Seeing as how it is December 11th, and I haven't booked a flight home to the Philippines, I will be spending the Holiday Season here in the States. When I was younger I used to imagine that people in New York became gentler and kinder at this time of year. I love cold weather and although I am a Jew who doesn't give a flying fuck about a pagan solstice celebration wrapped in hypocritical Christian trappings I do confess to being quite partial to Xmas lights, especially the very small bulbs in pastel colours.
Of course my not returning to the Philippines means that I will not be able to join Mariz and her family on their big trip to Bataan Province to meet both sides of her extended family. Mariz's father, the pastor, is especially upset because he has been trying to chat me up about buying a house in their ancestral village. Bataan is only an hour and a half north of Metro Manila. As such real estate is extremely expencive. Her father tried to talk to me about buying a lot for P3 Million ($66,000) for a half a hectare (less than an acre). Compared to Mindanao it is a fortune and a half. Failing to kindle my interest he has now zeroed in on a 400 square meters lot and simple block house for P1 Million ($22,000). Never mind that Inot even sure about a future with Mariz, let alone shacking up with her parents and siblings- because that IS why the pastor is so keen on chatting about real estate- but I need at least 2 hectares.
IF I ever leave Mindanao I aim to build a commercial hog farm, or in Filipino English, a "piggery," with a smaller goat operation. Land in Bataan is out of the question. I mentioned Palawan to the pastor since the family had spent 4 years there, leaving in 2005. Palawan is a very long island that lies between Luzon, the island upon which Manila sits, and Mainland Malaysia. The offshore islands off the southern tip are Muslim but the populated environs on Palawan proper are dominated by Mariz's ethnicity, Tagalogs. Palawan is what Mindanao was say 30 years ago. Much of it is uncharted. There are conceivably uncontacted tribes in the interior rainforests apart from stone aged tribes already known to outsiders.
The huge advantage over Mindanao is that there is no insurgencies to deal with. The NPA, or New People's Army as the Maoists are known, barely supports a single "Front" (30 guerilla regulars) on the entire island. On the downside is it is rife with a form of malaria that kills within a month in many cases. I take anti-malarials on Mindanao but the island only has the chronic forms, not that carrying that shit for a year and a half is any less painful, just that you will probably not be killed by it.
Speaking of Mindanao, aside from the endemic violence which is now through the roof as the country gears up for elections in May of 2013, the island was broadsided by a typhoon last week that killed at least 1,200. It is interesting that I was able to witness Americans shitting on themselves over Hurricane Sandy. A woman on Staten Island (1 of New York City's 5 boros) tried- stupidly- to drive to Brooklyn to double up with her mum as that storm made landfall. With her 2 toddlers strapped into car seats she drove into a flooded street and the car's engine died. Grabbing her children this dummy then tried to look for some help. Sadly flood waters overcame her and first one child and then the other were swept away and drowned. This tragedy inspired President Obama to gran some photo opportunities as he hugged her and consoled her. Actually he should have had her hogtied and whipped for being so fucking negligent but that is America for you.
Seeing how Americans flip out when anything mildly threatens their luxurious day to day existence I can only shrug my shoulders as I think about a platoon from the 66IB on Mindanao being buried under tonnes of mud as they embarked on a search and rescue mission trying to assist the thousands of injured civiliains in ComVal (Compostela Valley Province). Imagine if an American National Guard platoon was wiped out during Hurricane Sandy? Life is very cheap if you aren't white. THAT is the truth of the matter.
Some readers may recall how we lent our heavy equipment during a mud slide last year. The platoon was killed on the next ridge. I never posted about it but yet another mud slide took place there in between the one I DID write about and this current incident. People are so hungry for gold that they tunnel through ridges like termites and end up weakening literally kilometers of denuded slopes. Each time one of those ridhges slide dozens die.
It is strange that a typhoon even touched Mindanao but downright bizarre that it was the 2nd one to do so this season. Both have been catastrophic. Mindanao is subject to just about any fucked up thing you could imagine: volcanoes, tsunamis, earthquakes scoring at least 5 on the Richter at least once each month, malaria, Dengue, cholera, even fucken Ebola! It has 7 insurgencies, rampant kidnapping, narco-terrorism, political violence, yada, yada and fucken yada. One thing it has heretofore been exempt from though has been typhoons since it sits well out of the typhoon belt. Guess weather patterns are shifting radically though I don't neccessarily suscribe to the "Global Warming" hypothesis. I'm still considering that issue.
Whatever the reason, people on Mindanao are suffering once again. Most of the Philippines knows nothing about the island but this latest typhoon has put it in the forefront of Filipino consciousness. Mariz, bless her heart, was in tears seeing a little boy orphaned AND crippled by the storm. In the Philippines, where you cannot see a doctor without cash up front, he is destined for a horrid existence. Mariz went up a notch in my estimation when she said that she wanted to adopt a child like that. Adoption is extremely rare in the country with most people ignoring children in need. You see people spitting on homeless children as they huff Rugby (rubber cement) on street corners.
Of course my not returning to the Philippines means that I will not be able to join Mariz and her family on their big trip to Bataan Province to meet both sides of her extended family. Mariz's father, the pastor, is especially upset because he has been trying to chat me up about buying a house in their ancestral village. Bataan is only an hour and a half north of Metro Manila. As such real estate is extremely expencive. Her father tried to talk to me about buying a lot for P3 Million ($66,000) for a half a hectare (less than an acre). Compared to Mindanao it is a fortune and a half. Failing to kindle my interest he has now zeroed in on a 400 square meters lot and simple block house for P1 Million ($22,000). Never mind that Inot even sure about a future with Mariz, let alone shacking up with her parents and siblings- because that IS why the pastor is so keen on chatting about real estate- but I need at least 2 hectares.
IF I ever leave Mindanao I aim to build a commercial hog farm, or in Filipino English, a "piggery," with a smaller goat operation. Land in Bataan is out of the question. I mentioned Palawan to the pastor since the family had spent 4 years there, leaving in 2005. Palawan is a very long island that lies between Luzon, the island upon which Manila sits, and Mainland Malaysia. The offshore islands off the southern tip are Muslim but the populated environs on Palawan proper are dominated by Mariz's ethnicity, Tagalogs. Palawan is what Mindanao was say 30 years ago. Much of it is uncharted. There are conceivably uncontacted tribes in the interior rainforests apart from stone aged tribes already known to outsiders.
The huge advantage over Mindanao is that there is no insurgencies to deal with. The NPA, or New People's Army as the Maoists are known, barely supports a single "Front" (30 guerilla regulars) on the entire island. On the downside is it is rife with a form of malaria that kills within a month in many cases. I take anti-malarials on Mindanao but the island only has the chronic forms, not that carrying that shit for a year and a half is any less painful, just that you will probably not be killed by it.
Speaking of Mindanao, aside from the endemic violence which is now through the roof as the country gears up for elections in May of 2013, the island was broadsided by a typhoon last week that killed at least 1,200. It is interesting that I was able to witness Americans shitting on themselves over Hurricane Sandy. A woman on Staten Island (1 of New York City's 5 boros) tried- stupidly- to drive to Brooklyn to double up with her mum as that storm made landfall. With her 2 toddlers strapped into car seats she drove into a flooded street and the car's engine died. Grabbing her children this dummy then tried to look for some help. Sadly flood waters overcame her and first one child and then the other were swept away and drowned. This tragedy inspired President Obama to gran some photo opportunities as he hugged her and consoled her. Actually he should have had her hogtied and whipped for being so fucking negligent but that is America for you.
Seeing how Americans flip out when anything mildly threatens their luxurious day to day existence I can only shrug my shoulders as I think about a platoon from the 66IB on Mindanao being buried under tonnes of mud as they embarked on a search and rescue mission trying to assist the thousands of injured civiliains in ComVal (Compostela Valley Province). Imagine if an American National Guard platoon was wiped out during Hurricane Sandy? Life is very cheap if you aren't white. THAT is the truth of the matter.
Some readers may recall how we lent our heavy equipment during a mud slide last year. The platoon was killed on the next ridge. I never posted about it but yet another mud slide took place there in between the one I DID write about and this current incident. People are so hungry for gold that they tunnel through ridges like termites and end up weakening literally kilometers of denuded slopes. Each time one of those ridhges slide dozens die.
It is strange that a typhoon even touched Mindanao but downright bizarre that it was the 2nd one to do so this season. Both have been catastrophic. Mindanao is subject to just about any fucked up thing you could imagine: volcanoes, tsunamis, earthquakes scoring at least 5 on the Richter at least once each month, malaria, Dengue, cholera, even fucken Ebola! It has 7 insurgencies, rampant kidnapping, narco-terrorism, political violence, yada, yada and fucken yada. One thing it has heretofore been exempt from though has been typhoons since it sits well out of the typhoon belt. Guess weather patterns are shifting radically though I don't neccessarily suscribe to the "Global Warming" hypothesis. I'm still considering that issue.
Whatever the reason, people on Mindanao are suffering once again. Most of the Philippines knows nothing about the island but this latest typhoon has put it in the forefront of Filipino consciousness. Mariz, bless her heart, was in tears seeing a little boy orphaned AND crippled by the storm. In the Philippines, where you cannot see a doctor without cash up front, he is destined for a horrid existence. Mariz went up a notch in my estimation when she said that she wanted to adopt a child like that. Adoption is extremely rare in the country with most people ignoring children in need. You see people spitting on homeless children as they huff Rugby (rubber cement) on street corners.