put the food and water bowls right next to her.  She tried to walk a bit later but kept falling over.  Eventually she made it to her litter box and after about 20 minutes managed to … well you know.  Then she went back to her bed and slept for about 8 hours.  Every so often she would wake up and try to walk around.  Then she would go back to the cat bed and go back to sleep.

    I stayed up, keeping an eye on her and eventually tried to spark her appetite by giving her wet food.  She sniffed at it a bit, but didn’t seem to be too interested.  I think our kitten, Thumper, wound up eating it all.

    Who Are You?!

    One interesting thing to note about this whole trip to the vet is that when I brought Dapper home, Thumper initially had no idea who she was.  Dapper was only out of the house for about 10 hours or so, but Thumper initially reacted as though we’d brought home an entirely new cat.  It was strange and a bit upsetting.  Thumper made that strange mewling sound that cats make when they’re pissed or trying to look tough around strange animals.  Dapper seemed a bit perplexed by Thumper’s reaction but wasn’t very interested in anything other than sleeping at the time, so she ignored her. 

    Eventually, Thumper started trailing after Dapper, watching her whenever she would visit the food bowl or the litter box.  I think Dapper came back carrying the scent of other cats and Thumper viewed her as an outsider, a crazy one, that was helping herself to her and  the real Dapper’s territory.  Eventually those other scents must have faded, because the following day I woke up to find the two of them curled up next to each other.

    Get Well Soon!

    It’s been almost 6 days now since her spaying.  She still seems a bit odd, compared to usual, but every day she seems to get a bit more active.  Today, she started to playing with Thumper again, which is nice.  Thumper was starting to get annoyed because he would try to get Dapper to play with him and she would smack him in the head and lay back down.

    One thing I definitely miss about her is her friendly meow when she wants you to pet her, or when she greets you at the door when you come home.  Since her spaying she’s only meowed once, and that was tonight.  Hopefully, she’ll be back to her old self before long.

    I can’t help but wonder what the longterm effects of the spaying will be on her personality, but for now she seems to be coming back to herself, much to my wife’s relief.  According to her, spaying isn’t a common practice in the Philippines, so I think she was more worried about the whole thing than I was.

    What Now?

    It seems like every time we get one thing taken care of with our two cats, another problem crops up, resulting in another visit to the vet.  Dapper came back from her spaying with a dry, hacking cough.  I think she might have picked it up from one of the other cats at the clinic, and fromw hat I’ve seen on the internet it’s probably an upper respiratory infection.  Coupled with the fact that she’s recovering from surgery, it’s starting to get bad.  So, tomorrow she has to take another trip to the vet with me.  I wonder if she’ll be as willing to get into the carrier on her own this time?

    Taking on pets is definitely a big responsibility, both in time and care as well as financially.  Still, she’s part of the family and I can’t stand to see her coughing and hacking like that, and I’m anxious to get her checked out.  At first I thought it was a side effect of the surgery, but now I’m almost positive it’s not, and I don’t want to take any chances.

    Hopefully this will be the end of their vet visits for quite a while though!

  • New Business Flower Arrangements

    New Business Flower Arrangements

    Yesterday, the new mall, Tampines 1, was packed with these flower arrangements to the point that they had to be shifted around constantly to make room for customers.

    In fact, the store that seemed to be drawing the largest crowd, UNI QLO, actually moved their arrangements to a column in the center of the walkway in front of their store to make way for a line of people waiting to get in. I’m not too sure what the deal is with UNI QLO, except that it’s supposed to be a premier fashion line in Japan and people seemed particularly excited to get in. I’ll have to take a look around there soon, but I’ll wait until it’s not so crowded.

    Apparently these flower arrangements are significant enough to keep on display even though it impedes customer traffic. Most are marked with cards from other business, or perhaps financial backers, offering “best wishes” and “luck.” Maybe that’s all it really boils down to? The concept that having these arrangements in front of your business on opening day is good luck? Sort of like how most Singaporeans and Filipinos I’ve met have a fear of black cats?

    The last US business I went to on opening day was quite a few years ago. It was a Johnny Carrino’s in Columbus, Georgia.  I don’t recall seeing anything like this there, so I’m wondering if it’s particular to Singapore, to Chinese culture, to Asia, or if I’ve been living under a rock and just never noticed them in the US before.

  • Cosplayers at Tampines 1

    Cosplayers at Tampines 1

    I’m not entirely sure what they were advertising, but their outfits were really great, so I took some photos.

    Toy Soldier and Toy Maid
    Toy Soldier and Toy Maid
    Toy Soldier and Toy Maid Routine
    Toy Soldier and Toy Maid Routine
    Toy Soldier and Toy Maids
    Toy Soldier and Toy Maids

    They were even acting the part!  They would only move when someone “wound up” the key on their backs and then after a while they would stop again.  It was very fun to watch for a while!

    By the way, in that third photo, the guy is totally checking out that girl’s “buttons”!  Ha ha ha!

  • Tampines 1 Open For Business

    Tampines 1 Open For Business

    Singapore has a heavy shopping culture. Imagine your high school days when you had to wear the right clothes to be part of the “in” crowd. Now imagine that experience on crack. You’ll sort of get the picture. Most of the younger Singaporeans pride themselves on their handbags, mobile phones, shoes or having the newest Mango apparel. They crave the latest and greatest items and pursue the hottest fashion trends. I suppose there’s nothing inherently wrong with the Singaporean love for shopping, but it definitely takes some getting used to. Keeping that in mind, imagine the chaos that surrounds the opening of a new mall, especially one in a prime location.

    The mall was packed tight with people and everyone was excited to explore the mall and see all of the new shops. While walking through the mall I saw people of all ages, as if elderly mothers and fathers had been dressed and dragged out of the house for the big event. I also saw quite a few foreigners wandering around, which is highly unusual for an area so far from downtown Singapore. In fact, the people were almost as fascinating and entertaining as the mall itself.

    Unfortunately, it seems that there was such a rush to cash in on the excitement and newness factor that the mall was opened before it was completely finished. With the interior of the mall not quite polished, the “Wow” effect wasn’t as great as it could’ve been. For example, the tile flooring was still a bit dusty and the fountain on the bottom floor seemed more like it was leaking than running. While I was walking around the mall I sneezed frequently and I was happy to be able to blow my nose when I got home later.

    Besides the incompleteness of the mall itself, not all of the stores were open. In fact, some were still under construction, including the HSBC bank pictured below, which is on the lower level. Hope you brought cash with you, because these ATMs are still down for the count!

    Handling all of these minor (and in some cases major) issues, work crews were scattered throughout the mall, hurriedly trying to apply their finishing touches. Still, they did a great job getting the place ready before opening the doors today. Just a week ago I would have said that the mall couldn’t have been opened any earlier than the end of the month, judging by the exterior and what I could see through the windows. They must have been pulling all-nighters to make sure they met their opening deadline, or at least partially met it.

    Still, those minor eye sores didn’t detract from the overall appearance of the mall. Have a look at the shot below, which was taken from the top floor near the Petstation store.

    The overall effect of the mall and the quality of the decor in the shops is reminiscent of the malls you find along Orchard. When the interior of this mall is actually completed, it should be fantastic!

    Also, as a side note, if you take a close look in photo above (click it for a larger image) you’ll see an information panel on the ground floor near the round railing that lists the stores in the mall. Going a step beyond the average poster board, this little marvel is completely touch screen and interactive. Despite its lonely appearance in this photo, every time I tried to get near it there was a mob of people trying to play with it, so I couldn’t really dig into it to see if it went further than just listing locations. It does feature a nifty “You Are Here” arrow though!

    One of the special things about Tampines 1 is that the building designers seemed to have recognized peoples’ desire to just hang out at the mall and incorporated it into their building plans. Tampines 1 has multiple outdoor viewing decks that you can relax on. The lower viewing deck offers a very nice, mostly unobstructed view of the Tampines Central area as well. As with the rest of the mall, these areas seemed a bit unfinished, especially in the lack of benches, but there’s definitely potential in these areas for cart vendors and perhaps an outdoor coffee shop.

    Also, here’s a shot I took of the Tampines MRT station from the lower viewing deck:

    One of the great things about this mall is the variety of stores. I was somewhat concerned that this mall would be just a rehash of what was already available in the two existing malls: Tampines Mall and Century Square. Thankfully, this didn’t turn out to be the case. There are a few stores that seem to have migrated over, Times being the one that sticks out most in my mind. It was a good choice for them to make the move. One of the problems with Century Square and Tampines Mall is that the store spaces were just too small. Tampines 1 is generous with its floor space and Times took advantage of that to bring in a wider variety of books, which will be better for their business in the long run. Like I said, though, there are plenty of new stores, or new to Tampines anyways, and I’m glad that I have one less reason to have to venture all the way down to Orchard just for shopping.

    Something my wife and I love to do is eat out at good restaurants. The few that were previously available in the malls in Tampines were starting to get old, so I’m glad to see that there are some new options. Here are some I’m very excited to try in the near future:

    This first one is called Manpuku, and is a Japanese food restaurant. In the second photo you can see some of the menu items. The wall to the right of the restaurant entrance is a glass display area that showcases their offerings. It’s really a great way to encourage people to try the food and keep coming back for more.

    This second restaurant is called Sushi Tei. Looking into the restaurant, the first thing you’ll notice is the conveyor belt of sushi dishes sliding past the bar. It’s a very entertaining and engaging setup and reminded me of the sushi restaurant located near the gym and pool just a short distance from Century Square. I took a look at the menu and the prices are reasonable for most of the items, though the food at the sushi place by the gym looked better and is better priced. I wish I could remember the name of the place.

    There were a few other restaurants I noticed but most of them were generic.

    The last place I want to mention is called “teadot”. My wife and I enjoy having tea in the evening sometimes, so I’m excited to try this place out. Coffee Bean and Starbucks serve tea, but more as just an option than with any real focus. “teadot” should be a nice treat, and besides that, look at the furnishings. It would be cool just to sit there.

    Overall, Tampines 1 is a fantastic addition to the shopping scene in the Tampines area and I’m sure my wife and I will be spending a lot of time there in the future, window shopping and actually shopping too!

    I hope you enjoyed my review of Tampines 1 and I hope you enjoy your first trip there!

  • Beer & Cigarettes in Singapore

    Beer & Cigarettes in Singapore

    Differences in prices between locations is nothing new to me, but I was shocked to see the price of alcohol and tobacco products in Singapore.

    I spent most of the years I lived in the US in the southern states, where prices are more reasonable, due to lower taxes. I won’t go into the “when I was younger” stuff, but when I left the US in 2008 you could get a pack of cigarettes for about 3 dollars in Texas. It was about the same in Georgia. When I would visit my mother in New York City I would typically bring cigarettes with me, because they’re about 7 dollars a pack there, which I thought was ridiculously expensive. Beer is about 5 to 6 bucks a pack regardless of where you are in the States.

    So, like I said, I was used to seeing different prices for these items. Still, I was shocked when I saw that in Singapore the average price for a pack of cigarettes is 11 Singapore dollars and the average price for a six pack is about 15 to 18 Singapore dollars. I had to wonder why the prices were so high, and after having spent some time here, I think I’ve found the reason. Singapore is a country that prides itself on cleanliness and that carries over into a push by the government to promote healthy living.

    That’s not all bad, of course. I’ve never seen a place with so many parks, free work-out areas, and playgrounds, all of which are kept in near pristine condition. On top of that, each regional area has a gym and pool, which have very low entrance fees. If you’re a swimmer or you like to work out in a gym then you’ll definitely appreciate the Singapore government’s health initiatives.

    On the other hand, the Singapore government has also put steep taxes on the alcohol and tobacco, to influence people to use them less, if not quit entirely. Again, that’s not exactly a bad thing. However, for foreigners who come to Singapore to live, it requires a slight lifestyle modification.

    I never really drank much anyways, so cutting alcohol almost completely out of my life didn’t phase me. The cost of the cigarettes, though, makes my wallet cry. It’s hard to go from carefree smoking to counting your cigarettes and counting your puffs. I remember tossing half smoked cigarettes into butt cans on my way into buildings, but now I stop to finish the cigarette before continuing.

    So, if you move to Singapore and like to drink and smoke, expect the amount of time you spend partying to get cut down. On the bright side, you can take advantage of the convenience of the gyms and pools to get back into shape, so you can look good when you take vacations to the numerous, gorgeous beaches in the Southeast Asia area.

  • Funcom’s Age of Conan Going Down The Drain

    Funcom’s Age of Conan Going Down The Drain

    I was taking a look through my Google Reader subscriptions and found a great article at Online Massively Multiplayer.com about Funcom’s Age of Conan. I decided to leave a comment and really got going, so I decided to re-post my comment there as a blog entry here.

    I was one of those initial AoC subscribers. I was looking for a way to break free of the WoW grind. AoC was fun… at first.

    The starter island is a masterpiece and is everything an RPG MMO should be. I especially loved listening to the voice-overs. That’s partly where Funcom failed I think. They set their own bar during the first 20 levels of game-play, and then fell short afterward. I remember being shocked when I left the starter island and found out that there was no more voice-over dialogue. I remember seeing it mentioned that they intended to complete more voice-overs for the quests, but I didn’t stick around to find out. They should have had it all done to start with, or not done it at all. That was just the first disappointment.

    On top of that, AoC didn’t really introduce anything innovative or new. In fact, it felt like a step left, instead of a step forward. There was nothing wrong with the classes, per se, just the game-play itself. Most of the interfaces felt awkward and just not that intuitive.

    Also, I remember being particularly disgusted with the amount of quests that required you to go from one end of the zone to the other (or one end of the game world to the other), especially considering they weren’t very interesting to start with. Granted, there are only so many scenarios you can come up with as far as quests go in a game where you grind XP or grind quests to level up, but instead of making them as hard as possible to take up time, why not make them easier and focus on other aspects of the game that will appeal to your player base? I think most players now take partial enjoyment from the leveling up, are amused slightly by some of the quests, but all in all just want to get to the “end-game” content.

    Speaking of running from one end of the zone to the other, what was with their idea of putting the crafting NPCs in a separate zone on the far end of a zone packed with mobs? Why did the game even need a special zone for a crafting town? That should have been incorporated into the three major cities. On top of that, placing level restrictions on being able to craft is getting old. It doesn’t make sense, even for a fantasy world. I can’t wait for a game that will allow a person to be solely a crafter if they want to be. (And a good game with a bard class would be nice! I miss that from DAoC/FFXI!)

    I suppose the general idea I’m trying to get across is that AoC wasn’t well thought out, and had a rough, unfinished feel to it. Today’s MMO players expect more from their games. On top of that, most have played multiple MMOs of high caliber and don’t want to take a step sideways. They want to take a step forward to something better. When it was released, AoC didn’t stand a chance against polished games like WoW.

    The market is so competitive now that I think companies will have to try to appeal to niche markets rather than mainstream. For example, most people play WoW because there’s just nothing better available.

    I’ve been rather disappointed by the MMOs coming out recently so I’ve turned to F2P games to occupy my spare time while I keep my eyes peeled for the next blockbuster MMO. Right now I’m content with Combat Arms and Runes of Magic.

    Combat Arms is a fantastic online FPS that keeps the action pumping. It’s so well laid out that I just can’t believe it’s free. Every time I log in I’m impressed with the gameplay. The only thorn in Combat Arm’s side are the number of hackers that manage to get past their hack detection software. If Nexon could find a way to prevent hackers from getting in the game matches this great game would be golden.

    Runes of Magic is a great game that’s free to play and incorporates elements of WoW, UO, Guild Wars, FFXI, and who knows how many others. It’s as if they plucked out the best parts of each game and rolled them into one very entertaining MMO.

    Hmm… looks like I dropped a quarter instead of two cents!

    [Posted by myself on Massively Multiplayer.com on Tuesday, March 31st at 12:38am SGT]

  • Whitening Products in the Philippines

    Whitening Products in the Philippines

    One of the most peculiar things I found in the Philippines is the array of whitening products available in the stores. The range of the products is impressive to the point of national obsession. There are whitening soaps, whitening creams, whitening powders, whitening deodorants, whitening pills, etc etc.

    (And as a side note, you can see in these commercials that most of their actors / actresses are mixed Filipino / Caucasian, further promoting the white is better mentality.)

    It took me a while to wrap my mind around the purpose of these products, because the concept of wanting to whiten your skin was entirely foreign to me. In the US, people like to have a tan, and on the extreme side may visit tanning beds occasionally. Plus, becoming more tanned due to sun exposure is natural and normal. The idea of popping pills (or using any of these other products) to try to force your skin to turn a color it’s not meant to naturally be is absurd.

    First of all, how healthy can it be to use these products to change the color of your skin? Second of all, there’s nothing wrong with the color of Filipinos’ / Filipinas’ skin in the first place! That naturally tanned skin is part of a Filipina’s appeal, at least from my perspective anyways. It’s part of what makes them unique and desirable. I’m not a make-up artist or expert, but beauty products should be used to augment your natural beauty, not change it entirely.

    My wife explained what she thinks is the reasoning behind this fashion trend. The Philippines has been repeatedly dominated and/or occupied by other countries, including Spain (300 years of occupation), the US and Japan. This constant domination by fair skinned peoples may have caused a “whiter is better” mentality to set in and eventually become part of the national media/pop/fashion mainstream. My wife went on to say that fair skin has an impact on social status as well. The darker your skin is, the more likely you are to be ridiculed or socially ostracized from your peers. This perception is also carried over to visiting foreigners, in that white foreigners are placed on a pedestal and black foreigners are seen simply as a curiosity and an opportunity to try to make some money.

  • Sent Off In Style

    Sent Off In Style

    Remember how I said in an earlier post that Filipinos will use a motorbike for just about anything?

    Well, when my wife and I flew back out of the Philippines, we had to leave through Clark Air Base, since that’s where we arrived at. We spent most of our stay in Antipolo and had to commute back to Pampanga for our flight. The original plan was to leave Antipolo the day before, spend the night in Pampanga and then head back to the airport the next day. We just couldn’t bring ourselves to leave Antipolo though, so we wound up leaving the morning of our flight.

    Our trip back to Pampanga was a bit hectic. We stopped by my brother-in-law’s restaurant to have a meal first and then we headed to Manila. Before leaving Manila we had to stop by POEA. That’s the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration, or in other words, another place to get slammed by senseless fees. We had a bit of baggage with us, so my wife deposited me at the nearest Starbucks, told me to have a coffee and surf the net on my laptop and then disappeared for a while. I think she knew I would have fun surfing the net on my own laptop for the first time in 8 days and she probably didn’t want me in the POEA. If I were there, they might have tried to hit her with more fees, just because, and then I would get pissed off, and it would have led to me making a scene and being aggravated for the rest of the day.

    After that we had to find our way to a bus terminal. So, we jumped in a cab. Unfortunately, the cab deposited us at a bus terminal that only had routes going in the opposite direction from where we wanted to go, so we had to do some walking. It was hot that day, and we wound up being a little toasted by the sun while we trudged up the street. Luckily, a bus going to Pampanga happened to be stopped on the side of the road, trying to pull in more passengers before it hit the highway. We hopped on and relaxed.

    By this time, we were counting the hours. We weren’t sure we were going to make it on time. The bus was kind of puttering around too, stopping everywhere to find more passengers and we started to get nervous, but once we hit the highway this guy’s foot turned to lead. He laid on the horn and tailgated people to get them out of his way and we reached Angeles City in a short 55 minutes.

    Now, it was time for another headache. When we got off at Angeles City we realized we didn’t remember exactly how to get back to my father-in-law’s house so we could get the rest of our baggage and freshen up a bit. After a furious texting session, we finally gave up on outside help and took our chances. We hopped onto a Jeepney that deposited us at what looked like a Jeepney terminal. Then we just asked around until someone pointed us in the right direction. The ride on the 2nd Jeepney was a bit long, and we were nervous because we weren’t sure we were going the right way, but eventually we saw things that looked familiar and we got off in the right place. A short tricycle ride later and we were at my father-in-law’s house.

    So, the hard part should be over right? Well, not quite. The yard is walled and the gate was locked. My father-in-law wasn’t answering his phone, so we wound up leaning up against the wall by the house, yelling for him. We knew he was there, since the house’s windows were open and the gate was locked from the inside. I was about to look for a place to climb the wall when we heard him call out from inside the house that he was coming. Turns out he caught a cold and was laid up in bed, passed out.

    Once we got in we packed our things together and then took showers. Yup! Showers! We got to enjoy the first pay-off of fronting the money to have the water connection hooked up! The water was cool, which was refreshing on a hot day. I prefer hot showers usually, but anything is preferable to dragging water in from the well and washing out of a bucket. In Asia, “central” anything is rare. As in, there’s no central A/C. There’s no need for central heating of course. Also, there’s no central water heater. The only place you usually get hot water is in the showers, and that’s only if you spend extra cash on a wall mounted water heating unit.

    So, after we freshened up, we began our journey to the airport at Clark Air Base, accompanied by my father-in-law, who wanted to see us off. My mother-in-law was still on her way from Manila and said she would catch up with us at the airport. So, how did we get from the house in Pampanga to Clark? Here’s where the motorbike comes in. Part of our trip was on a modified motorbike that had a frame built around it, including a passenger area/cargo area in the back. I was amused, and impressed, by the owner’s ingenuity.

    On the trip, I had the pleasure of seeing this pigs riding in the sidecar of another motorbike (which I also showed in Part 9).

    The ride in the modified motorbike was fun, but it was incredibly slow. By the time it dropped us off outside the main gate to Clark Air Base, I was almost sure we’d rode all the way back to Antipolo. Outside the gate, we had one more Jeepney ride to go before we made it to the terminal.

    We went ahead and checked in as soon as we got there. We arrived at 7:30 PM, and check-in had started at 7:00 PM. Afterward, we came back out and talked for a while and waited around for my wife’s mom. She must have gotten hung up in traffic though, because at 7:55 PM we gave up and went inside to finish the check in process and move to the departure gate area. We didn’t want to risk missing our flight. We wound up saying our goodbyes to her over the phone. She arrived at the terminal at about 8:05 PM, but by then we’d already gone through immigration.

  • Corruption in the Philippines

    I was told that in the Philippines, making money depends on how inventive you are, and how entreprenuerial you can be.  The average salary in the Philippines doesn’t count for much when converted to almost any other foreign currency, and most salaries in the Philippines don’t count for much there either.  This is especially true in the provincial areas, where an average salary might be 7,000 – 12,000 PHP (144 USD – 248 USD) per month.

    Even the police and military in the Philippines receive low wages and have to do extra jobs on the side just to get by.  To me, this seems detrimental to the overall health of the nation, especially in regards to the military and police.  If the people who are meant to protect you can’t concentrate on their jobs because they’re so poor, they’ll either become ineffective or they’ll exploit their position, leading to corruption.

    It’s no secret that the Philippines already has problems with corruption. The Philippines should be listed as an example of political corruption in encyclopedias, as it’s almost become a tradition for politicians in power to screw over the citizens. According to agencies like Transparency International, and Filipinos, the current president, Gloria Arroyo, is considered to be the most corrupt president in the history of the country. So, where do you lay the blame? The people who elected her? Well, maybe in a country like the US, where there are actually checks and balances and a somewhat fair election, but Gloria openly admitted to cheating during the 2004 election to win the presidency.

    So, was the corruption in the Philippines evident even to me? Sure it was. The poor quality of public works like roads, phone and water services, the low quality of life, the rampant inflation between my first visit a year ago and this visit, and fees, fees, and more fees. Did you know you even have to pay a fee just to leave the country? It applies to tourists and Philippine nationals alike, except it’s higher for foreigners, because like I said before, all foreigners are rich in the eyes of Filipinos. They like to call it a “Terminal Usage Fee” and it comes up to something like 16 USD. What’s this fee going to? It’s certainly not going towards improving the terminals I’ve used there. That’s for damn sure. Again, I’d like to point you back to a prior post I made about NAIA, in Manila, here. For my wife, the fee is only 100 pesos (about 2 USD) but to get the paperwork done she has to travel to an office in Manila and sit around for an hour or more. On top of that they regularly charge Filipinos who work overseas exorbitant fees for something called the Overseas Workers Welfare Administrations, and Filipinos are required to upkeep their domestic Philhealth healthcare, even though they’re abroad and don’t need it. It’s all just ridiculous. When I left the US, I wasn’t required to pay extra fees. I’m not required to join an organization just because I left the country and have plans of working abroad. In fact, my foreign earned revenue won’t even be taxed up to a certain point (which is pretty high).

    The Philippines is a country with a lot of potential that will never be realized as long as people like Arroyo sit in office, embezzling money from the people for the purposes of self-enrichment (and not the good kind like learning a second language either) and self-aggrandizement. It’s almost disgusting to look at. In fact, it’s almost like watching a large group of schoolyard bullies fight for authority, not realizing that there’s so much more beyond the schoolyard fence.

  • Montage of Poverty and Upscale Construction

    While we were commuting back and forth through the Philippines I noticed something that I haven’t seen anywhere else.  The Philippines is like a montage of poverty, middle class, and upper-class establishments and homes.

    What I mean is that in, say, the US, you have neighborhoods that are well-to-do.  The houses are all very nice.  Then you have middle class neighborhoods, lower class neighborhoods, and poverty level neighborhoods.  In the commercial areas, everything is fairly well put together.  Everything has a sort of continuity to it.  You see what you expect to see for the area of town you’re in.  Maybe it has something to do with zoning, or with developers buying large plots of land.  I don’t know.

    In the Philippines, however, there doesn’t seem to be any kind of zoning.  There doesn’t seem to be any sort of building code either.  You might be standing in front of a popular mall that’s as modern and attractive as any mall in the US or Singapore, but right next to it, or across the street, are buildings that look like they were constructed entirely of plywood and sheet metal.  You could be standing in front of a McDonalds, but when you look down the alley next to it, you see shanties that would make the Red Cross cringe for the lack of quality of life.  It’s an incredibly jarring experience.

    This seems to be common to almost every part of the Philippines.  The old and the new, the ultra-poor and the ultra-posh, set up right next to each other.  You can even see this in the housing areas, such as they are.  You might have a nicely built home right next to a house that even bums wouldn’t want to live in, in the US.  From what I can see, as long as the land is yours, you can put whatever you want to on it, of whatever quality you want.  There was one instance where I wondered about whether or not the homes were built legally.  We were riding a bus on the highway between Angeles City and Manila.  The portion of the highway we were on was raised about two stories above the ground.  I’m not sure why it was raised, except maybe that there were quite a few little streams passing below the road.  What caught my attention is that people who were farming the land had set up their houses below the road, in the shade it created.  Maybe laws are different in the Philippines, but I assumed that doing something like that would be considered unsafe and illegal.

    There are areas where land developers seem to be trying to build a more modern type of sub-division.  One in particular comes to mind, near the housing area where my wife’s family lives in Antipolo.  It’s walled off, gated, and the houses inside have a modern construction to them.  Just outside the wall, though, is the normal eye-jarring experience.  I’ve also seen posh, walled and gated apartment complexes situated in the middle of an area that looks like a slum.

    On my next trip I’ll try to take a few pictures to add to this post as examples.