Snorkeling, playing poker and birding

Well, I am still here and enjoying myself. However, I am discovering, as the newness wears off that it is simply a continuation of my life. As the old saying goes, “Wherever you go… there you are.” Haha. That being said I am happy with how things are. My new apartment (actually 2 large 1 room apartments each with a bath, one above the other) is so close to what I envisioned that I can’t think of anything I would change. My balcony view is a garden area and the South China Sea just beyond. No sand beach, just a low sea wall (kind of nice since this means no people) but a sand beach is about 75 yards down the small access road. I have gone snorkeling a couple times but the waters near my apt are not very interesting. Just today I went exploring and found a Marine Sanctuary where fishing isn’t allowed and the reef is protected about 12 miles from me. I didn’t bring my snorkel but was told that the coral and variety of fish is world class. I plan to make it there soon (maybe tomorrow).

My days are uneventful but fun. After breakfast I head to one of the local pool halls to match up or to one of the 2 Texas Hold-em games I found. It has been pretty interesting. They are both no-limit games and the betting feels very big-time but really only amounts to less than $30. It sounds (and feels) very exciting to hear (or say) “all in for 800” (about $17). Both games are an interesting mix of Filipinos and all are affluent. Lawyers, businessmen and once the vice-governor of the province. Dealers are there like a casino game. Been quite an education in my quest to play better and for insight into the culture here. Although, no doubt I'll have better results in both areas once I can understand the local dialect. I know a lot of info is passed around that I'm not privy to.

I have done a little birding and found sort of a field guide. The only birds that seem at all familiar is a sparrow resembling the House Sparrow. Other than that, there seems to be no species even similar to the U.S. except maybe the Sea Eagles and the wide variety of colorful kingfishers (none of which are the same as the ones in the Americas). I brought a hummer feeder but guess what?… no hummers. Only a similar sized bird with similarly long (but curved) beak species called Bee-Eaters. They are extremely colorful (or so they look in the photo guide, lol). I have seen a few different (and interesting) species but none of the spectacularly colored ones yet.

Update to a Friend: Still here in Paradise

Well, I'm still here in paradise. It's a beautiful morning with a nice breeze off the ocean but it will get hot later. I'm sitting here at my computer looking over the garden out onto the sea. Beautiful. Maricarl left already to attend her Caregiver class. In May she will also start the Teacher License Review class on the weekends. It is a 5 month-long undertaking as most of the colleges fall short in preparing students for the dreaded exam. Even with the review that most take, only 26% pass which also has to do with the test itself which from what I gather is sort of weird and is purported to have some wrong answers, lol.

In a little while I'll eat my first meal of the day... which always includes rice as does my 2nd and 3rd. Surprisingly, I don't mind. Meat or fish and cabbage in a broth or served by itself with some veggies (and you guessed it: rice, lol). Although yesterday I had my first American style meal since I arrived, at a bar/restaurant which also has a nice pool table (it's also where I practice). A fine rib-eye, french fries and a salad (and a San Miguel Light). The owner is from Texas. Very expensivo: about $6.

My days are fairly uneventful. After breakfast I drive my Kawasaki 130 downtown, take care of any business or shopping I need to do and spend 1 hour practicing. Then I play with the owner and win anywhere from $2 to $10 which generally pays for my coffee and my pool time with a little left over (he seems to be tiring of this part, lol). This generally takes a while as we play for P100 per game (about $2) and I give him a handicap and being a decent player he wins some. Usually, Maricarl will show up after class and have one of their milkshakes (courtesy of the owner, lol).

Then I go to one of 2 pool halls I frequent and there is always someone wanting to match up. One of the pool halls has 2 tables and the other has 3. Never-the-less there is always a table made available for me and my opponent. My matches are for high stakes and usually my opponent will have a financier or many financiers who pitch in to cover the bets (I am glad for this as I never like someone to risk their own money). No one minds that we claim a table because the matches are generally good entertainment for the onlookers which can be as many as 25 people. The owner of one in particular is happy to see me as he and his wife have a snack area which does a brisk business during my matches. They sell numerous individual cigarettes, narrow bags of ice water, penny candy, small bags of chips and several of their lunch specials (a P30 (70 cents) meal of a broth with chicken, a few vegies and noodles and of course the obligatory rice on the side. I've had it and it's pretty good. In fact, they bring out a plastic chair (no rough wooden benches for the honored guest who has contributed more to the local economy then he has removed, lol) and set up a small fan for me since I'm a “Kano” and not as comfortable with the heat as others. Oh, by the way, "high stakes" represents between $10 and $25.

I bought Maricarl's son his first bike. OMG, he was so excited. I paid the princely some of P1500 ($35) for it new. He took to it like a champ and since the training wheels broke the first day (as did the replacement set) he was forced to learn to ride it for real. On the 4th day we noticed that his slippers (the ubiquitous flip-flops) had a great deal of wear at the toes. Apparently, the breaks had given out and were beyond repair so he was doing the Fred Flintstone thing to stop. I noticed also that the basket had come loose and the screws were missing. Anyway, by the end of one week every moving part (and some that aren't supposed to move) of the bike were unserviceable (including the chain) with no hope for recovery. Well, I exaggerate... the spring loaded trap carrier on the back fender is in fine shape as no one understood it's purpose so it went unused. I have yet to find a replacement that is better manufactured. Man, no wonder American goods are much sought after. However, I have seen and bought some locally made stuff that is top notch. Like the rattan coffee table and chairs for our balcony and the bedside tables which were manufactured locally.

I will return to the States on May 22nd. Visit my mother and probably attend the Hardtimes Summer Jamboree tournament in Sacramento in early June. It's one of my favorites. Not sure how long I'll be in the States but hope to keep it to a month or less.

Finding Your Sweetheart Online

Tips and Strategies for Avoiding Scammers

Cebuanas.com is a good site (there are others) for connecting with women in the Philippines. I know cause that’s how I met Maricarl. However, being a third world country there's not many good economic choices. I'm afraid that people like you and me can be seen as a viable and lucrative opportunity. You have to be very cautious. I chatted with numerous gals who after about a week asked for money for some "emergency." In general, no self-respecting, well raised Filipina would ask for money and it's best to have a simple rule:

Never send money to anyone before meeting them. Cebuanas.com asks that you report any girl that asks. After a period of chatting you might be sorely tempted. That being said, I broke that rule and sent money to Maricarl before we met. My excuse is that we had been video/voice chatting daily for about 2 months and I initiated the discussion about money. It amounted to about $100 to travel to another city, stay over night and apply for a passport the next morning. She was so stunned that I would make that offer that she started to cry.

To get a sense of the economics here, the average middle class family income is about $400 per month. This fact is reflected in the cost of most products and services. For example, I took Maricarl to the dentist (her first time) and she got her teeth cleaned, one cavity filled AND a root canal... peso equivalent of $70. Doctor visits are in the $3 to $5 range. A man I met got a complete physical exam work-up. The package deal included a 3 day stay in the largest, most modern hospital in Manila with every conceivable test including MRI's. 4 specialists administered the tests and read the results with an additional doctor acting as the coordinator: $500 (including the hospital stay!). The tuition for a semester at Silliman University (a fine school where a lot of people come from other countries to attend) in Dumaguete is a little over $700. I mention these things so you will be alert to requests that within your frame of reference may seem reasonable if one should come. A gal I had chatted with for a couple weeks told me she needed Php16,000 (around $350) to take the final exam at her nursing school. She was very convincing. She said her mother spent the money budgeted for it on her cousin who was in the hospital. I told her I'd think about it and immediately emailed the school and asked if such a thing was possible. Nope. The final exam cost was included in the tuition. I bet she never told anyone the name of the school again. Which is not to say that she was actually enrolled, I don't know. The "death" of both parents should raise a red flag as it sets up asking for dough because she "has no one else to turn to." However, Maricarl's parents did both die when she was an adolescent (which made me suspicious and nearly caused me to stop chatting with her).

Getting a tourist visa to the States is sort of the holy grail of visas here. The American Consulate requires many things that an average Filipino doesn't have, like a long standing bank account with a strong deposit history, to own a business and some property. Anything that will help insure that the person has real motivation to return here. Maricarl's cousin has been denied 2 times to attend a family member's wedding. She and her father own a house with a small retail space and a small internet cafe and she was in the last semester of nursing school. I mention this so if someone tells you they can get a visa to come visit you, well, they are either grossly misinformed or setting up a scam to get you to pay for things like "the agency" that will assist her with the visa and ultimately airfare (usually with the same "agency").

The Cebuanas site has a rating system of 1 to 5 stars. Non-paying female members begin with 3 stars. Paying members 4. If there is any questionable stuff or complaints about the girl the admin will downgrade to 1 or 2. If they get caught asking for money they will be downgraded or may be booted if the admin is certain that it's true. Generally, the scammers have multiple accounts and won't pay a membership fee so the 4 and 5 star women are a safer bet but don't rule out the 3 star gals, just be careful. I would avoid the 1 and 2 stars.

If you don't have a web-cam and microphone headset you may want to consider it. Video chatting weeds out the ones that aren't the person pictured in their profile, such as the men pretending to be women (except the gay men who will video chat and can look surprisingly feminine). If they tell you they have no web-cam and can't, be suspicious... there are countless internet cafes and for about a quarter (10 pesos) anyone can get on a computer with a cam for 30 minutes or more. Not very many people here have their own computer (why cafes are so prevalent) and if they tell you they do but can't afford a cam, well it's probably bogus. "It's my cousins computer" is popular, but if cousin can afford a computer and the P1000 ($22) a month for internet access then you can be sure they would have a cam. However, if she's poor, don't expect too much as that same quarter will buy a couple pounds of rice (or several cafe visits to write emails).

The absolutely gorgeous, too good to be true gals are usually photos of Filipino models or up and coming movie actresses. How would we know? You know the look... perfect and light/white skin, coiffed hair, snazzy clothes, professional looking pix, etc. Filipinos as a rule think brown skin is unattractive and go to great lengths to be as white as they can. 95% of the models and actors/actresses are mestizo- half Filipino and half American, European and sometimes Chinese. Really, it's like a national complex and truly a shame that they can't see how beautiful and rich the variety of common skin tones are. Although, it sort of works to our advantage in that very beautiful brown skinned women think that at best they are average looking. They don't have the "I'm so pretty and sexy I should get whatever I want" mindset that I have often found with very attractive women in America. Furthermore, average looking guys like me are very attractive to the women here (the bigger the nose, the better, lol). Maricarl is an example of a beautiful woman (in my opinion) that feels very average. 

Anyway, Cebuanas.com is focused primarily on gals in and around Cebu and the Visayas. This includes the island province of Mindanao which has some areas that aren't safe for foreigners to travel to. Maricarl is from just such a place so I arranged for her (and her family) to take a ferry to Cebu City for us to meet (I did end up going to Mindanao for about a week). Cebu City is as safe as any large American city and safer than some to be sure. Another nice thing about the Cebuanas website is that you can arrange to have flowers delivered to the gal and she will need to pick them up at the office and they will check her out for you. As a paying member, you can also email them for an opinion on any of the women listed on the site. I did this and was given good info but no guarantees.

Now that I've scared you into wondering if it's a good idea at all... here's the upside: The culture here is unique and refreshing. The women pride themselves on caring for their man and they have a super strong commitment to family in general. To me, introducing Maricarl to new things has been a lot of fun. At 26, not only had she never gone to a dentist but she had never taken a hot shower (or been someplace that had hot water). Homes with hot water represents only 2% of all homes. Her first reaction was a scream but by the third day at the hotel she was luxuriating in a hot bathtub. I went out to do some shopping and when I returned 2 hours later, she was still in the tub (napping) with the hot water trickling to keep it up to temp, lol. 

The women do things for their men... I have yet to peel my own shrimp (which are great here), make my coffee, wash a dish or clear the table (she wouldn't like it), do any laundry, make the bed or any other household task. It's nice that I can actually make a real difference in her and her son's life whom I have also come to love. He will start at Silliman's elementary school in June and has his first bike. 

Their personal history is a sad one but she has somehow managed to have a loving rather than a resentful nature and a sense of humor. She is truly grateful for the smallest kindness and really appreciates what I have been able to do for them but doesn't let that interfere with the heart of our relationship. In that regard she is a remarkable person. Maricarl is also very hardheaded compared with the average shy Filipina. She is a true equal in our relationship and I wouldn't have it otherwise but in any given moment I may not like it, lol.  

As I think I mentioned, kindness is valued (and not considered a weakness), as is friendliness and friendship. Considering that people have so little, they are incredibly generous. In general, I have to say that people here are happier than the people in America. Sort of an affirmation that money isn't the key to happiness. Although, having it is pretty handy for sure, lol. People sing all the time (no kidding), laugh easily and don't need much of an excuse to have a party.