Saturday 8 March 2008

Saturday 8th

Well regarding the cricket... which I know you all love....... joking of course, but at least England had a great last session to make the match interesting... I still believe we will lose easily but hope to be wrong.

I am a couch potato at the moment, tonight I watched football which I rarely do, I watched Portsmouth beat Man u which was very enjoyable.... sorry Paul in Skegness !!!

Anne (my big sis) mentioned about how clean the clothes were on the street kids that I showed on my post yesterday, well this is common here and let me educate you on what is the general thing here for lots of young people even here in Manila.

Here in Manila and probably more so in Makati there are 1000's of young girls and boys working in the service areas, mostly assistants in the shops of all the malls here, there are more shops and all sorts of services, hotels have many working for them.
They all only get a 6 month contract because that allows the employers to avoid paying any benefits, so you work for 6 months and if you are lucky you may get another 6 month contract if your face fits. Really scandalous but this is the real world.

All these people need somewhere to live, eat and help their families on a meagre wage, from the many that I have spoken the following description is the norm. They can't afford to rent a house or a flat/condo especially not anywhere near Makati, what they have a lot of here which I have seen many times, is a bedspace to rent, they will rent a bed in a room, if you share with 3 others it is cheaper than renting with only 1 or 2 but all you get is the bedspace which could be a bunkbed.

Now every day I see these young people as I walk around Makati and I know some of them through badminton, they are always immaculately dressed with really well ironed shirts and trousers/dresses, some of them are lucky to have a uniform if they work in the big stores. The main thing is that in reality they have very few clothes but they look after them because they can't afford to buy new whenever they want.

So what you see on the outside doesn't tell the true story, most of them work all day, here in the Phils it's generally 12 hours per day and 6 days per week. They will go home rest and wash/clean/iron any clothes that they may have/need for the next day. They will eat cheaply somewhere probably from the street stalls which we even have here in Makati and they are extremely popular... couldn't touch them myself but I'm lucky. They will then have to sleep in a room with 3 others before doing the same thing the next day. Lots of them have to provide for their families that live in the province so they will not spend 1 pesos on themselves that they don't have to.

They may not have much but what they have they look after, that goes for most of the people that live in the slum areas.
I've seen some lovely well dressed young ladies but when you have a chat, you find out the above mentioned is their situation, if you met them on a regular basis you will see the same clothes every 3rd or 4Th day or some sort of permutation of same.

Nice jeans and clean T shirt is the norm here, sometimes walking through the mall it's like seeing 1000's of clones, long dark hair, white T shirt and tight jeans with a butt to match.

That is your little bit of Filipino education for this evening.

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend.... I am planning trips possibly to Cebu and Baguio. When the summer gets really hot I should really go to Baguio as it is colder there....... we shall see.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Gerard,

Keith didnt think much of England at the weekend, the cricket and the rugby were rubbish, where as the rugby was wonderful for us, nice change. When Keith said that England played badly, I said it wasnt that they played badly it was Scotland played a lot better........

The 6 month contract works here as well, lots of companies only employ for 6 months at a time it saves them paying holidays etc.

When you go to Cebu are you going to Layte as well???

Hope you enjoy the rest of your trip as it's whirling past, a bit like the gales we're having at the moment.

Take care

LOL
Anne xxxxxxxxxxxxx

gerry said...

Hi Anne, I think that it's just you and me on the blog. Maybe I should just email you rather than posting here !!!

I'm not sure if I am going to Cebu yet.. I may. I am not going to Leyte thats a definite.

yes i only have 4 weeks to go !!!!! I'm scared.