Makati City, Philippines

[slang]

There are two complaints with the garden:

1. There is stagnet water throughout in ponds that are a haven for mosquitos.

2. There are people sleeping on the railings of the pavilions, setting up cardboard shantys and appearing as this is their mailing address.


On the upside, those that were there seemed in good enough spirits to smile when we walked around and there were some people reading books and magazines.

If one had a five gallon pail of chlorine and were to give each of the 5 or 6 ponds a little dash of it here and there, it might improve the overal enjoyment of coming to visit.

There are also some interesting looking ( Chinese ) pavilions and the walkways are brick or cobblestone instead of just some poured concrete path.

[slang]

Many of my daily pictures are of traffic and different looking things that I see.

Sometimes those different looking things are cars that are not seen in the US and sometimes they are cars normally seen in the US but not often here.

This is a very bad shot of a vette that zipped by before I could adjust the camera for an action shot.

There may be a lot of Vettes here but I've not seen them with my own eyes very often.

[slang]

Someone explained to me today that the nicer looking Jeepneys often have sealed windows instead of being open to the outside or having plastic over them.

The nicer looking ones like this have AC, so they cost a bit more, are a bit fancier, etc, etc.

When we get into one, you can be sure that there will be photos here of it from the inside.

[slang]

Here are some night shots from the lineup for the taxi at the Glorietta Mall.

This mall is not nearly as big as many here. The only reason that we ended up here was to go to a specialty shop that is not at other malls.

There are booths you may call them, simple displays with goods on them. Most of them are women's items or cell phone accessories.

As you pass ( if you are a white man ) the girls say hello and then politely say what they have there, as if you could not recognize the items by simply looking at them.

It's ok at first but it gets old after a while.

Example:

Hello Sir, Maam...gold watches?
Hello Sir, Maam...Handbags?
Hello Sir, Maam...shoes?
Hello Sir, Maam...gold rings?
Hello Sir, Maam...high capacity Glock mags?


Ok, so I made that last one up. It's absolutely true about the other items though.

It's only when I go with my wife that they seem so friendly too.

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There are normally "security" officers outside that write the name and the number of the taxi on a form for you as they guide you into a cab.

This gives the passenger some reassurance that the driver will not be a complete ass during the trip.

Tonight the security people were not only writing the cab info on the form to give to the passengers as they entered the taxi, they were also taking pictures of them getting in.

I had seriously hoped to get a picture of the security gaurd taking our picture but they stopped just before we stepped up the the head of the line

[slang]

Billboards from the EDSA highway

[slang]

Ok, this is out of the car window but what the hell. Here it is.

This is a spanking new Chevy Suburban. What's the big deal? They sell for $75k here. In a country where the median yearly salary is $1400.

Take a look at some other prices on American cars here.

The prices listed may not be competetive but that's all I have to go on.

The stupidass stuffed animals on the dash are not mine Zippy.

[slang]

Here's something a bit different.

There's a joke for drivers. When it's lunch or dinner time they warn each other to stickly follow all the rules.

This is what one of the passengers in a car might say to the driver.

"Hey Slow down you jackass! It's lunchtime...don't you know!?"

The complete meaning of this "joke" has completely bypassed me until a few days ago.

There were 5 of us in a Kia Adventure on EDSA, I was in the front, a pinoy was driving.

We were in traffic that slowed down and the driver merged into the right hand lane to avoid the traffic jam. He very purposely merged out of the traffic and into a split in the highway to take a different route.

A police officer ran out into the highway to halt the car. It was 12:20 pm.

The driver yelled, "Oh Fuck!! It's lunchtime!"

Whatever.

He pulls the car over. The officer comes to the window.

Liscence, registration.

I was thinking to myself, what is the problem here but activated my STFU button for the duration of the "traffic stop".

The officer takes the L and R....comes back....speaks Tagalog for about 5 minutes with the other passengers.

His citation pad is out....he's writing something and speaking in a more serious tone in Tagalog.

I see the driver hand over a P500 note which the officer quickly crumples into his hand.

Then the officer says....OK, I've giving you a warning this time. I have to go eat lunch now.

Not really. Not about saying that he has to go to lunch. That is the only part that didnt happen.

He didnt need to say "I have to go eat lunch with your money for a warning, for an offense that you didnt commit"

I just laughed out loud.

I told the driver in all my miles on the road in the US not one single time has anything like that ever happened to me. That in all the backwoods billy-bob states and counties, in the north, south, east and west not one time has that happened to me and that I was truly a bit skeptical that it does happen here.

He laughed with me for a second or two.

"How do you know how much to give?" I asked.

He said normally he gives P100 but no one had any smaller bills today.

So now whenever we drive around, I make sure to have a few hundred peso notes.

With a "rich" white guy in the front seat, this will surely happen again.

At about 4 o'clock, just by coincidence I'm sure, we saw 2 other motorists buying the police dinner.