Common misconceptions and clichés about life in the Philippines
Old clichés die hard, as the saying goes... and living in the Philippines can generate lots of misconceptions in the eyes of the people.
What are the most common misconceptions about the expat lifestyle in the Philippines?
What are the most common clichés about life in the Philippines in general?
Did you have a biased view of the country before moving there? What is you view now?
Thanks in advance,
Priscilla
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from 18 to 27, that will sacrifice for a little less fun with the older guys.
That is not correct there are many other great things here and that is a
misconception. You can try some local food like lechon and belut., and experience the
local flavor or riding in a traditional jeepney, or see a local museum or zoo.
i never had any problems with acomodation ,i enjoi the culture and the filipino ppl as they are very nice ppl .i must say this how ever i served with the belgian navy for 20 yrs so i'm used of other cultures and in Belgium to many of my frends were from other cultures so for me there has never been a "culture shock"haha.
and i adept quit easy to other ppl as i lived, workt and go in to war often with ppl i knew only short time ,i gues not many ppl are used of such sircomstances .but after 2 yrs i feel safe to say this is now the country i love and belong,and i dont think i wil ever return to europ other than to go on vakation ,the Philippines have been and stil are good to me ,i love it here and i love my Perlie dearly .
Tank you ppl of the Philippines for allowing me to be happy here
greets Dirk
Television and wrong beliefs have shape the thinking of the people. My experience have lead me to believe that many of Filipinos think foreigners are all rich. Mine you rich is a relative term. When a person here (providence) makes $4.00 dollars a day and a foreigner has a monthly income of $1000.00. To them you are richer than they.
Because of this belief we pay more for things that has no fixed price. This is if the foreigner is negotiating the price.
so maibe am just lucky or one just has to be realistick on the fact there are good and less good ppl any were in the world ,i go to the market on my own often and never i felt cheeted as i payed always the same prices as filipino ppl .same thing wen i used a trike or jeepny to get around
up til now i have only nice expieriances here .
one thing amazed me,in 2 yrs+ i have seen no racism or prejudice ,i wish i was able to say the same about my own country but i cant .
greets Dirk
Drive down many Streets, and there seems to be more Sari Sari Stores than Houses.
Of course many Thousands do run succesfull Buisnesses. By hard work over long Hours they are able to support there Families. People such as Market Traders, Farmers, Fishermen, to mention just a few.
There are however. Those that believe running a 'Buisness' is just a matter of sitting
on there Bottoms, telling other People what to do. Especially if this 'Buisness' is financed by some Hapless Foreigner.
Even if the 'Buisness' is at first viable. Within Six Months. The same Buisness will have opened up in at least Seven places in the near vicinity, and the origional One will go quickly Down The Tube.
Enjoy life in the Philippines. It's a Great Country.
But spend your Money. Don't Invest it.
i see electricians plumbers masons and carpenters working and see imediatly they did not have any propper technical education ,those who want me to explain how i see this feel free to ask i wil explain .
i am very technical myself so i see these things and notice many times they just folow what they have been teached by on the job training by ppl who did not get that education themselves ,sad thing ,i think .but also dangerous,if an electrician go from a licht cable to a more heavyer cable this can overload the lihgt cable and start a fire ,just to give 1 example .
so expats who want to invest in a busenis i advise to ceep in charge ,thinking just investing is the thing ,to my opinion are trowing away funds .
a good thing to ceep copy cat oposision away is to make it so that it takes an investment of quit a ,for filipinos ,large sum so without sufficiant funds one dos not have to fear those compeeting competition and one can start a good busenis .
ofcorse the secret is to know what the niece in the market isss hahaha.
i have been thinking on such an endevour , but , i am stil contemplating on ,do i need this ;not realy -
do i want to invest a large piece of my time in such an adventure ;wel ,it woold ceep my busy -
can i ever leave the busenis in other than my own hands ; this is a hard one to answer .it wood depend on if i find a person who i can trust to folow my rules and be ruthles enoughf to fyer ppl if needed .
there are some other considerations to to this desision haha,but am reyerd and i got all the time in the world to make them .
to many ppl make such desisions very lightly and later regret them .walking over one night ice is taking a serious risk he
greets Dirk
Since I am not working any more, our life goes up and down and my lovely wife is often doing miracles for us to survive. We have also unbelievable friends and they helps us whenever they can. We help them too when possible.
I think that within my 7 years here, I am learning more and more - not to criticise and not to judge anyone, especially locals. We, foreigners, are guests here!
So what I am saying is their is no pride in their building work and at all stages of a build corners will be cut to pocket money that would have bought say a decent electrical cable instead of a burn out copy and fuse box.
Maybe that's why you can get a house built at one fifth or less of the price of the west its just not anywhere near the same build.
From an architects mouth here " they done care" as she took the money and produced a poor outcome ironic isn't it.
Its a great place for a tourist holiday but challenging at times to exist residing as an ex-pat when your spending they all want some almost mercenary in construction. Maybe half get lucky the other half get ripped off.
Moonshine Star. wrote:Mentioning skill sets for building houses well they do not exist apart from banging a tin roof on top of hollow blocks with no concrete content that crumble when dry. If your not around they will throw a wall up with substandard materials and plaster over the mess. Plumbing is a joke they forget to glue joints and a two year trained plumber couldn't install a water gauge without it leaking. The icing on the cake comes to mind..what's inside maybe you will never know. A good tip with building a house make the corner and supporting posts at least 25cm by 25cmit might hold the roof up then. Excuses abound and it'll get done after is a common phrase. Its the worst place in the world for passing the buck.
So what I am saying is their is no pride in their building work and at all stages of a build corners will be cut to pocket money that would have bought say a decent electrical cable instead of a burn out copy and fuse box.
Maybe that's why you can get a house built at one fifth or less of the price of the west its just not anywhere near the same build.
From an architects mouth here " they done care" as she took the money and produced a poor outcome ironic isn't it.
Its a great place for a tourist holiday but challenging at times to exist residing as an ex-pat when your spending they all want some almost mercenary in construction. Maybe half get lucky the other half get ripped off.
i agree on the fact house construction is not up to western standart.but,i do not blame the ppl as i am convinced the lack of good technical education is to blame .i had long conversations with ppl working in the sector and i observed there working skils ,one of the things that struckt me was the way they had to work bekorse lack of tools and knolidge .
those i spoke to had pride in there job but just did not had the so needed education .
in Belgium carpenters masons electricians plumbers and so on all have 4 yrs of technical education on there desired job.all those i spoke to had only on the job training by ppl who were trained on the job themselves . so ofcorse they dont have any idea about structural strenght or how to calculate wich electrik cable to use for wich tension of power .here technical education is ondevelopt .
so please do not blame the workers who work so hard for a very small pay .
it is up to the goverment to better the education wich will better the ppls future.
wen i build or house i wil not use a contraktor that's for sure . i wil hire workers and supervise all the work and do a lot of it myself togetter with them.so later i will not be able to complain about corupt contractors or substandard quality ,the only one who i will be able to complain about will be me.
greets Dirk
excuse my bad spelling i never had education in englis, i do hope i get understood do,lol.
i've met a very nice filipina online and hope to meet up with her there soon. I'm honestly hoping to take advantage of costs and that's my priority for living there. I'm on sociail security for my income now solely. After too divorces here in the states i have little left to show lol. I'm giving up a lot here by moving since I'll be taking virtually only the shirt on my back when i arrive.
So ya i'm definately not a rich foreigner.
I appreciate everyone's comments here and trying to soak up as much knowledge as I can before i depart.
To Dirk. you go man! your english is fine my first language is english and i have difficulty spelling my self
My gf there maybe gets nose bleed coz she doesn'[t speake english well but we communicate fine. Her father only speaks bisaya her native language so ya there will be culture language differences but I'm excited to go there learn their culture language and start my life over in what i think is a country of freindly people. sure there are good and bad on both sides. here in the states youj never know if youj go to macdonalds someone may come with a gun and blow everyone away.
and scammers abound here in the states. some of it by what they deem as leagal bribery by lobbyists in congress so who is setting agood example here?
I enjoy the forums here and hope to post my experiences of my life there when i arrive
everyone have a great day and again thanks for the interesting topic and posts
danish12 wrote:HI guys, enjoyed reading your posts. Would it be a good idea to invest in the stock market over there.
If you have to ask us, then no.
Rich people do not live in the Philippines and even rich Filipinos move overseas to invest in property that's a good yardstick.
I must agree with you 100%. From what i have seen, what the workers produce, with the few tools they have is quite amazing. They have no training....it is so obvious, but they blunder through, and somehow get the job done. It may not be to a standard that we are used to, but it is done.
Training and education is the only way forward.
Peter
Our house was built by a local contractor. The owner is himself a qualified Engineer.
The Company don't just build Houses. Also Sports halls, Sea walls and other large Projects.
He employs a competent Architect. Who produced all necessary Drawings, and even a Computer Graphic of how the House would look.
We had a Fixed Price. With a Payment Schedule, with payments due after certain parts of the project were finished. A full list, and costing of all materials used.
The Roof is a welded Steel structure. But of course the walls are Hollow Block, backfilled with Steel, and Cement.
We were not happy with the standard of Two large windows at the front of the House. The Contractor replaced them without arguement, and no cost.
Apart from the Windows, and we have now lived here Three Years, we haven't had any other complaint. This is not always the case with Houses built in Europe.
Maybe we were lucky? We dont live in a large City, but a small Visayan town.
One small point. House Contracts here dont seem to include Ceilings. These we had to
pay extra for, and I have seen other New Houses with the same problem.
Deca 2015 wrote:Sorry to say but I have seen racism but not from The Filipino people but mainly from A few Americans against the Filipinos, don't get me wrong most US guys are ok but I have encountered some pretty nasty guys who are not nice to know . From the locals I just get " Heh Joe" but when I reply they are confused not being American
Deca,
Just to clarify, there is expat trash here from around the world and unfortunately they get the attention while the majority just want to live peacefully with the Philippine people and their culture.
Those who love to bash the Philippines may not necessarily be racist but have in all likelihood never been happy with either themselves or their surroundings, they are simply miserable people. We avoid them like the plague they are and embrace the beauty of our home and the good people we call family and friends.
TeeJay
- Foreigners are assumed by locals as having lots of money. And that if they're married to a Filipino woman, she only married him for money or to be able to go abroad.
My assistant's teenage daughter said at one time that she would like to marry a foreigner so that she could start a business and build a big house. My assistant explained to her daughter that the business was established and partially funded by my parents, and that the house was built with "ma'am's hard work, business savvy, and profits from the business which sir has no interest in managing."
One of my clients instantly thought that I was an illegal in the US, and that I married my husband to legally stay there, when in actuality, we were both US citizens even before we met. I think she still doesn't believe what I told her.
- Foreigners are assumed to be rude, that most of them have a habit of belittling Filipinos, which is why they are looked upon by some locals with disdain.
When my husband complained at the subdivision's clubhouse, the admin there told me that they heard him say an invective, and "only in the Philippines . . . blah blah blah" which my husband denies. (He's done this before.) So, when one of my foreigner neighbors complained about something at the clubhouse, he got in an argument with one of the board of directors, which almost resulted in a fist fight. He said that some of the staff's reaction was due to their experience with my husband.
Cliches about life in the Philippines:
- You can live like a king with just US$1000.
"Like a king": NO. "Live": Yes, but this word has a lot of qualifiers. I think it means you can afford to retire here on a US$1000 from SS or a retirement fund (which you may not be able to do in your own country) if you can adapt and live a simple life.
- That in the entire Philippines, there's a high probability that you will have to evacuate from your home due to a typhoon like Ondoy and that there's high risk of getting kidnapped .
My sister-in-law called and asked us, after Ondoy hit Metro Manila, if we have an inflatable raft. Haha. My mother-in-law's general view of the Philippines after her visit here: peaceful and a place to get cheap massages, haircuts, facials and other beauty treatments. The risk of being kidnapped is mostly in southern Philippines. So, avoid setting foot on certain areas.
- The biggest discomfort you'll have will be the hot and humid weather.
In my opinion, it would be the really bad traffic (which some might have already expected before moving here). And also being stared at like you have a physical disorder, when you're out taking a stroll, like at a mall.
You might think it's rude of Filipinos to stare, but they just sometimes can't avoid it. Imagine going to a fine dining restaurant with a big hat as the one in "Cat-in-the-Hat," or wearing a tuxedo, like the one Tom Hanks wore in the movie Big, and pink-dyed hair in your company's formal dinner party. In a land where most men are 5'6" or shorter and have medium-toned brown skin, you will stick out like a sore thumb. To stare at you would be a natural reaction.
This may be the case if you want to live as many of the locals do. If you want to live a life style you had in Australia (air conditioner, western style food, etc), when then you may well be better off staying in Australia and holidaying in the Philippines.
we have muslim relatives who deeply regret the fanatics problem,we love to visit them they have the same pinoy hospitality as others have and we always feel welkome ,it is prestine snorkling there as they never used dinamite fishing.the other muslims living there also are very nice ppl ,what shows it is not there faith wich is the problem .
other expats here to live simular life style and as far as i know they to feel no problem living here.
and as far as the food is consurn ,wen i cook it is westernised style pinoy food hehehe,and our visiting family love itt.
for the moment ER is the only supermarket here but next to the public market NCCCis building a big supermarket so i gues in the future more inported products will be availebol ,so that's great.
greets Dirk
Moonshine Star. wrote:Mentioning skill sets for building houses well they do not exist apart from banging a tin roof on top of hollow blocks with no concrete content that crumble when dry. If your not around they will throw a wall up with substandard materials and plaster over the mess. Plumbing is a joke they forget to glue joints and a two year trained plumber couldn't install a water gauge without it leaking. The icing on the cake comes to mind..what's inside maybe you will never know. A good tip with building a house make the corner and supporting posts at least 25cm by 25cmit might hold the roof up then. Excuses abound and it'll get done after is a common phrase. Its the worst place in the world for passing the buck.
So what I am saying is their is no pride in their building work and at all stages of a build corners will be cut to pocket money that would have bought say a decent electrical cable instead of a burn out copy and fuse box.
Maybe that's why you can get a house built at one fifth or less of the price of the west its just not anywhere near the same build.
From an architects mouth here " they done care" as she took the money and produced a poor outcome ironic isn't it.
Its a great place for a tourist holiday but challenging at times to exist residing as an ex-pat when your spending they all want some almost mercenary in construction. Maybe half get lucky the other half get ripped off.
The hollow blocks are porous for a reason. Here's the methodology behind it:
1. The hollow blocks are basically forms or molds if you will, to maintain a uniform structure. The first rows of blocks are put in place and the hollow parts are placed with reinforcing bars (rebars).
2. Wet concrete is added into the hollow parts. This basically turns the hollow parts as columns, since they have a reinforcing element and concrete. The wet concrete is soaked up by the porous hollow blocks from the inside out, which acts as a sponge. This is done row by row. 6 hollow block height per day is generally done in construction by the laborers. This is so that the compression due to weight would not weaken the lower parts while concrete is treating.
3. a finishing layer is added, again as wet concrete. The outer parts of the hollow blocks again sponges up the finer concrete from the outside in.
We may not do it the american way, but get a sledgehammer and try to bust a filipino wall. The rebars alone will be sufficient to stop your advance hahaha. In a study done in my materials engineering class, we found this method to be sturdier than traditional western wall building where there are no reinforcing iron bars in each hole.
A testament to this is how our walls stay up when a 7.8 quake strikes, and buildings topple in san francisco over a 6.9 quake. A 7.8 quake is 10x stronger than a 6.8 magnitude, by the way.
Its common for foreigners to complain when watching the job being done because they are not used to it being done in that way. But you cant argue with the end result. Look around you, lots of buildings around despite experiencing atleast one strong quake a year.
I hope this information is useful to you and to other expats planning to build in our country. Cheers!
The system of putting up a business here is very hard and confusing in most cases. You need a lot of money before you can put up a business. Lucky on my side, I met a friend who introduced me into a perfume business. I am enjoying it. PM me if interested for more details.
For those expats dreaming to come to Philippines in search of work, I will advice them to be extra careful because the Philippines is having good graduates. This makes it hard to find job here. Managers won't risk employing foreigners because the salary will be too high therefore they prefer to employ locals. There are many opportunities in the BPO for French, Japanese, Chinese speaking expats.
You can never own the land & its much simpler to rent, safer and cheaper.
If you met a woman in your own country would you give her the deeds to the property?
James Mitchel wrote:I do agree if done right the walls & floor remain. But how do they get away with so few rafters & cross beams or 2x4s to keep the thin sheet metal roofs on? Or after every typhoon are you to go out. recover your roof. Weave it into your barbed wire fence & use it to keep the neighbors pigs out of your garden. Then just replace it with a new roof.
They only get away with it if you let them get away with it. My advice?
1. If you have sufficient knowledge in construction: Pay them above the minimum wage (rightfully so) so they will not have any reason to rip you off. And lay out a proper floor and construction plan with all specifications and also in the right format. You will be amazed at how well these "uneducated" laborers are at reading floor plans. They are engineers in their own rights by experience hahahaha. Get help from someone fluent in both your languages to better convey your ideas and information to these laborers.
2. And if you can't do these yourself: Get a civil engineer to supervise the job. Foremen are usually the ones that rip you off, but engineers will not since they can have their licenses revoked for this. Negotiate a fixed price for supervision, consultation and possible design changes. You might have to hire laborers yourself, but if you find the right engineer, he will have contacts with him.
3. If you have the money, get an architect instead. Architects, by law, require you to pay 10% of your fixed total project cost as a professional fee. Give them a fixed price, consult for design ideology and conceptualization, and leave the rest to them. They will hire the laborers, buy the materials, and consult with their own engineers. All you have to do is pay up, see his design renders (and small scale models if you want hahahaha, they will make these if you agree to the 10% project cost price) and sit back and wait. It will be expensive, but in my opinion, architects will make the best work.
If you come to the point where your house is not getting enough rafters and is using a substandard galvanized iron sheet, its because you might not be investing enough. Not investing enough cash, or more importantly, not investing enough work into it.
Yes as foreigners we are considered rich and that should not surprise anyone of us. Not because Filipinos do not know that not everyone is rich (they do know that better than anyone) but because of the way we behave when we first come here or in the years to follow since most are coming and staying with the belief it is a cheap country to live in....which is not!!!
They consider every white guy "American".... US people consider every south American as Mexican at first glance and when he tells them Guatemalan some reply where in Mexico is that...and same goes for Europeans on other immigrants and so on...so where is the surprise?
Construction standards? Simple, you get what you pay for. Everything exists and everything can be done, for a price. Now if you want with 20k$ to build a 50m2 house with all the modern amenities, best materials, skilled workers and amazing engineer and architect....good luck!!!! If you try to judge the materials placed...what do you know about these materials in this country? what qualities are made, where they are made, original pricing etc..you will only end up frustrated, express your frustrations to your workers with your imported way of saying things, piss them off too and get the entire thing become more difficult for everyone and on the end you will be the one resulting with a product you do not like.
Foreigners rude, yes we are to the Filipino's standards of conduct. We are used to different ways of talking/interacting with people and to this culture sounds rude. Is it the Filipino's fault? it's their own country and customs...get used to their ways so to get along better.
You cannot make money on land or real estate? Wrong, it is real estate, it all depends where and what. It is ruled under the real estate marketing laws and the country's specific ones. I sold on 2016 a land I bought 13 years ago for 5 times the price I bought it without spending a dime on it to upgrade it or so. I also bought another one back then and today I cannot even get my money back. Some you loose some you win, depends on your decisions.
Businesses for foreigners here? It is a developing country, the word by its self should testify that opportunities are plenty. Now if you think you will invest 20-30-40-50k$ and you will spend the rest of your life in a sofa drinking beers and enjoy the sites...yes in the best given case will be the sofa of the welfare house in your country and as for the beer it will be drunk from the ones who took advantage of your investment. Opening a store or so called business is usually creating a job for your self.
Finding a job to work here...first of all most if not all of the jobs are not allowed to foreigners. Not unless you have an online business or working as an executive for an international firm.....forget about it.
I can write endless stories, the facts are simple though. Philippines is not a western country neither an Asian country, it is what it is, Philippines. The geography of it does assumes some similarities to South East Asian countries but the history of it have made it to a unique country of it's own.
It is not a place for everyone, there are no middle feelings on it, you either love or hate it. Stay or go.
Enjoy life everyone!!!!
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