Filipino Observations

When traveling to a new country I like to keep track of my unique observations about that place, some of these may be obvious to everyone while visiting, others may be less noticed and some may already be known. After five weeks in the Philippines, this is my list in no particular order.

1. A lot of the language they use comes from Spanish and they use Spanish words in their language. For example, their numbering system is pronounced the same as it is in Spanish.
2. They are extremely friendly, helpful and smile a lot. I was blown away at how amazing the people are and how willing they are to speak English. Part of me thinks they were all trying to find a husband for somebody they knew. Their first or second question always was, “are you alone” followed by a “yes” from me and then “where’s your wife?” Pretty sly if you ask me.
3. They always repeat your order back to you at a restaurant. It’s weird because even if you order one thing they’ll do it, but it’s helpful so you know they haven’t missed anything.
4. They love playing basketball and pool. On the islands they have pool tables next to the side of the road covered by a roof and no walls. Basketball courts are literally everywhere, even in the smallest of towns.
5. They don’t use knives. Instead they use fork and spoons for everything.
6. They call everyone “sir” and “madam”
7. It feels cleaner than it is. There’s hardly any garbage on the streets and roadsides, but pollution is a bad problem. They have some of the most polluted rivers in the world and the air quality in Manila is horrendous.
8. They have an Uber like app for scooters called Angkas. A scooter comes, you grab a helmet and hop on the back. It is a unique and incredible experience. If I had to make a list of things to do in Manila (which isn’t a lot) it’d be number one. It’s terrifying. Imagine the game snake, you’re the snake chasing the pixel as you weave through traffic, cars and buses are so close to you you can reach out and touch them on either side. At night it’s beautiful, there’s no roof stopping your vision, surrounded by skyscraper.
9. There’s a lot of transgender people.
10. They’re short.
11. Pizza is offered at almost all restaurants. I don’t know if they think foreigners love pizza or they do, but its everywhere.
12. They love singing and aren’t afraid to sing in public. You can almost always here a Filipino singing a song or actually singing to a song that is playing. Driving through the most rural of villages you’ll usually hear someone from somewhere belting a song out.
13. Almost everyone speaks English. It’s amazing, you will have no problem having a conversation anywhere. This is one of the reasons why I loved the Philippines so much was because everyone was so happy to speak.
14. The water machines at the airport keep repeating “cold water, cold water” while filling up your water bottle until you let go of the button.
15. Paved roads will have a “chunk or chunks” of them missing. Its the strangest and most frustrating thing when driving around. It’s as if some politician objected to that specific area or areas to being paved because they didn’t get sufficiently bribed. I was joking when I wrote that, but a Filipino told me that when they don’t win re-election they destroy that part of the road.
16. On the islands, most of the toilets have to be flushed by pouring buckets of water down them.
17. Cock fights are legal, but only on Sunday’s.
18. They love bakeries or bakeshops as they call them. They’re will be 5 or 6 of them across from each other
19. It’s an amazing country with incredibly beautiful islands and people