by Rosario Buenaflor

Created on: April 15, 2011

The Philippines has wild and remote areas rarely seen by anyone that to explore and experience them safely, you would need to follow specific precautions and to know some local knowledge.  Along with wilderness, there are also bustling cities with bumper to bumper traffic, that as a tourist, you cannot avoid as airports are usually situated in cities or near it.  In a city such as Manila and Cebu, there would be thousands of people all around you at its busiest time and place.  When you’re up and about, you may see things that are done very differently to how you imagine them to be.  Some of them won’t make sense to you, yet for the locals - this is the only way that they will do it.  The Filipinos may understand and speak English fairly well, but there will be times when the only thing you recognize is the sky above you, everything else may seem totally strange to you.  It can be an overwhelmingly disorienting and lonely experience, indeed.

Whether you like high adventure or just a quiet, relaxing time lying on a peaceful beach, you will be meeting the locals - the smiling Filipinos, as they are often called.  Yes, just Filipinos, not counting the tourists, that is.  Not many people from other parts of the world are choosing to live in this country mainly because of economic reasons; if you see any, they would be people who have established local businesses; there’s hardly anyone from overseas working here, as unemployment is very high, thus working overseas is a popular thing to do for many citizens.  This landscape is very different from other multicultural societies like USA and Australia, and certain wealthy countries in Asia & Europe, where you see people from all parts of the world living and working together side by side.  One of the ways that illustrate this situation is by the fact that Filipinos refer to tourists and visitors as “foreigners”.  If you have Filipino features, then this eases a bit.  For very simplistic and materialistic reasons, Filipinos usually look up to visitors especially if they look Anglo-Saxon, American or generally, just those who come from rich countries.  This is definitely one of Filipinos’ worst qualities.  

Yes, money can buy comfort and convenience.  In the Philippines, though, comforts and conveniences that we would usually associate in the form of government-provided facilities and infrastructure, are often

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